Recently, law enforcement officers reported the exposure of a corruption scheme that allowed men of conscription age to avoid mobilisation and travel outside Ukraine. The scheme involved judges in the Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi City District Court of Odesa Oblast, including Oleksandr Boyarskyi. Slidstvo.Info journalists found that his relatives became owners of expensive real estate in 2023 worth more than $500,000. According to the declarations, the judge does not have his own home or car.
On 9 January, the NABU served Oleksandr Boyarskyi, a judge of the Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi City District Court in Odesa Oblast, with a bribery notice. Law enforcement officials believe that Boyarskyi asked for $1,500 for issuing the “necessary decision” in the case of depriving a mother of parental rights in favour of a man of military age.
Law enforcement officials believe that Judge Boyarskyi is involved in a large-scale corruption scheme that allowed men of military age to avoid mobilisation and travel outside Ukraine. This scheme involved issuing court decisions to establish the place of residence of a minor child with the father, so that he could use such a decision as a basis for travelling abroad with the child.
During 2022-2023, the number of such cases increased among all courts in Ukraine, but only the Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi City District Court of Odesa Oblast considered the most cases. Law enforcement officials speak of more than 1,000 decisions.
Local media call Oleksandr Boyarskyi a millionaire judge. His declaration for 2022 shows that he has $72,075, €45,962 and UAH 2,955,223 in his accounts.
Judge Oleksandr Boyarskyi / Photo: 368.media
Oleksandr Boyarskyi is only involved in judging and teaching at the university and does not have any business. Only his relatives — Zoya Boyarska, Volodymyr Boyarskyi and Anna Boyarska — are entrepreneurs in Boyarskyi’s family. They own a lot of real estate in Odesa and the region, which they rent out.
Judge Boyarskyi declares that he uses the apartment owned by Zoya Boyarska free of charge. The declarations also indicate that the judge uses a car and an apartment belonging to Hanna Boyarska free of charge.
Hanna and Volodymyr also appear in the judge’s declarations, for example, they give the judge money. In 2021, Hanna and Volodymyr gave Boyarskyi UAH 268 thousand, and in 2020 — UAH 300 thousand.
In 2023, Hanna Boyarska was presented with 5 apartments in the Aqua Marine residential complex. On the Internet, prices per square metre in this residential complex range from $700 to $1,400. The total area of the apartments owned by Anna is almost 322 square metres. This means that, according to conservative estimates, Anna Boyarska received real estate worth $225,000 as a gift in 2023.
Volodymyr Boyarskyi also received expensive property in 2023. He purchased three land plots near Odesa. According to the State Service of Ukraine for Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre, their value is almost UAH 10 million (about USD 264 thousand). He also became the owner of two apartments in Odesa with a total area of 106.2 square metres.
Slidstvo.Info journalists called Judge Oleksandr Boyarskyi to find out how his relatives could afford to buy new property in 2023, but he refused to talk to the journalists.
On 12 January, the High Council of Justice allowed Oleksandr Boyarskyi to be detained. Boyarskyi himself was not present at the High Council of Justice meeting, as he explained, he was ill.
As a reminder, NGL.media journalists recently discovered that during the large-scale war, the number of cases in Ukrainian courts where a man was deprived of parental rights to their common child increased dramatically. Most of these cases were fictitious and were needed only to register the child’s place of residence at the man’s home. In this way, men tried to avoid mobilisation and went abroad.
In 2022, 859 men received decisions on cohabitation and child support in their favour, and in 2023, 2,708 such decisions were recorded in Ukrainian courts.
The journalists found that 30% of such decisions were made by the Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi City District Court of the Odesa Oblast Court. Almost all of these decisions were made by only four judges of this court — Oleksandr Boyarskyi (364), Serhii Savytskyi (312), Valentyn Zaveriukha (124) and Yuliia Shevchuk (30).
