Bureau of Economic Security: Case of embezzlement of funds during infrastructure repairs at the Odesa port referred to court

The Bureau of Economic Security has completed the investigation into the case of embezzlement of funds during the repair of the railway infrastructure of the Odesa port – the losses amount to almost 5 million UAH.

This was reported by the Territorial Department of the Bureau of Economic Security in the Odesa region.

According to the BEB, in 2023, the founder of a private company, together with the director of a controlled company and officials of the Odesa branch of the State Enterprise “USPA”, organized a scheme to embezzle public funds.

According to the investigation, the defendants artificially inflated the cost of construction materials at the stage of developing design and estimate documentation. During the performance of the work, they entered unreliable data on the cost of rails, sleepers, switches and other materials into the acts.

The Bureau notes that the prices of individual items in the documents exceeded the market prices by two to three times. To conceal the scheme, they used fake expense invoices on behalf of third-party companies, which later confirmed that they did not actually make deliveries.

According to the expert’s conclusions, the losses to the state-owned enterprise amounted to almost 5 million UAH. The total amount of funds transferred to the contractor under the contract exceeded 15.3 million UAH.

The organizer of the scheme is suspected of organizing the embezzlement of state funds in particularly large amounts in collusion with other participants. The executor is accused of embezzlement, entering false data into official documents, and using forged documents. The indictment was sent to court.

Earlier, the Bureau of Economic Security stopped an attempt to export 28 thousand tons of corn through the port of Odesa.