SBI lost surveillance footage of possible “Midas” meetings
The recordings from the internal surveillance cameras of the State Bureau of Investigation, which could have recorded meetings and conversations between the persons involved in the Midas case and the bureau's employees, have not been preserved. This was reported by the media and People's Deputy Yaroslav Zheleznyak, referring to comments by the SBI leadership during a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada's Temporary Investigative Commission on Economic Security on December 10.
At the beginning of the TSC meeting, the head of the Internal Control Department of the State Bureau of Investigation, Bohdan Chobitok, confirmed that the persons involved in the so-called "Mindich films" did indeed visit the bureau's premises. The agency established: the fact that the persons involved in the scheme were in the State Bureau buildings and the purpose of their visits; the circle of State Bureau officials (in particular, the investigator and the head of the unit) with whom the persons involved communicated; the essence of the issues that were discussed.
Currently, the Main Investigation Department of the State Bureau of Investigation is investigating possible illegal benefits received by the bureau's employees, pressure on individual employees, etc. As part of the internal investigation, 47 witnesses have already been questioned, expert examinations have been ordered, and the phone of one of the investigators has been examined. The latter's correspondence with the person involved in Operation Midas, according to the State Bureau of Investigation, was exclusively "of a working nature within the framework of the criminal proceedings conducted by this investigator."
To date, no SBI employee has been suspended, fired, or disciplined.
Deputy Head of the Main Investigation Department of the State Bureau of Investigation Dmytro Mirkovets also explained that video recordings from the periods when meetings between the participants in the scheme and the State Bureau of Investigation employees could have taken place were not preserved, since their storage period is only 14 days. Mirkovets was unable to answer a clarifying question from MP Andriy Gerus about when exactly such a short period was established.
The head of the Anti-Corruption Committee, Anastasia Radina, also suggested that the SBI premises were visited by one of the defendants in the NABU case regarding embezzlement at Energoatom, Ihor Myronyuk.
Dmytro Mirkovets confirmed that Myronyuk visited the State Bureau of Investigation as part of a criminal investigation involving his former subordinate or colleague at the State Property Fund. The meeting allegedly took place in the lobby of the State Bureau of Investigation. The conversation between Myronyuk and the State Bureau investigator lasted an hour and a half, but there is no record of the conversation, as Myronyuk allegedly did not provide any important information in the case.
As a reminder, NABU and SAPO conducted searches at the home of President Zelensky's former business partner and co-owner of the Kvartal 95 studio, Timur Mindich, as well as at the home of Justice Minister Herman Galushchenko, who previously headed the Ministry of Energy.
The criminal organization built a scheme for systematically obtaining illegal benefits from counterparties of JSC NNEGC Energoatom in the amount of 10% to 15% of the value of contracts. The scheme involved, in particular, the former deputy head of the State Property Fund, who later became an advisor to the Minister of Energy, as well as a former law enforcement officer. In addition, NABU announced suspicion against former Deputy Prime Minister Chernyshov.
