Position: Deputy Head of the International Cooperation Department of the Office of the Prosecutor General.
Area of Corrupt Activity:
Region of Corrupt Activity: All of Ukraine.
Legal Qualification: Part 3 of Article 255 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine — leading a criminal organization, committed by an official using their position; Part 3 of Article 27 in conjunction with Part 3 of Article 209 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine — organizing the legalization (laundering) of property obtained through criminal means under qualifying circumstances.
Status: In pre-trial detention.
Case Details: The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) exposed a criminal organization whose members systematically received unlawful benefits from fraudulent call centers and laundered assets worth millions. The organizer of the scheme turned out to be one of the heads of structural divisions of the Office of the Prosecutor General. According to the investigation, the official created and headed the criminal organization in mid-2025. He involved both current employees of the prosecutor’s offices and unofficial associates close to him in the illegal activities.
Members of the criminal organization established a mechanism for systematically receiving bribes in exchange for allowing so-called call centers to operate without interference. These shadow operations carried out mass fraud, targeting both Ukrainian citizens and foreigners. The participants laundered the proceeds of crime through a series of schemes. More than UAH 20 million was spent on purchasing real estate, jewelry, and valuable movable property. Assets worth more than UAH 12 million (their minimum market value) were legalized by the organization’s leader through re-registration in the names of third parties to conceal the actual ownership. These included real estate in a popular apartment complex near the Carpathian Mountains. Members of the group deposited more than UAH 10 million into bank accounts belonging to their relatives, disguising the funds as legitimate income allegedly earned through business activities. Five members of the criminal organization have been exposed so far.
Legal Qualification: Part 3 of Article 255 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine — leading a criminal organization, committed by an official using their position; Part 3 of Article 27 in conjunction with Part 3 of Article 209 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine — organizing the legalization (laundering) of property obtained through criminal means under qualifying circumstances.
Serhii Kropyva, Deputy Head of the International Cooperation Department of the Office of the Prosecutor General, was remanded in custody with the alternative of bail set at UAH 120 million.
Individuals Potentially Involved in Corruption Schemes: According to Watchers, five people have so far been notified of suspicion in the case: Serhii Kropyva, Deputy Head of the International Cooperation Department of the Office of the Prosecutor General (referred to as “Chancellor” in the investigators’ recordings); Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko, a person close to “Chancellor” (referred to by investigators as “Muse”); Serhii Kutsyi, Kropyva’s driver (“Comrade”); Oleksandr Dydych, a lawyer and Kropyva’s trusted associate; and Danylo Slipchuk, an employee of the Information Technology Department of the Office of the Prosecutor General (“Flash”).
Other individuals also appear in the case materials, but they cannot be described as accomplices in the procedural sense because they have not been notified of suspicion. In particular, Bohdan Boiko is described by the prosecutor as an alleged “unofficial supervisor” of some of the call centers. During a court hearing, a conversation was played in which Kropyva allegedly warned Boiko about planned searches in Dnipro and asked him to provide the addresses of call centers associated with him so that they would not be affected by the investigative actions. At the same time, there is no confirmation in open sources that Boiko has been notified of suspicion as part of Operation Carthage.
Former Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko also appears repeatedly in recordings and other case materials. In recorded conversations, Kropyva refers to him as “the boss” and “Andriiovych.” The prosecution also presented records of communications between them, including discussions of everyday matters, home renovations, and a trip to Madrid. However, there is no publicly confirmed information that Kravchenko has been notified of suspicion in the Carthage case, although he fled Ukraine.
Ivan Tymoshenko, former head of the IT Department of the Office of the Prosecutor General, is also mentioned in materials and recordings disclosed during the proceedings. However, SAPO prosecutor Mykola Karas explicitly stated that Tymoshenko does not have procedural status in this criminal proceeding.
Assets: According to an analysis by Viktoriia Eismunt and Alona Malichenko of NGL.media, Serhii Kropyva’s family and immediate circle alone acquired assets worth at least UAH 120 million.
In his 2025 income declaration, Kropyva reported a salary of nearly UAH 1.4 million, a pension of UAH 283,000, and cash savings of USD 65,500 and UAH 700,000.
Despite the fact that Serhii Kropyva and his wife Iryna have three daughters aged between 6 and 13, the family did not own a home. The prosecutor owns only a share in a family apartment in Zolotonosha, so until 2025 the family officially lived in rented apartments.
However, in 2025 the family moved into a house measuring almost 260 sq. m in the village of Lisnyky near Kyiv. The 10-sotka plot, worth UAH 1.6 million, as well as the house itself in this elite Kyiv suburb, are registered in the name of the prosecutor’s mother, Valentyna Kropyva. As it turned out, all his relatives were also quite wealthy, but more on their assets later.
Thirty-seven-year-old Iryna Kropyva had barely reported any earnings before 2020, but after her husband’s appointment as First Deputy Head of the Cyber Police Department of the National Police, she also decided to go into business.
In her first year as an individual entrepreneur, according to her husband’s declaration, she earned UAH 2.5 million — while giving birth to their third daughter during the same period. Over the past six years, Iryna Kropyva has earned more than UAH 26 million as an individual entrepreneur.
According to YouControl, in March this year she registered LLC Power Point in her name, a company engaged in property rental. Notably, Iryna Kropyva’s phone number is also listed as a contact number for two other companies — LLC Shyny Dysky Servis and Trade Development — which are officially owned by other people and were registered in April and May this year.
In 2023, Iryna Kropyva purchased a new Mercedes-Benz GLE 450 worth almost UAH 5 million. She does not declare any real estate of her own, but has also accumulated some cash savings: USD 83,000 and UAH 2.8 million.
His wife was not the only one to start a business as Serhii Kropyva’s career advanced. His parents also joined in. They apparently still live in Zolotonosha.
The official’s mother, Valentyna Kropyva, registered as an individual entrepreneur in August 2021 and went into “photocopying.” This coincided with the period when her son effectively took charge of the National Police Cyber Police Department. Within just a few months, she acquired a plot of land and a garden house measuring almost 260 sq. m in the village of Lisnyky near Kyiv. Her son’s family moved into this property, although Serhii Kropyva lists the house in his declaration as unfinished. NABU values this property at UAH 3.82 million, although specialized websites list similar houses in the village, with comparable floor areas, a swimming pool, and a plot of land, at market prices reaching UAH 40 million. At the end of 2020, even before she registered as an individual entrepreneur, an apartment in Kyiv’s Comfort Town residential complex was registered in Valentyna Kropyva’s name.
At that time, one-room studio apartments there without renovations cost from UAH 1.3 million.
Last year, Valentyna Kropyva became the owner of two more apartments. One, measuring 53 sq. m, was registered in her name in a residential district of Cherkasy; the other is a three-room apartment in another Kyiv residential complex, Faina Town, where prices for such properties start at UAH 6.64 million.
In 2022, the subject of our investigation’s father, Vasyl Kropyva, also registered as an individual entrepreneur. Without much imagination, he chose “photocopying” as his business activity, just like his wife. Vasyl Kropyva is the official owner of two plots of land and a 291 sq. m house in Odesa, a 15-minute walk from the city’s Zolotyi Bereh beach. The value of similar houses in this area ranges from UAH 4 million to UAH 10 million. Vasyl Kropyva also owns real estate in Kyiv — for example, an apartment in the UNIT.Home residential complex, one of the most expensive residential developments in Kyiv, where prices for one-bedroom apartments directly from the developer start at UAH 7.86 million. Since last year, Vasyl Kropyva has also owned non-residential premises in Boyarka, Kyiv Region. A fitness center currently operates on the premises.
Halyna and Oleksandr Rohovchenko — Serhii Kropyva’s parents-in-law — also decided to go into business and purchase real estate starting in 2021. That year, 61-year-old Halyna Rohovchenko purchased three small non-residential premises in the same Faina Town residential complex as her relative by marriage, Valentyna Kropyva.
Another apartment in Faina Town, registered in the name of Liudmyla Horobets — Halyna Rohovchenko’s biological sister and, consequently, Serhii Kropyva’s wife’s aunt — is listed as the registered business address of the Rohovchenkos’ business activities. Another non-residential unit measuring 41.5 sq. m in Faina Town officially belongs to Oleksandr Rohovchenko, Serhii Kropyva’s father-in-law. A year ago, a one-bedroom apartment in the Great residential complex on the banks of the Dnipro was also registered in his name. On the primary market, prices for an unfinished apartment of this type start at UAH 3.3 million.
It is worth noting that in all state registers, Serhii Kropyva’s parents-in-law are listed as individual entrepreneurs without patronymics, which may indicate an attempt to conceal information about their family connections. In February last year, LLC Ortigo, whose founder is listed as Vasyl Kropyva, Serhii Kropyva’s father, took out a UAH 7 million bank loan secured by six apartments in Odesa Region. Officially, however, these apartments do not belong to Ortigo but to another company, LLC Agency for Investment Development and Real Estate Transactions. Nevertheless, the two companies — the borrower and the mortgagor — are directly connected, as both have the same co-owner, a certain Oleksandr Dydych, who is married to Serhii Kropyva’s sister, Viktoriia.
Viktoriia Dydych also works in the prosecutor’s office, though in Cherkasy Region, where the entire family originates. Since 2016, she has held the position of Deputy Head of the Procedural Guidance Department of the Cherkasy Regional Prosecutor’s Office.
Last year, Viktoriia Dydych even took part in a study visit to Rome for Ukrainian prosecutors, organized by the EU Advisory Mission. “It is important that such events create a shared space for professional development based on common values and standards of justice,” the EUAM Ukraine website quoted her as saying. Serhii Kropyva’s sister attended the event together with Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko, her brother’s mistress. In a group photograph, the women are even posing next to each other.
Oleksandr Dydych is actively involved in the family business. In addition to LLC Ortigo, in which Serhii Kropyva’s father holds a majority stake, Dydych has operated his own individual enterprise providing legal services since 2020. Since 2021, he has also held a lawyer’s license issued in Odesa. The phone number of his individual enterprise matches the number registered to Serhii Kropyva’s father’s individual enterprise. But Dydych is not merely a passive co-owner of the family business.
As emerged during a hearing at the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC), he is one of the group’s key members. Investigators believe that Dydych’s main task was to launder money received from providing protection to illegal call centers. He also maintained all the “off-the-books accounts,” including those relating to fictitious individual entrepreneurs. According to the prosecution, Kropyva himself repeatedly said in private conversations that all the individual entrepreneurs were “under Sasha’s wing,” referring to Dydych.
It appears that Oleksandr Dydych is now only Viktoriia Dydych’s husband in name. The couple are not officially divorced, but she lives with Maksym Shtompel, Deputy Head of the Cherkasy Regional Prosecutor’s Office. For this reason, a SAPO prosecutor referred to Shtompel in court as Serhii Kropyva’s “indirect relative.” Investigators believe that Kropyva himself may have lobbied for Shtompel’s appointment to the regional prosecutor’s office in April 2026. In general, the scale of relatives’ involvement in the scheme is astonishing.
For example, at the court hearing on the preventive measure, the prosecutor mentioned Serhii Kropyva’s wife’s aunt, Liudmyla Petrivna Horobets. “Listen, has Lyuda been brought in?” the SAPO prosecutor quoted a conversation between Kropyva, his driver, and Dydych.
Lyuda really had been “brought in.” A month before that conversation, on February 26, 2026, she registered as an individual entrepreneur under the business activity code “Restaurant activities and mobile food service provision.” However, back in 2024, nearly 200 sq. m of commercial premises in Kyiv had been registered in Lyuda’s name, followed by almost 50 sq. m of additional “non-residential premises” in 2025.
But the most interesting assets turned out to be registered in the name of Liudmyla Horobets’s 83-year-old mother, Yevheniia Horobets. In addition to suddenly becoming an individual entrepreneur in June this year, she acquired two apartments and a parking space in May at the premium Glacier Premium Apartments hotel in the center of Bukovel.
Extracts from the real estate register revealed that Rohovchenko H. (most likely referring to the prosecutor’s mother-in-law, Halyna Rohovchenko) acquired the rights to this property back in 2024, but transferred the rights of claim to Yevheniia Horobets several months ago.
The prosecutor himself was somewhat overshadowed by his mistress, Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko. The 24-year-old woman, referred to in anti-corruption authorities’ materials by the codename Muse, is suspected of participating in the legalization of property worth UAH 21.6 million obtained through criminal means. Judging by the audio recordings released by NABU and SAPO and the available photographs, Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko led a luxurious lifestyle. In NABU recordings, she mentioned Porsche, Loro Piana, bracelets, watches, handbags, and fur coats.
Last October, Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko became the owner of non-residential property measuring more than 153 sq. m in Kyiv’s Pechersk district. A very similar property at the same address is currently being offered for sale for USD 420,000. She also owns a 2023 Mercedes-Benz EQE, which was offered for sale last year for USD 60,000.
Yelyzaveta registered as an individual entrepreneur in the “legal services” sector only in July last year. A few months ago, her mother, Tetiana Ivakhnenko, decided to follow her example and went into… “photocopying.” According to SAPO, between April and June this year, Tetiana Ivakhnenko received UAH 1.78 million into her account, despite not actually engaging in business activities. NABU investigators also claim that she purchased an apartment in Odesa in January this year.
NGL.media found that Yelyzaveta’s older sister, 29-year-old Karyna Topalova, who works as Deputy Director for Educational Affairs at the municipal European Lyceum in Odesa, became the owner of an apartment in Odesa measuring almost 60 sq. m in December last year. According to YouControl, she also owns a 2020 Tesla Model 3.
Authorities Responsible for Responding: In Kropyva’s case, law enforcement authorities responded in a timely manner.
Scandals: One of the most high-profile storylines in the Carthage case concerns 24-year-old Yelyzaveta Ivakhnenko, who appears in the case materials under the pseudonym “Muse.”
According to the prosecutor’s office, Ivakhnenko was Serhii Kropyva’s live-in partner. However, during the appeal hearing, Ivakhnenko herself denied that she had been living with him at the time. According to SAPO, the relationship between Kropyva and Ivakhnenko was not merely personal. The prosecutor claimed that they discussed laundering money, distributing funds among individual entrepreneurs, purchasing real estate in Odesa and the Carpathians, and paying for expensive gifts for Ivakhnenko. One of the individual entrepreneurs allegedly used to channel the funds was Ivakhnenko’s mother. Their recorded conversations about the possibility of Ivakhnenko obtaining a position in public service also attracted considerable attention.
According to Babel, Ivakhnenko told Kropyva that she wanted to work at the Ministry of Education, and Kropyva replied that he knew a deputy minister and had already instructed him to help arrange her employment.
The publication notes that the prosecutor referred to a senior position but did not specify the exact job during this episode. However, the Transparency International Ukraine project “HACC Decided,” summarizing the prosecutor’s position, specifically reported that Ivakhnenko intended to become a deputy minister of education. One of the most frequently quoted episodes in the case relates to this potential public-sector appointment. In March 2026, according to materials disclosed in court, Ivakhnenko told Kropyva that she did not own a single non-branded handbag, which could raise questions about her wealth if she entered public service. Kropyva responded by offering to give her such a handbag for International Women’s Day on March 8. The same materials also refer to a discussion about a watch given to Ivakhnenko — an Audemars Piguet valued at approximately USD 59,000.
Another episode concerns the display of an expensive lifestyle on social media. According to materials disclosed by the prosecution, Ivakhnenko and Kropyva discussed deleting social media photographs showing expensive cars, clothing, watches, bracelets, and handbags. Ukrainska Pravda also reported that investigators linked this discussion to efforts to conceal signs of a luxurious lifestyle. The SAPO prosecutor used these conversations to substantiate the risk of evidence being destroyed or distorted. According to the “HACC Decided” project, the prosecution referred to conversations between Ivakhnenko and Kropyva about destroying documents, deleting social media photographs, and “cleaning up the phone.”
Another episode that investigators considered particularly revealing concerned explanations for the origin of the assets. According to the prosecution, the suspects considered creating a “cover story” about savings belonging to Ivakhnenko’s parents that had allegedly been brought out of Russia. They also discussed using cryptocurrency and channeling funds through a company in the United States to make the assets appear to have been legally acquired. Investigators claim that approximately UAH 10 million was deposited into accounts belonging to the suspects’ relatives, including Ivakhnenko’s mother, disguised as legitimate income from individual business activities. Overall, the prosecution in the Carthage case alleges the laundering of more than UAH 89.9 million, although not all of this amount is directly attributed to Ivakhnenko.
Ivakhnenko denies any wrongdoing. Her defense maintains that she knew neither about the existence of the alleged criminal organization nor about the possible criminal origin of the funds, and argues that the case materials do not prove she knew about the provision of protection to call centers or the laundering of proceeds. Ivakhnenko has also stated that her income was declared, that she engaged in business activities, and that she provided legal and consulting services.
Sources:
https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2026/09/06/8052169/
https://hacc-decided.ti-ukraine.org/uk/news/shho-inkriminuyut-muzi-z-operaciyi-karfagen
https://hacc-decided.ti-ukraine.org/uk/cases/52026000000000295
https://www.pravda.com.ua/articles/2026/09/11/8052853/
https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2026/09/07/8052227/index.amp
https://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2026/09/15/8053527/
https://public.nazk.gov.ua/documents/9b5ade74-a4d4-4378-ac1b-a12d8606536d