Gennady Chekita: Life Details of a Lying Odessa Swindler. Part 1

Gennady Chekita: Life Details of a Lying Odessa Swindler. Part 1

It's very difficult to find people in Odesa who would speak positively of their fellow countryman Gennady Chekita, and even more difficult to find anyone who would explain why they elected him to the Verkhovna Rada. Was it really just about cheap glass mugs used to bribe voters? But the fateful choice was made, and now MP Chekita, entrenched in the ranks of the pro-presidential faction, is zealously fighting against... the fight against corruption. This is precisely how one can assess his bills No. 7499 and No. 8257, which aim to decriminalize bribery and kickbacks and legalize the shadow income of elected officials and officials.

It's fair to say that Chekita himself desperately needs this bill, as he's been implicated in numerous scandals: from ties to organized crime groups and fatal traffic accidents to corporate raids and corrupt enrichment schemes. Yet, he consistently denies any involvement in all the accusations against him, even when the facts prove it.

The Kremlin cadet's criminal connections

Gennady Leonidovich Chekita was born on July 17, 1966, in Odessa, where he graduated from School No. 35 in 1983. He then entered the prestigious Moscow Higher Combined Arms Command School (named after the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR, the Order of Lenin, and the October Revolution), whose cadets have been known for a century as "Kremlin cadets." The school has always been among the top five most elite law enforcement academies in the USSR and Russia, and accordingly, the competition was fierce, and not everyone was accepted—to be accepted, one had to excel not only in combat but also in political training.

An interesting detail: Chekita's biography states that at this school he also earned two civilian qualifications: engineer and translator. However, this school never trained military linguists; its graduates received only civilian qualifications: engineer and human resources specialist. This raises the question: where, then, did Gennady Chekita study foreign languages? And also, why is he concealing his exact service in the Soviet Army from 1987 to 1990 (after graduating from the school), and why did he leave its ranks? Incidentally, in 1989, a certain Lieutenant G.L. Chekita left his mark on the Minsk Higher Military-Political School (which, incidentally, has a foreign languages ​​department) as a cadet platoon commander. If it was he, and not his namesake, then why did he conceal this fact and falsify his biography?

It's no coincidence that rumors circulate around Gennady Chekita that he was recruited back in the late 80s as an agent of either the GRU, the FSB, or perhaps both, or perhaps even the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Equally interesting, similar rumors circulated about several other well-known Odessa figures: Gennady Trukhanov and the late Alexander Angert , who was called Odessa's main criminal overseer (there are about a dozen different overseers in Odessa).

And so, in 1990, Gennady Chekita left the army (or was he sent on a special mission?) and returned to his native Odessa, where he immediately received a position as deputy general director of the territorial-intersectoral association of the Zhovtnevyi District Council of Odessa. This is where his official "work" biography begins. But it, of course, doesn't specify how and to whom the 24-year-old Lieutenant Chekita so successfully integrated into civilian life and, over the next twenty-plus years, held leadership positions in various commercial enterprises—primarily those belonging to the structures of the joint venture "Pankom" (EDRPOU 14362066). Apparently, Chekita doesn't want to expose his longtime friend, comrade, and associate, Alexey Alexeevich Kozachenko—another well-known figure in Odessa.

Alexey Kozachenko

However, many Odessans know that Chekita and Kozachenko are inseparable, like Siamese twins. It's not so much their friendship and partnership that matters, but how it began. According to Odessa sources at Skelet.Org , since the late 80s, Alexey Kozachenko has been directly connected to the organized crime group of Sergei Nikolaevich Ershov, known by the nickname "Katsap." Moreover, they claim that Kozachenko was practically a "foreman" under Katsap, but specialized in shady business, particularly non-ferrous metals. Moreover, from 1990 to 1994, Kozachenko served as the general director of the very same territorial-intersectoral association of the Zhovtnevy District Council, and he immediately invited Gennady Chekita to be his deputy, with whom he "conjugated" shady and criminal metal schemes. In 1994, these schemes began to be gradually legalized – and this is how the joint venture "Pankom" was founded, founded by Kozachenko and Chekita (and several other people from the Katsap organized crime group), and headed by friends and partners who took off their "brotherhood" sports jackets and donned the crimson jackets of businessmen.

And quite timely, because in the second half of the 90s, a major criminal war erupted in Odessa, beginning with the murder of Viktor Kulivar (Karabas). During this war, Katsap's organized crime group opposed Angert's and was routed. Katsap himself was wounded and even left Odessa for a while. But then he returned, acknowledged Angert's victory, abandoned his previous criminal activities, and re-established himself as the "respected businessman" Sergei Ershov, who controls a significant share of Odessa's shadow economy. This was once confirmed in an interview by Alexander Presman , another Odessa businessman with a criminal past.

Gennady Chekita: Life Details of a Lying Odessa Swindler. Part 1

Rumor has it that Kozachenko and Chekita remained connected to Sergei Ershov for quite some time, and that he not only served as their "protector" but also had a stake (through third parties) in their business—and perhaps still does. Furthermore, sources in Odessa claim that there's an entire Ershov family clan, to which Tatyana Nikolaevna Ershova, the longtime city council manager (since 1994), allegedly belongs. Incidentally, she started out in the Zhovtnevyi district! All of this explains how Chekita and Kozachenko carved out their niche in Odessa business and maintained it throughout this time.

But although Yershov "submitted" to Angert, their "nukers" continued to squabble among themselves for a long time. Thus, in 2004, amid the din of the first Maidan, "Our Ukraine" member Kozachenko publicly called Trukhanov's sports school a "forge of bandits" and him their mentor (in his sports clubs, Trukhanov did indeed train militants and "titushki" for Angert). In response, Trukhanov, who at the time had no aspirations for the mayoral seat but had a reputation as "Angert's right-hand man," sued Kozachenko for "defamation." Kozachenko failed to appear for any of the six scheduled court hearings, and in 2006, he softly apologized to Trukhanov's Muay Thai Federation. According to informed sources, the incident was settled between Angert and Yershov!

Killer Companions

The friendship between Kozachenko and Yershov was once again recalled in Odessa in 2004, after a high-profile and resonant incident of national significance. It's no joke: a Ukrainian MP shot and killed a man in the street! That MP was Oleksiy Kozachenko, elected to the Rada in 2002 under the banner of the pro-Kuchma bloc "For United Ukraine," then defected to "People's Power," then to "Center," and immediately after the incident, hid in the ranks of the opposition "Our Ukraine."

Alexey Kozachenko

It happened on July 23, 2014, at 11:45 p.m., near Kozachenko's home. According to his main story , he, his wife, and their children were getting ready to go to his mother-in-law's village (at midnight?). Kozachenko went outside first, and there he was attacked by two drunken young men waving a pistol. During the struggle, Kozachenko allegedly snatched the pistol and wounded one of the attackers, 25-year-old Alexey Zherebko, a previously convicted felon, who later died.

According to the victim's mother and the human rights activists who supported her, her son and his friend were passing by the car where Kozachenko was sitting, asked him for a light, and were told to "send them away." An argument ensued, Kozachenko, reminiscing about his wild youth, got out of the car to give the brazen assailants a hard time, but it turned out they were the ones who hit him over the head. Kozachenko then locked himself in the car, pulled out a TT pistol, and began shooting at his assailants through the window. Kozachenko's security guards, alerted by the noise, either beat the wounded Zherebko to death or finished him off with a second shot, then dragged the body about a hundred meters toward the park (but then the police arrived).

It later emerged that Kozachenko had changed his story several times. Initially, he told police he had used his own pistol in self-defense , taking it from his briefcase after the attackers had knocked him to the ground. But when he woke up and remembered that illegal possession of a pistol is also a crime, especially after it was discovered that the pistol was "hot" and wanted, Kozachenko reached an agreement with the police and rewrote the report—and the ill-fated TT pistol became the weapon of the crazed attackers. Furthermore, Kozachenko publicly voiced his second version at a specially convened press conference, calling it a "political reprisal against an honest deputy!"

The Odessa newspaper "Vecherniy Gorod" reported in issue #7 for 2004 that this TT was a gift to Kozakov from his friend Sergei Ershov! Later, information emerged that Alexey Kozachenko is a big gun enthusiast and keeps a registered arsenal at home (nine pistols and carbines) plus a certain number of illegal firearms.

The case of Kozachenko, nicknamed "the second Lozinsky," dragged on for more than seven years! When it became clear back in 2006 that the case was stalled and its materials were being stolen and replaced, public activists staged numerous pickets, and the victim's mother wrote a letter to Viktor Yushchenko—both as president and as the leader of "Our Ukraine," of which Kozachenko was the head of the Odesa branch. But all this was in vain: attempts to achieve justice continued until 2011, and then Kozachenko's case was somehow forgotten. However, murder has no statute of limitations, and the case could be revived even today. This, however, is highly doubtful, given that Kozachenko's friend and associate, Gennady Chekita, is now a member of the pro-presidential faction "Petro Poroshenko Bloc."

But Gennady Chekita also bears the grave sin of murder! It happened on November 5, 2013, in Odessa, on Nikolaevska Road near the Odesakabel plant: a Bentley speeding at top speed struck 23-year-old Yevhen Burdeyny, who was running across the road, and killed him. As the video shows, both parties were at fault, but the driver of the car was more at fault—if he hadn't driven into the oncoming lane while avoiding a traffic jam, the boy would have survived.

Odessans immediately recognized the Bentley by its license plate number, BH 0017 OR. It was the same car Gennady Chekita was driving around the city in at the time, not particularly abiding by traffic rules: he drove as fast as he pleased, parked wherever he wanted, drove into oncoming traffic, cut people off—basically, he behaved like a brazen lord. And, well, he "drove too far." However, within the first minute of the accident, the Bentley driver hastily left the scene, and another, a plant, took the wheel. High-ranking traffic police officers arrived at the scene, drafted the necessary reports (according to the ORD website, this cost Chekita a million dollars), and soon the official version from the Ministry of Internal Affairs emerged: the car was driven by an employee of the luxury car dealership "Oskar," to whom the Bentley had been assigned for sale. Just two days later, the employee was released on bail of 91 hryvnia.

That same Bentley

Journalists launched their own investigation and discovered that the car was registered to Gennady Chekita's mother, who, due to her age (77 at the time of the accident), naturally doesn't drive it. He himself has power of attorney for the car. But Gennady Chekita responded to journalists' questions curtly and bluntly: the car never belonged to me personally, and I had nothing to do with the accident! The case was closed, and soon, Odessa and all of Ukraine had no further to do with it, as the second Maidan began.

Political jumper and international mafia

Gennady Chekita's path to the Petro Poroshenko Bloc was long and winding, and in politics he long followed in the footsteps of his partner, Oleksiy Kozachenko: wherever Kozachenko went, Chekita followed. Although, in principle, Chekita's stints as a member of parliament in the Zhovtnevyi District Council (1994-1998) and the Odesa Regional Council (2002-2006) couldn't really be called political stages – there, he positioned himself as a "business executive," and received his mandate to facilitate his business dealings. Chekita became deeply involved in political intrigue while serving as a member of the Odesa City Council (2006-2009). Then his business partner, Kozachenko (a member of parliament and a member of the political council of Our Ukraine), created the Our Ukraine faction in the city council, which brought together his business partners, managers, and old acquaintances from the 90s: Andriy Golubov, Volodymyr Kompaniyets, Vera Markova, Dmytro Tantsyura, Serhiy Mastyuga, and others. Tantsyura headed the faction, Chekita became his right-hand man, and Anatoly Balinov, director and co-owner of the Grad shopping center, became the faction's main spokesman.

Anatoly Balinov

Balinov himself is quite the flyer: initially, he was a supporter of Eduard Gurvits , but then fell out with him and defected to Kozachenko's group, who also had a falling out with the mayor of Odessa. It was difficult to say which of them initiated the conflict, as Gurvits had a habit of breaking with his former sponsors and starting wars with them. For example, in the 90s, he broke with Karabas, and then with Angert, calling on other Odessa organized crime groups (including Katsap) to help him, and then relying on Chechens and Kyiv organized crime groups (which is how Presman and Ubiria arrived in Odessa).

Interestingly, in 2014, Balinov headed the "Trust Deeds" faction in the Odesa City Council, which became a stronghold of Gennady Trukhanov. This faction, composed primarily of former members of the Party of Regions, also included Dmytro Tantsyura, a trusted confidant of Kozachenko. So, no matter how much squabbles between members of different organized crime groups who later became members of different parties, they can always find common ground for action!

Here's another interesting fact: Balinov's business partner in Grad is Tatyana Shpaltakova, who owns 51% of the shares. Shpaltakova is also known for being a partner of Gennady Chekita and Alexey Kozachenko in a number of enterprises, including Odesgrazhdanproekt, Leg-Trans LLC, Stroygidravlika OJSC, Pankom-Met Joint Venture, and others.

The fact that Kozachenko and Chekita had transformed the Our Ukraine faction into an anti-Gurvits camp, as well as the high-profile murder charges against Kozachenko, did not escape the attention of the party's honorary leader, Viktor Yushchenko. When the Odessa Opera House reopened after renovations in September 2007, Kozachenko secured a front-row aisle seat in anticipation of the president's visit. Eyewitnesses reported that Yushchenko, as he ascended the stage and shook hands, pointedly "ignored" Kozachenko, who was giving him a dog-like look and nervously twitching his sweaty palm. But Yushchenko didn't want to soil his hand with a man at the center of such scandals. Kozachenko remained in Our Ukraine only because of his close ties to Mykola Katerenchuk and Roman Bessmertny. Incidentally, today Kozachenko is financing the election campaign of Bessmertny (he himself admitted this), who is also running for president.

Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Org

CONTINUED: Gennady Chekita: Details of the Life of a Lying Odessa Swindler. PART 2

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