Igor Benedisyuk: Where is Poroshenko's pocket judge running? Part 1
The head of the High Council of Justice, Ihor Benedysiuk, decided not to renew his membership in this body and hastily resigned. Has he become yet another rat, rapidly abandoning Poroshenko's sinking ship? Or are we witnessing a planned evacuation of the most trusted members of the presidential "family," who are being transferred to other key positions? After all, Benedysiuk is now preparing to take a judge's seat on the Cassation Commercial Court, part of the Supreme Court of Ukraine. He handed over the position of chairman of the High Council of Justice to his successor, Volodymyr Govorukha, another Poroshenko protégé, who, like Benedysiuk, comes from the military court system.
Until now, Igor Benedysiuk was virtually unknown to Ukrainians, and only made the news twice. First, for a clash with activists from the "Tradition and Order" movement, whom he repelled by firing his award pistol, and then as a judge. who received almost 3 million hryvnia in salary over the yearWell, let's try to find out more about him...
Hybrid citizenship
Igor Mykhailovych Benedysiuk was born on December 12, 1965, in the village of Velykyi Luh, Krasnoarmeysky District (now Pulinsky District) of the Zhytomyr Oblast. His biography contains many curious gaps, the first of which is the question of what he did after finishing school. The fact is that Benedysiuk graduated from a ten-year Soviet secondary school in the summer of 1983 (assuming he enrolled in 1973), and began his career as a driver for the Novohrad-Volynsky District Sanitary Department in January 1984. It might seem so, but Benedysiuk was a country boy, not a city brat, and among villagers, slacking off for six months was unacceptable. However, this is the least of the mysteries of his biography.
In May 1984, Benedysiuk enlisted in the Soviet Army. His service there so captivated him that he immediately enrolled in the Military Institute of the USSR Ministry of Defense, which trained military lawyers, or more precisely, judges for military tribunals. And so, in the summer of 1991, just before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the young graduate Igor Benedysiuk was assigned to the ends of the earth, all the way to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, where he became a member of the local military tribunal and, after its reorganization, a fifth-class judge of the 37th Military Court of the Far Eastern Military District of the Russian Federation. He worked there until April 4, 1994, as evidenced by excerpts from the relevant documents. As you can see, Benedysiuk was in no particular hurry to return to his native Ukraine, even though he had had the opportunity since 1992!
And yet, there would be nothing wrong with this, were it not for a few "buts." First, since 1992, service in the Russian army, much less promotion, would have been impossible without Russian citizenship. This doesn't mean Benedisyuk received a Russian passport, as many Russians continued to use old Soviet ones until the late 90s. After all, a passport is merely an identification document issued to a citizen, meaning one can be a citizen without having one. Moreover, Benedisyuk could have obtained a Russian passport after 1994 (and still can), since no one has ever revoked his Russian citizenship.
But secondly, Benedysiuk himself categorically denied having Russian citizenship. This was particularly true when, in 2018, Roman Maselko, a member of the Ukrainian Public Council of Virtue (it turns out we have one too), filed a disciplinary complaint against Benedysiuk. And then things got interesting, because the lawyer and judge with 28 years of experience began making absurd excuses, like a juvenile hooligan. He said, "I don't know, I don't remember, I didn't receive it!"
Benedysyuk also tried to justify himself by citing the agreement between CIS countries of February 14, 1992, according to which servicemen discharged from military service retained the citizenship of the republic from which they were drafted into the Soviet Army. However, this agreement only applied to those being discharged and was adopted for those who wanted to return to their homeland and obtain citizenship. According to this agreement, Benedysyuk himself should have automatically received Ukrainian citizenship—but only after being discharged from the Russian army. From 1992-94, he served in the Russian army, meaning he received Russian citizenship.
Thirdly, although Igor Mikhailovich's service in the Russian army lasted until April 4, 1994 (see document), he somehow managed to simultaneously begin working at the Kyiv Garrison Military Court on February 24 of that year. In other words, he served in both the Russian and Ukrainian armies simultaneously! This simply boggles the mind: it would be fine if some devious warrant officer had contrived this, but Benedisyuk was a military judge, a lawyer—and later this man became the chairman of the VSP.
Moreover, the question arises: does he still serve both Kyiv and Moscow? Amid the political conflict between Ukraine and Russia, and Poroshenko's team's endless assertions of a "hybrid war," it was precisely these "double-dealers" who were the first to fall under suspicion of working for the Kremlin. But... Petro Poroshenko He himself appointed him to the post of head of the Supreme Court! Perhaps through someone's patronage? Whose? But that's another mystery, because Benedysyuk's patrons remained in the shadows.
Fourth, the secrecy surrounding Igor Benedysiuk's past is unclear. Although some documents related to his career have been published and discovered. Skelet.Org, the key information was carefully erased, as if deliberately destroyed. For example, in 2017, the public organization "Automaidan" submitted official inquiries to the Supreme Court of Justice and the High Qualification Commission of Judges of Ukraine (HQCJ) asking whether Ihor Benedysiuk had ever received Ukrainian citizenship. The question seemed absurd—how else could he have worked as a judge in Ukraine for twenty years? But it was so, considering he began his work as a judge in the Kyiv garrison while still a Russian citizen and without Ukrainian citizenship (he continued to serve in the Russian army). So this truly required documentary clarification. However, the official responses received were, to put it mildly, quite surprising: the Supreme Court of Justice and the HQCJ replied that they had no such information.
But the activists did not relent, and a year later the question of Benedysyuk's citizenship was raised by the aforementioned Roman Maselko. In response to his request from the High Qualification Qualification Commission in February 2019 She had a “conversation” with Benedisyuk, and based on his verbal answers (which he doesn’t know, doesn’t remember, and didn’t receive), she rejected Maselko’s complaint – saying that everything was in order with Igor Benedisyuk’s citizenship!
Let's emphasize: in the summer of 2017, the High Qualification Qualification Commission (HQC) officially stated that Benedysiuk's judicial file lacked the requested information about his citizenship. And in February 2019, the same HQC, having never received the required information, acquitted him solely on the basis of an oral response from the head of the High Court of Justice. This is a clear example of what "justice" looks like in Poroshenko's post-Maidan Ukraine! Incidentally, how do the members of the HQC now intend to explain this incident? Or are they hoping it will be forgotten?
Secret and obvious patrons
Igor Benedysiuk served as a judge at the Kyiv Garrison until 2000. His work was hardly unprofitable, as in addition to criminal cases against deserters, "grandfathers," and thieving managers, the military court had jurisdiction over economic matters concerning the Ministry of Defense's property. After all, the Kyiv Garrison was responsible for numerous military units with extensive and expensive real estate, some of which was expropriated and divided up in the second half of the 90s! This allows for some interesting speculation, but it is currently impossible to confirm them, as information on Benedysiuk's citizenship is missing (or has been destroyed).
But in 2000, Benedysiuk's career took off, as they say: he landed a judge's seat at the Kyiv Arbitration Commercial Court. And it was a lucrative position! However, Benedysiuk went further: in November 2001, he became a judge at the Kyiv Appellate Commercial Court, whose jurisdiction extended to the Kyiv, Chernihiv, and Cherkasy regions (in 2018, it was reformed into the Northern Appellate Commercial Court). But Benedysiuk didn't stay there long either, and in June 2003, he moved to the Supreme Commercial Court of Ukraine, where he worked for the next 12 years. Again, Skelet.Org There's also no information about his diligent fifteen-year service in the commercial courts. But Ukrainians are well aware that the idea of an "honest commercial court judge" is practically a joke.
But the question is different: who facilitated the transfer of a military judge from the Kyiv garrison to the capital's commercial court, and then three years later, to the Supreme Commercial Court? After all, even back then, in the early 2000s, positions in such courts could only be purchased for very large sums of money (hundreds of thousands of dollars) or obtained through very influential patronage.
Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Org
CONTINUED: Igor Benedisyuk: Where is Poroshenko's pocket judge running? Part 2
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