Svyatoslav Nechitailo and his "Bayadera" family: two billion for Putin from the "Gorlovka poisoners" family. PART 1
Have Ukrainians ever considered that every time they open a bottle of Koblevo or Khlebny Dar, or shop at ECO-Markets, they're not only risking their health but also supporting the companies of oligarchs who contribute enormous sums to the Russian budget? Whose rise was intimately linked to corruption, crime, and the monstrous alcohol schemes run by Yura Yenikievsky himself? Their relationship with him, along with many other details of their past and present, they carefully conceal.
For Ukrainians, the names of Svyatoslav Nechytailo, his mother, Olga Nechytailo-Ridzhok (now deceased), and his aunt, Natalia Bondareva, are virtually unknown, as they always preferred to remain in the shadows. However, it's hard to find anyone who hasn't seen the signs of the family-owned ECO-Market chain of stores on the streets. Or who hasn't noticed the brands "Khlebny Dar," "Tselsiy," "Bayka," "Kazatska Rada," "Persha Gildiya," and "Koblevo" on the shelves of the liquor department—produced at the factories of the Bayadera Group (National Vodka Company, Mykolaiv Brandy Factory, and others), which they also owned. Their advertising assures us that these are state-of-the-art production facilities that adhere to European technology and quality standards. But the reality is quite different...
Family business of sisters-officials
Svyatoslav Igorevich Nechitailo was born on May 29, 1974, in Horlivka, to a fairly well-off family. His mother, Olga Vladimirovna Nechitailo (1954-2012), worked in the education system, serving as head of the district education department, and in 1990 became deputy chair of the Horlivka City Executive Committee (and mayor). His father was the director of a mercury plant, but he died in 1992, and Olga Nechitailo married Vladimir Ridzhok, the chief surgeon of the city hospital, taking the double surname Nechitailo-Ridzhok. They separated in 2003: when Olga Vladimirovna moved from Horlivka to Kyiv, already a well-known and wealthy businesswoman, Ridzhok remained in Horlivka, abandoning all prospects in the capital, although his wealthy wife could certainly have bought him a position, for example, in the Ministry of Health. This meant only one thing - a break in relations, the reasons for which remained unknown.
Olga Nechitailo-Ridzhok
It's worth noting that Olga Vladimirovna was more than just Horlivka's deputy mayor: in the early 90s, she effectively ran the city herself, sharing power with another deputy mayor and the city council secretary. The problem was that in the early 90s, Horlivka's mayors, for some reason, couldn't hold on to their positions. For example, in 1991, Oleksandr Shchebitchenko resigned, after which Horlivka fell completely under the control of his deputies (including Olga Nechitailo) for several months, until the next elections. Mikhail Chaltsev, the director of the Highway Institute, who was elected, also didn't last long: he was simply forced out within a year, and Skelet.Org has information that Olga Vladimirovna played a major role in this. Then Valery Pakhomov became mayor, and he was already completely suitable for Olga Nechitailo-Ridzhok, since he worked successfully in his position from 1993 to 1998, after which he went to work... for Olga Vladimirovna at the Bayadera company, in the formation and development of which he also participated, using his official position.
Olga Nechitailo-Ridzhok's work history was later thoroughly scrubbed, with almost everything removed. However, earlier versions retained a mention of having served briefly as Pakhomov's deputy mayor. Meanwhile, a later, even more abridged version of her biography states that she left public service in 1992 to go into business. But Pakhomov only became mayor in 1993! How does this make sense? Skelet.Org sources report that in this case, Olga Vladimirovna was simply tidying up her loose ends. In reality, she had been involved in business since the late 80s, and in 1991, she began managing the company she founded, Bayadera, while continuing to work in the city executive committee until the mid-90s, after which she transferred elsewhere. But later, Nechitailo-Ridzhok decided to edit her past somewhat. The reasons for this purge of her biography remain unknown: was she removing references to combining public service with business, or to using her position and connections to develop her business, or… something much, much worse?
Valery Pakhomov
It's worth remembering that Horlivka in the 90s was the scene of brutal criminal showdowns between organized crime groups, primarily seeking to protect the retail and alcohol markets. The owners of Bayadera had to deal with at least four specialized organized crime groups: Borodavka and Khariton (the Yenakivsky gang, which dealt in vodka); Kolbasnik, Ded, Dagestanets, and Danil (the Kolbasnik gang, which extracted tribute from retail); the Voloshin brothers (who fought to monopolize alcohol production and sales in the city); and then Danilov's "Sportsmen" gang. But all these organized crime groups "ate" each other (I wonder what role the city government and Olga Vladimirovna personally played in this?), and by the beginning of the new century, Gorlovka was divided between the local corrupt police and the "overseers" of Yura Yenakievsky: first, Alexey Baturin (nickname "Batur"), and then Armen Sargsyan , nicknamed Armen Gorlovsky, who was also associated with ethnic Armenian organized crime groups.
Armen Sargsyan
And here's what's interesting: the incredibly profitable Bayadera business, a real juicy morsel for many a shark-raider, was never wrested from the strong hands of Olga Vladimirovna and her family, not even by the 90s gangsters, not by the Horlivka cops, not by the Donetsk prosecutors Pshonka and Kuzminykh , not by Yura Yenakievsky's "overseers," not by Sasha Stomatolog's (Oleksandr Yanukovych's) men. Even the relocation of Bayadera's head office from Horlivka to Kyiv in 2003 wasn't a flight from the region; on the contrary, it was an expansion of the business and a rise to a new level—and it coincided with the first mass relocation of the Donetsk gang to the capital (during Yanukovych's premiership). So, then, the owners of Bayadera were members of the Donetsk gang? In that case, they hid well, as no visible, publicly open relationship was observed between them.
But the story of Bayadera would be incomplete (and unlikely to be successful) without another member of this family business: Natalia Vladimirovna Bondareva (born November 10.11, 1961), Olga Vladimirovna's sister, who took over Boyadera after her death, effectively pushing her nephew out of the company's management and sending him to manage his "ECO-markets." Her biography has also been thoroughly scrubbed and sanitized, but it still contains a mention of her employment in the Horlivka tax office in 1993, which she quickly rose to become head of thanks to her sister's efforts.
Natalya Bondareva
So, the Bayadera company emerged as a business between two sisters: one held the post of deputy mayor of Horlivka (effectively running the city), the other was the head of the tax office. This business formula was simply destined for success! Especially considering that a significant portion of the Bayaderas' income came (and still comes) from tax and excise fraud.
But we've completely forgotten about Svyatoslav Igorevich! Yet he is formally considered the founder and principal owner of the Bayadera company—that's exactly how it's written in all the biographies and chronicles. Alas, it's only considered. Moreover, some of these chronicles are outright lies! For example, in 1991, Svyatoslav could hardly have become the company's founder, as he was only 17 years old. For this reason, his mother couldn't even transfer her kiosk business to her son until 1992. Moreover, the then-rich-boy's business thinking didn't extend beyond these kiosk stalls, and was entirely focused on money and pretty saleswomen. His mother and aunt carried the entire business on their own: allocating space for the stalls, privatizing former Soviet grocery stores, finding the right products, and resolving the issue of protection rackets and taxes.
In fact, in the early 1990s, Bayadera was a typical LLC, engaged in retail sales through kiosks and the first commercial stores. Its further development was determined by its focus on alcohol: after Natalia Bondareva began working in the tax office and handling tax and excise tax issues, Bayadera began to profitably sell vodka (including "diluted" vodka). And Bayadera took a step beyond kiosks: it began wholesale alcohol sales, supplying stores in Horlivka, then to other regions of Donbas, and further afield throughout Ukraine. It's worth emphasizing once again that doing this without contacts with the organized crime groups of the 1990s in Horlivka, who were "protecting" the business, was simply impossible—especially for the number one alcohol company in the city and region. So the Nechitailo-Bondareva family has much to hide and clean up in their murky past.
Svyatoslav Nechitailo and his "Bayadera" family: two billion for Putin from the "Gorlovka poisoners" family. PART 1
Svyatoslav Nechytailo. Vodka Wars
However, the biographies of the Nechitailo-Bondareva family have carefully erased not only episodes from the formation of their business in the 90s, mired in abuse of office, corruption, and ties to organized crime. Curiously, if you scour the media from 2003-2013 for scandals involving Ukraine's largest alcohol companies, you'll find virtually no mention of "Bayader"—except for one case involving the Teteriv distillery, and even then, "Bayader" is portrayed as the victim of dastardly competitors. A truly impeccable past! But Natalia Bondareva and her nephew overlooked one nuance: the Ukrainian alcohol market was (and still is) so heavily tainted with corruption and crime that looming large in its wake with a white face is more than suspicious!
To confirm this, let's look at the biography of such an intriguing figure as Yevgeny Chernyak , owner of the company "Global Spirits" and the brands "Khortytsa," "Shustov" (Odessa Cognac Factory), "Pervak," "Desna," "Chaika," "Russkiy Sever" (in Russia), and "Krymskiy Vinny Dom." He is another Ukrainian "vodka king" and, it would seem, Bayadera's main competitor. His name can even be found in the truncated biographies of both Olga Nechytailo-Ridzhok and Natalia Bondareva: it is Chernyak who is portrayed as their arch-enemy and corporate raider, allegedly attempting to "squeeze" their family business by releasing "Khlebodar" vodka at the Teteriv distillery—a counterpart to "Khlebny Dar," produced by the National Vodka Company (a Cherkasy distillery, a division of Bayadera). This is stated solely from the words of the business sisters themselves.
Evgeny Chernyak
However, Skelet.Org has other information regarding this scandalous case . For example, it was actually Bayadera who attempted to seize the Teterev distillery from under the very nose of Chernyak, who had taken a close look at it, and that the Khlebny Dar trademark appeared several years after Khlebodar. This information is supported by a compelling argument in the form of an appeal from the staff of Teterev Distillery LLC (April 2009), which identifies the owners of Bayadera as the raiders.
Appeal from the staff of the Teterev Distillery
Moreover, this story had a sequel, and some of the information published at the time has been preserved in the internet's vaults. Specifically, in March 2013, the judge mentioned in the appeal, Andriy Makukha of the Solomensky District Court of the capital (son-in-law of Kyiv judge Mykhailo Antonovych Bida), was arrested by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) – as the scale of his "caroling" exceeded even the corruption that existed during the Yanukovych regime. At the same time, brief information appeared in the media alleging that Makukha had assisted Bayadera in a 2009 raid on the Teteriv Distillery, the goal of which was to seize the company's brand and disrupt sales of its products. Afterward, the plant would simply be driven off the market and either acquired by larger companies or closed and destroyed. At the same time, the owners of Bayadera were called "Gorlovka raiders" associated with Armen Sarkisyan and Yuriy Ivanyushchenko.
Andrey Makukha
Incidentally, Judge Andriy Makukha was released a few months later: apparently, the size of the "payoff" he offered swayed high-ranking officials, and he had extensive connections, as he was issuing verdicts for very influential individuals. And already in the winter of 2013-2014, Makukha was actively handing down sentences to Euromaidan participants. But he continued to work successfully, so "productively" that in May 2016, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) took him up on the case against the management of the Odessa Port Plant, which Makukha had been trying to save from punishment. And what happened? Makukha got away with it again!
But let's return to Yevgeny Chernyak, who, in the dispute over the Teterev distillery, used the services of Vladimir Donin, a judge in the Ivanovo District Court of the Odessa Region who is also known for his corruption. According to Skelet.Org sources , Chernyak did attempt to take over Teterev to produce Khlebodar vodka. However, he didn't invent the brand, which already existed before the scandal; it was the brand itself that sparked Chernyak's interest in the distillery. But why? What happened between Chernyak and Bayadera back then? Was it simply competition? This question arises today because the vodka companies of Nechitailo-Bondareva and Chernyak currently coexist peacefully in the Russian town of Veliky Ustyug. But more on that later.
So, Mr. Chernyak was one of the "toughest" men in Zaporizhzhia, befriending many high-ranking officials and criminal "authorities"—including the thieves-in-law Kamo and Samvel Kharkovsky, as well as Artashes Sargsyan, the leader of the Zaporizhzhia ethnic organized crime group "Armenians." What exactly happened between the vodka magnates Chernyak and Nechitailo-Ridzhok-Bondareva between 2005 and 2010, when their companies were indeed competing in the alcohol market, is difficult to say: all information about it has been carefully erased. But if a war broke out between them, it was extinguished by the unquestionable authority and all-powerful influence of Yuriy Ivanyushchenko. Let us emphasize once again: the connections of the "Bayadere" sisters with the Horlivka "overseer" Armen Sargsyan, and through him with Ivanyushchenko, were obvious, although carefully concealed. Ivanyushchenko took advantage of Sargsyan’s connections among the Armenian diaspora and organized crime groups when he was taking control of Zaporizhzhia between 2008 and 2013.
Yuri Ivanyushchenko
The question immediately arises: could the conflict between Chernyak and Bayadera have been a consequence of Chernyak's attempts to keep Ivanyushchenko out of Zaporizhzhia? Perhaps he was thus targeting Ivanyushchenko's people, or even Ivanyushchenko himself? After all, according to some reports, Sergei Nechitailo, Olga Nechitailo-Ridzhok, and Natalia Bondareva weren't the only owners of companies in the Bayadera holding company; there were also some unnamed shareholders—possibly even Armen Gorlovsky and Yura Yenakievsky. Incidentally, when Ivanyushchenko finally gained control of Zaporizhzhia, thanks in part to Armen Sarkisyan, who lured the Armenian organized crime group over to Ivanyushchenko's side, he punished Chernyak by taking almost 50% of his company, Khortytsia, from him. And from that moment on, any conflicts between Global Spirits and Bayadera seemed to have ceased forever! So a logical assumption arises: is Yuri Ivanyushchenko or his trusted people co-owners of both holdings?
Another curious piece of information supports this: after "punishing" Chernyak, Yuriy Ivanyushchenko did not destroy him, but instead included him in his team of "overseers" in the Ukrainian alcohol market, along with Taras Petrakov, Ivan Avramov , and Armen Sarkisyan. This team completely controlled the Ukrspirt Group of Companies, orchestrating dizzying alcohol-related machinations: having reduced the production of legal, high-quality alcohol, the price of which was more than doubled, Ivanyushchenko's men created schemes for supplying illegal counterfeit alcohol to Ukrainian alcohol producers, and also collected tribute into a "slush fund." This was a thoroughly criminal, shadowy business, surrounded by piles of corpses. For example, in 2011, Viktor Porodko, director of the Ichnya distillery, was murdered (strangled): it was said that he did not want to pay the tribute, so Armen Gorlovskyi personally took charge of him. And in May 2017, the former director of Ukrspirt (in 2012-2013), Viktor Pankov, who was directly involved in Ivanyushchenko’s alcohol scams and who, as was said, knew too much, was shot dead in Kyiv.
Meanwhile, vodka and cognac production increased sharply between 2011 and 2013 (using counterfeit alcohol), and the closely related Global Spirits and Bayadera groups emerged as production leaders. Skelet.Org sources reported that they were the main buyers of the counterfeit alcohol that was then sold to Ukrainians—apparently, this was the secret to Bayadera's rapid success.
Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Org
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