The Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAP) has filed a motion with the court to apply a preventive measure to Serhiy Krapiva, Deputy Head of the Department of International Legal Cooperation at the Office of the Prosecutor General (OPG). This is reported by RBC-Ukraine, citing a live broadcast of the court hearing. The prosecutors are insisting that the suspect be held in custody, with an alternative bail of 200 million hryvnia.
Details of the motion and procedural status
During the court hearing, the prosecution officially asked the court to apply a preventive measure in the form of detention to Krapiva. Should the court deem it necessary to give the suspect the opportunity to avoid arrest, the prosecutors are demanding that an alternative bail of 200 million hryvnia be set. According to the investigation's assessment, this amount reflects the scale of the alleged damage and the degree of the defendant's involvement in the activities of the organized criminal group. At the time of the hearing, the decision on the motion had not yet been announced.
Operation 'Carthage': the scale of the investigation
The SAP's motion is one of the episodes of a large-scale special operation under the code name 'Carthage,' within the framework of which anti-corruption authorities exposed a criminal organization operating with the involvement of an official of the Office of the Prosecutor General. According to the investigation, the group systematically received bribes from fraudulent call centers and was involved in laundering an illegally obtained fortune worth millions. Law enforcement carried out a series of detentions and searches, which allowed them to document the key elements of the scheme and establish the links between the members of the network.
The 'protection' scheme and money laundering
According to the investigation materials, the group's operating mechanism was based on so-called 'protection' (krysha) — providing cover for fraudulent call centers in exchange for regular payments. The funds received were then funneled through a chain of legal transactions to launder them. The role of the OPG officials in this scheme was to ensure 'protection' from law enforcement and to conceal the traces of the financial operations. Details of exactly how the scheme worked and whom the detectives detained were previously revealed in a separate RBC-Ukraine article.
Contradictory data
When cross-checking the information from the original text and the source headlines, a discrepancy was found in the spelling of the defendant's surname. In the main body of the news and during the broadcast of the hearing, the spelling 'Krapiva' (in the dative case — 'Krapive') is used, whereas in the headline of the RBC-Ukraine publication (source_id 1) the spelling 'Kropyvye' is used. The difference may be due to a typo when typing the headline, transliteration peculiarities, or the variability of the Ukrainian/Russian spelling of the surname. Until official confirmation by the court or SAP, the correct spelling remains subject to clarification. In addition, the provided additional sources (korrespondent.net, news.liga.net) cover other procedural episodes — the case related to the 'Mindyk films' and the change of the preventive measure for Yermak — which neither confirm nor refute the details of the motion in Krapiva's case.
The court's decision on the SAP's motion regarding the preventive measure for Serhiy Krapiva is expected in the near future. The outcome of the hearing will determine whether the defendant in the 'Carthage' case will be held in custody or will be able to continue cooperating with the investigation under a 200 million hryvnia bail. The case remains one of the most high-profile anti-corruption investigations involving the top echelons of Ukraine's prosecutorial system.
