The Podilskyi District Prosecutor's Office of Kyiv has filed charges against a 54-year-old woman. She is accused of fraud with money for the purchase of Mavic drones.
This was reported by the press service of the Kyiv City Prosecutor's Office.
The investigation established that the suspect's accounts received money from people who wanted to purchase drones. Law enforcement officers believe that the organizer of the scheme was her daughter, who in one of the Telegram channels where volunteers communicated, presented herself as a reliable supplier of Mavic UAVs from abroad.
“To pay for the drones, she gave the buyers her mother's bill. So, in 2024, the victims transferred 540 thousand hryvnias to it. At the same time, they never saw the promised drones, and the money was not returned to them either,” the report says.
Her actions were classified under Part 4 of Article 190 Fraud committed by a group of persons in a prior conspiracy, under martial law, on a large scale under the Criminal Code of Ukraine. The sanction of the article provides for up to eight years of imprisonment. The materials of the pre-trial investigation regarding the organizer of the illegal activity and another of her accomplices have been separated into separate proceedings, and they have been declared wanted.
In December last year, the prosecutor's office reported that law enforcement officers had reported the suspicion to a 30-year-old woman (the alleged organizer), her mother, and an acquaintance. At that time, the investigation established that the accomplices first defrauded a volunteer of over UAH 500,000, and later two of the defendants took possession of another over UAH 1.5 million of funds from a company that wanted to purchase drones for the military.
The organizer of the scheme and her 28-year-old accomplice fled abroad. They were charged in absentia under Part 5 of Article 190 Taking someone else's property by deception (fraud) on a large scale, committed under martial law, in prior conspiracy by a group of persons, committed repeatedly Criminal Code of Ukraine. The sanction of the article provides for up to 12 years of imprisonment with deprivation of the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for a term of up to three years with confiscation of property.