{"id":1240682,"date":"2025-06-12T14:07:47","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T11:07:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/the-gray-cardinal-of-the-judicial-system-how-portnov-influenced-the-state-bureau-of-investigation-and-the-courts-investigation\/"},"modified":"2025-06-12T14:07:47","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T11:07:47","slug":"the-gray-cardinal-of-the-judicial-system-how-portnov-influenced-the-state-bureau-of-investigation-and-the-courts-investigation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/the-gray-cardinal-of-the-judicial-system-how-portnov-influenced-the-state-bureau-of-investigation-and-the-courts-investigation\/","title":{"rendered":"The \u201cGray Cardinal\u201d of the Judicial System: How Portnov Influenced the State Bureau of Investigation and the Courts \u2013 Investigation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andriy Portnov, an advisor to fugitive President Yanukovych, had influence not only on Ukraine’s judicial system, but also on law enforcement officers.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This was reported<\/a> in Texty.<\/p>\n

Portnov’s control over the SBI<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

One of Portnov’s main levers of influence was the State Intelligence Service, which helped him promote his hostility towards Poroshenko and other representatives of the government of that time, as well as avoid responsibility for his activities under Yanukovych.<\/p>\n

People’s Deputy of the 8th convocation Tetyana Chornovol stated in 2019 that the then head of the State Bureau of Investigation Roman Truba was controlled by Portnov and therefore the latter was not accountable to justice.<\/p>\n

“He controls the head of the State Bureau of Investigation, Roman Truba, so much that we have been charged with treason!” Chornovol wrote<\/a> on her Facebook page.<\/p>\n

It states that, at Portnov’s request, the head of the State Bureau of Investigation opened a case “on the fact of organizing a counteroffensive by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which resulted in the liberation of Sloviansk, Bakhmut, and Severodonetsk.”<\/p>\n

In the so-called “sailors’ case,” according to Petro Poroshenko’s lawyer Ihor Golovan, Portnov gained access to secret information through connections in the State Bureau of Investigation.<\/p>\n

It is noted that Portnov did not hold any position and actively commented on the progress of the case even before the release of official reports from law enforcement officers.<\/p>\n

Portnov’s influence on the courts and the fight against the media<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

It is known that Portnov influenced the appointment of many judges. A specific example in July 2019 was given by the then head of the Special Investigations Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office, Serhiy Horbatyuk: “Information has been received that one of the leaders from the Yanukovych era influenced the change in the leadership of the Kyiv Court of Appeal. Literally over the last two months… he influenced – and they changed.”<\/p>\n

Horbatyuk did not specify the names of the judge and official, but Interfax-Ukraine<\/a> writes that they are Volodymyr Melnyk and Andriy Portnov, respectively.<\/p>\n

During his career in this position, Melnyk became the subject of several scandals and journalistic investigations.<\/p>\n

The public organization Chesno analyzed<\/a> Portnov’s numerous lawsuits against Ukrainian media outlets and activists, which he won, despite the obvious value judgments in his publications and statements.<\/p>\n

For example, in 2019, Andriy Portnov sued<\/a> Channel 24, the Prosecutor General’s Office, and the head of the Central Criminal Procedure Code for alleged defamation in one of the media programs.<\/p>\n

This case was considered by judge Tetyana Iliev of the Pechersk District Court. She granted the claim. Judges Olena Shkorina, Lyubov Polyvach, and Anatoliy Stryzheus of the Kyiv Court of Appeal also sided with<\/a> Portnov.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In 2023, Judge Tetyana Ileva, who granted the lawsuit, was<\/a> suspected of abuse of power and entering knowingly false information into the ruling.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A year after the previous lawsuit, Andriy Portnov also brought charges<\/a> against the “Schemes” project, “Hromadske”, the “Pryamiy” TV channel, and other media workers. Then, Pechersk court judge Oleksiy Sokolov also satisfied the lawsuit of the odious fugitive, and the aforementioned judges of the appellate instance supported him.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Sanctions against Portnov<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

In 2021, Andriy Portnov was subject to US sanctions for human rights violations and large-scale corruption. In the US, he was accused of influencing Ukrainian courts.<\/p>\n

However, Portnov did not receive any punishment in Ukraine. In January 2025, despite a petition to apply personal sanctions against him, the Ministry of Economy, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the BEB, the SBU, and the National Police stated that there was “no information on the existence of grounds for applying special measures.”<\/p>\n

Portnov under Zelensky<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Portnov’s influence on the Ukrainian authorities remained palpable even despite the full-scale invasion until the politician’s death in Madrid. All the news reports, citing Ukrainska Pravda<\/a> , reported that Andriy Portnov had traveled to Ukraine a few days before the murder and met with top officials responsible for the work of law enforcement agencies.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Journalist Danylo Mokryk says<\/a> in his investigation that political strategist Volodymyr Petrov, who now works for the current government, used to call Portnov his friend. But now it is “toxic” for the government and its staff to mention Portnov, so they are simply silent, the journalist notes.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In addition to Petrov, according to the journalist, Maksym Buzhansky, a People’s Deputy from the Servant of the People faction, was “sad” by Portnov’s death.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“At one time, he very actively “licked” Andriy Portnov on his Telegram channel and very warmly and flatteringly congratulated him on his birthday,” says Mokryk. However, on the day of Portnov’s death, Maksym Buzhansky remained silent.<\/p>\n

It was previously reported that on May 21 , former advisor to Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Andriy Portnov, was shot dead near Madrid.<\/a><\/p>\n

It should be noted that Andriy Portnov was the main coordinator of the authorities in criminal cases against Petro Poroshenko through the security forces and judges under his control.<\/a> <\/p>\n

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Also follow \u201c Pryamym<\/strong> \u201d on Facebook<\/a> , Twitter<\/a> , Telegram<\/a> , and Instagram<\/a> .<\/p>\n

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<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Andriy Portnov, an advisor to fugitive President Yanukovych, had influence not only on Ukraine’s judicial system, but also on law enforcement officers. This was reported in Texty. Portnov’s control over the SBI One of Portnov’s main levers of influence was the State Intelligence Service, which helped him promote his hostility towards Poroshenko and other representatives […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":1240832,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[76871,76872,76878,76885],"class_list":["post-1240682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-2","category-news-feed","category-society","category-policy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1240682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1240682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1240682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1240832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1240682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1240682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}