Former KRAIL head Ivan Rudyi may be released on bail after spending a year and a half in pretrial detention

Ivan Rudyi, the former head of the Commission for the Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries (KRAIL), who is accused of a number of serious crimes, has been granted bail. The Obukhiv District Court of Kyiv Oblast reviewed the pretrial detention measure and ordered him to post bail in the amount of 3.32 million hryvnias as an alternative to pretrial detention. 

The former official had been held in a pretrial detention center without the right to post bail since late December 2024.

The prosecutor insisted in court on continuing the detention without an alternative, emphasizing the risks of the defendant absconding, pressuring witnesses, or committing new offenses. For their part, the defense and Rudyi himself requested a less restrictive preventive measure, citing a significant deterioration in his health, past combat injuries, and type II diabetes diagnosed while in the pretrial detention center. The court partially agreed with the prosecution’s arguments regarding the existence of risks, but took the circumstances into account and set the amount of bail, despite the fact that Rudyi is accused of aiding an aggressor state, as well as the illegal possession of ammunition and narcotics.

This was reported by the news outlet Glavkom, citing materials from the court registry.

As a reminder, Ivan Rudyi became chairman of the Commission for the Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries on October 28, 2020. The State Bureau of Investigations detained him on December 18, 2024, in connection with the case involving the Pin-Up online casino, which has ties to Russia. The CRAIL chairman was charged with aiding an aggressor state and with possession of narcotics (cocaine was found on him during his arrest). 

According to the investigation, Rudyi facilitated the operations in Ukraine of the Pin-Up online casino, which is owned by Russians, and failed to take measures to revoke its license.

Also, according to court documents, Pin-Up in Ukraine collected data on Ukrainian military personnel, law enforcement officers, and those subject to military conscription—including their locations—which could have harmed the country’s defense capabilities. 

For more details on how Pin-Up may have corrupted Ukrainian courts, government agencies, and law enforcement officials, see our article “Pin-Up’s Web of Corruption: From Bribes to Judges to Informants at NSDC Meetings.”