Attempt to conceal assets: UA.NEWS journalist seeks to have a case opened against Judges Zhovnir and Marmash through the Court of Appeals
Grigory Zhovnir, the head of the Lychakiv District Court in Lviv, and Judge Volodymyr Marmash have found themselves in serious trouble for attempting to frame a journalist who had taken an interest in their assets. An official complaint against the two judges has been filed with the State Bureau of Investigations. They are accused of fabricating a criminal case against a UA.NEWS investigator in order to block the publication of a story about their foreign and Ukrainian assets. Now, for this fabrication, the judges face a very real charge of knowingly false reporting of a crime.
Background: A journalistic investigation and late-night threats
The conflict began during a UA.NEWS journalist’s official business trip to Lviv. While conducting his professional duties, the journalist managed to document evidence of judges potentially concealing income and real estate from mandatory disclosure. Specifically, Judge Volodymyr Marmash was found to have an undeclared right to use a parking space in Lviv, which is regularly used by his wife, who is also a judge.
Court President Hryhoriy Zhovnir was found to have rented out his wife’s apartment for $700 per month without reporting these amounts in his annual declaration.
Immediately after this information was documented and the investigator returned to Kyiv, he began receiving late-night threats via Telegram, warning of physical violence and the destruction of his property. The National Police have already opened a case regarding this incident under Part 1 of Article 345-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine concerning threats against a journalist, in which the press worker has been officially recognized as a victim.
Absurd accusations: an attempt to link the press’s work to a liquidated bank
Meanwhile, Judges Zhovnir and Marmash appealed to the High Council of Justice, the Office of the Prosecutor General, and the police with statements alleging that pressure was being exerted on them. They accused the investigator of attempting to influence the course of criminal proceedings that were pending in court at the time and to which the press representative had no connection whatsoever. Following this appeal, the Lviv police promptly opened a case under articles regarding interference in the activities of judicial bodies and fraud on an especially large scale. The investigation attempted to construct a narrative alleging that representatives of the liquidated JSC “Ibox Bank” had attempted to fraudulently influence the Lychakivsky District Court through the journalist.
However, the defense team for the UA.NEWS representative completely refuted these allegations with official documents attached to the statement filed with the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI). The journalist had never in his life conducted any investigations into the criminal proceedings mentioned by the judges, did not know Zhovnir or Marmash, and had never communicated with them. Additionally, in response to a legal inquiry, the Deposit Guarantee Fund officially confirmed that during the entire liquidation process of “Ibox Bank,” no complaints were received from depositors regarding the alleged misappropriation of their funds involving the journalist, and the Fund itself never filed any such reports with the police. Furthermore, an analysis of the court registry showed that during the period of the alleged “information attack,” there were no motions or any other materials related to the aforementioned criminal case pending before Presiding Judge Zhovnir, so it was impossible to exert pressure on the judge.
The judges used close relatives as witnesses against the journalist
The statement to the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) emphasizes that by knowingly making a false report of a criminal offense, Court President Zhovnir and Judge Marmash attempted to create artificial grounds for persecuting the journalist and to establish their own alibi to avoid accountability before the National Agency for Corruption Prevention (NACP) and the High Council of Justice. To lend as much credibility as possible to their statement, the judges called their own wives and mother-in-law as witnesses, who gave statements to the police about the journalist’s allegedly aggressive behavior while gathering information. However, the journalist’s defense already possesses full video recordings of these encounters, which clearly document exclusively proper press conduct during daylight hours with the presentation of a press card. These recordings are being prepared for submission to the State Bureau of Investigation as evidence that the witnesses provided knowingly false testimony.
It is emphasized that the actions of the Lviv judges directly violate Ukraine’s fundamental constitutional guarantees, specifically Part 3 of Article 15 of the Constitution of Ukraine, which prohibits censorship, and Article 24 of the Law of Ukraine “On Information,” which guarantees the prohibition of interference in the professional activities of journalists by public officials. Article 365 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine is also cited, as the judges intentionally committed acts that clearly exceed the powers granted to them, thereby causing harm to the legitimate interests of a citizen.
Relying on the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine, a representative of the UA.NEWS news agency officially requests that the State Bureau of Investigations immediately enter information into the Unified Register of Pre-trial Investigations regarding the knowingly false report of a crime committed by the head of the Lychakivsky District Court, Hryhoriy Zhovnir, and Judge Volodymyr Marmash.
The Kyiv Court of Appeals ruled that the SBI’s inaction and the first-instance ruling were unlawful
The press representative’s defense has already achieved its first procedural victories in the courts of the Kyiv region. Specifically, a panel of judges from the Criminal Chamber of the Kyiv Court of Appeals overturned the preliminary ruling of the investigating judge of the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv. Previously, the court of first instance had groundlessly refused to grant the complaint regarding the inaction of investigators from the State Bureau of Investigations, who found no grounds to open proceedings against Judges Marmash and Zhovnir.
The Kyiv Court of Appeals found these conclusions to be premature and determined that the court of first instance had committed substantial violations of criminal procedural law and had conducted an incomplete review. The panel of judges, led by Presiding Judge I. Mosondz, emphasized that the subject of the appeal is solely the inaction of authorized officials of the State Bureau of Investigations, who ignored the journalist’s official statement and failed to provide any information regarding the results of its review. Currently, the appellate court has fully granted the media worker’s defense requests, reinstated the appeal deadlines, and scheduled a new hearing of the complaint in the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv, ordering a thorough review of all arguments presented by the journalists.
