From dynastic interiors to pre-trial detention center: Who is really behind Yermak’s rescue?
On Thursday, May 13, a court remanded former Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak in custody for two months as a preventive measure, with bail set at 140 million. It took four days to secure his release from the pre-trial detention center.
Over these days, Yermak's public image has made a 180-degree turn — from almost demonic omnipotence to an object of ridicule due to advice from a feng shui specialist and sand stolen from a cemetery.
Furthermore, it highlighted several things that should serve as a lesson for others in the future. Although... that is unlikely.
First, power is a transient category.
Second, in today's world, one can organize money laundering schemes, but there is a 99% probability that these schemes will be uncovered, whereas posting legal money for bail will be very difficult.
Third, the institution of reputation works in Ukraine.
Fourth, no one has canceled the Al Capone precedent, where he was jailed not for murders but for unpaid taxes.
Fifth, building an estate while in power is a 100% guarantee of getting into a scandal. This was proven by Kuchma's "Syniohora", Yushchenko's Bezradychi, and Yanukovych's Honka.
Actually, let us start with the construction.
On May 11, NABU and SAPO served a notice of suspicion to the former Head of the Presidential Office, Andriy Yermak, for participating in a scheme to legalize 460 million hryvnias connected to the elite construction of the "Dynasty" residential complex.
The construction of this estate began in Kozyn in 2020 on 8 hectares of land previously purchased by companies affiliated with former Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Chernyshov. In particular, the "Soniachnyi Bereh" housing cooperative, which first surfaced in another case against Chernyshov last year when he was accused of receiving an improper advantage in the form of apartments from one of the developers.
According to the calculations of anti-corruption agencies, the construction costs more than 8 million dollars, roughly 2 million per house. Merely the project documentation cost $735,000.
The construction was carried out by the "Aktiv Technology" company. The company has a fairly broad profile — taking on work ranging from the reconstruction of the Pechersk Lavra to the construction of the Kyiv-Odesa highway, and from a distribution center for the Roshen company to the "Koncha-Zaspa" residential and recreational complex with an entertainment center and a golf course.
"Chernyshov was supposed to become the owner of residence R4, Mindich — R3, and Yermak — R2," stated prosecutor Valentyna Hrebeniuk during the hearing.
A communal building named R0 was also planned to accommodate a spa area.
It was not mentioned in court who was supposed to own residence R1. Earlier, the NABU Director and the Head of SAPO stated that the president is protected from investigative actions by immunity.
According to the prosecutor, the financing of the "Dynasty" construction was carried out in three ways:
- replenishing the fund by depositing funds in the form of share contributions obtained from transactions with fictitious companies;
- utilizing cash obtained through corruption in the energy sector;
- utilizing cash of unestablished origin.
In the communications of the Tsukerman laundromat participants, the group referred to the "Dynasty" construction as the "Big Construction" (evidently by analogy with the "Great Construction," which was the president's key program before the war).
"In total, 264,864,144 UAH was paid to the accounts of Aktiv Technology LLC. And overall, during 2020-2025, Chernyshov, Yermak, and Mindich invested funds into the construction of the residences ... totaling 460,122,207 hryvnias," the prosecutor stated in court.
The construction was primarily overseen by Timur Mindich, who organized the money laundering, and Oleksii Chernyshov, who paid the contractors. On behalf of Mindich, representative functions were performed by architect Nataliia Kvelenkova, and on behalf of Chernyshov — by his assistant Maryna Medvedieva.
It should be noted that Kvelenkova is the second wife of Yurii Kvelenkov. His first marriage as a producer was to Kateryna Buzhynska, and he was also friends with the late owner of ‘Inter’, Ihor Pluzhnikov. As is well known, a significant part of the development of ‘95 Kvartal’ is linked to ‘Inter’.
Judging by what was stated in court, Yermak did not involve himself much in the construction matters. He periodically approved the interior design with Kvelenkova. Among the architect's recovered conversations, there is a fragment: "Andriy… I have looked at everything… this time, 10 minutes will not be enough."
"No later than August 26, 2022, Yermak instructed his father, Borys Mykhailovych Yermak, to inform Kvelenkova that she was granted the authority to exercise further control over the construction on his behalf, which was carried out using funds the factual circumstances of which indicate their criminal origin," the prosecutor stated in court.
It is interesting to note that, judging by their correspondence and conversations, Mindich and Yermak did not trust Chernyshov very much and demanded reports from the contractors. This is also evidenced by conversations between Mindich and Kvelenkova, in which they suspect that Chernyshov was building at their expense.
"Serhii, my dear, everything was clear to me even after our meeting. I want our position to be clear. As a person who is directly related to R2 and has the corresponding authority from him, which you are aware of, I want not only to track what the funds transferred for the construction of R2 are spent on but also to participate in the approval process, including tender procedures for the procurement costs of materials and equipment, as well as to conduct an audit of the certificates of completed works," writes Yermak's father to Serhii Siranchuk, who was handling the construction on behalf of Chernyshov.
From the materials of the case, which was heard concurrently and concerned Chernyshov's assistant Medvedieva, it is clear that NABU detectives found most of the evidence regarding expenses either in the Tsukerman laundromat or with the contractors who carried out the construction. Specifically, on a Dell laptop seized from Vitalii Semenovych Nikolaienko, the construction project manager.
Among these correspondences, there is a mention that "R2 requires a certificate and acts; tomorrow will not work for him."
There is also correspondence from Olha Novikova, who also approved the design, where both Chernyshov and Yermak are mentioned: "our plans changed three times a day: first Chernyshov canceled the meeting, then Yermak scheduled one for Saturday evening."
The most cynical moment in the case is found in the correspondence of Oleksii Chernyshov with his wife Svitlana, where on March 29, 2022, he writes that he informed Siranchuk about the need to resume work because "windows, the roof, and roofing tiles are supposed to arrive, they have been ordered."
That is, at the moment when the Kyiv and Chernihiv regions had only just been liberated, and everyone was merely awaiting the shock of Bucha, Chernyshov was interested in roofing tiles.
During the hearings, several lawyers even expressed doubt in public posts that sufficient evidence had been presented for Article 209. However, the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC) still imposed a preventive measure on Andriy Yermak.
The most interesting part began later when the need to post bail arose. While in the case of the "Midas" case defendants, the bail money was collected several weeks before the notices of suspicion were served, here the funds were unavailable. And Andriy Yermak had to rent a paid cell in the pre-trial detention center.
The initial "donations" for the bail were small, but came from rather specific individuals. Yermak's acquaintance and the director of Babyn Yar, Roza Topanova, gave 8 million; Yermak's university classmate, lawyer Serhii Svyryba, transferred 6.5 million; Yermak's lawyer, Ihor Fomin, provided 5 million; and the former head coach of the Ukrainian national football team, Serhii Rebrov, contributed 30 million. Volodymyr Petrov, a black PR strategist who has been accused for years of cooperating with the Presidential Office, donated 80,000. Hryhorii Hryshkan, Alkhim's future husband, deposited 666 UAH.
After Petrov's public appeal to collect money for donations, many people mockingly threw in 6.66 UAH or mere kopecks.
However, the bulk of the money was collected on Friday, provided by seven legal entities.
Here is what the DEJURE Foundation gathered about these companies.
- The De Lege Lata Attorneys at Law (AL) posted 14 million UAH. According to YouControl, its owner is Vitalii Marfin. Marfin is a former employee of the SSU unit for counterintelligence protection of the economy. In 2011, he was detained for receiving a $180,000 bribe. The court found him guilty, Marfin spent almost a year behind bars, and, after his actions were reclassified, he received only a fine of 17,000 hryvnias as a punishment.
- Marfin is also the husband of Nataliia Marfina, a judge at the Dniprovskyi District Court of Kyiv.
- The A.DVA.KA.T Attorneys at Law posted 4 million UAH. Its head, Yaroslav Kuts, is the Deputy Chairman of the UNBA Committee on Information Policy. This committee was previously headed by lawyer Oleksii Shevchuk, the UNBA speaker, and is now headed by Shevchuk's business partner Yurii Radzievskyi. According to AntAC, it was Shevchuk who wanted to stand surety for Yermak, but ultimately did not appear at the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC) for the preventive measure hearing.
- The Scientific and Research Forensic Expert Institution posted 30 million UAH. It should be noted that this is a private entity. Until September 2025, it participated in government agency tenders for conducting forensic examinations. In a comment to Schemes journalists, its head explained the contribution as a personal whim — "I just wanted to," and called it "advertising."
- "SU "SEM" LLC: the largest corporate donor, contributing 32 million UAH. This is a Dnipro-based construction company founded in 2000; its head is Valerii Rieznik.
- "SV-GROUP" PE posted 10.2 million UAH. It is an automobile trading company.
- "Miralif" LLC posted another 9.8 million UAH. There are currently no public explanations as to why these specific companies decided to finance the bail for the former Head of the Presidential Office. According to media reports, the company's director, Valentyn Krutko, was involved in a 2018 nightclub shooting case in Ivano-Frankivsk and was convicted along with other participants. He also heads "Vita DKD" LLC, which is associated with the Sivkovych group.
- "Arena Marin" LLC, a logistics firm with a registered capital of 40,000 UAH, managed to deposit 4 million.
According to rumors, an exchange rate of 1:3 was offered for clean money to secure Yermak's release. Yaroslav Zhelezniak filmed an entire program about the difficulties of collecting this money. Specifically, that many banks did not want to process the funds. Notably, Sense Bank, where Yermak had arranged a position for Vasyl Veselyi. Both Zhelezniak and ZN.UA report that although the president did not speak publicly about the process, internally there was a signal to both Budanov and Arakhamiia to help with the bail.
In this context, it is interesting that a 10% stake in "SU "SEM" LLC is held by "AMC TEMP" LLC, which was owned by the Cyprus-based company "Pandais Limited" until May 2025. The latter, however, is already associated with Serhii Tihipko, who, as "Chesno" discovered, is an advisor to the new Head of the Presidential Office, Kyrylo Budanov.
It was through this company that Tihipko purchased the Ukraine Minerals company from VTB in 2018 over debts.
As is known, Budanov and Yermak have never been friends. The new Head of the Presidential Office did not even move into his predecessor's office. And his advisor, Leshchenko, inherited from Yermak, even reshared posts about "Veronika feng shui" for some reason. Although a year ago, he vehemently defended Yermak for attending Mylovanov's notorious Chatham House.
Therefore, the issue of the appearance of a company affiliated with Tihipko will still have to be investigated.
In the meantime, it is interesting whether there will be more notices of suspicion in the "Midas" case. After all, many interesting details about this story were voiced last week, in particular within Oleksii Honcharenko's Temporary Investigative Commission (TIC).
Tetiana Nikolaienko, "Censor.NET"
