In the Lviv region, law enforcement officers have informed an entrepreneur of suspicion in the unauthorized seizure of a land plot measuring 2 hectares.
It has been established that in 2023, the owner and director of a limited liability company occupied and fenced off the land plot situated in one of the villages in the Lviv district without permission. **In doing so, the perpetrator restricted access to this land** and essentially incorporated it into his business operations. He was fully aware that the plot, larger than 2 hectares, was under the communal ownership of the village council and had no ownership or usage rights to it.
Subsequently, to conceal the unauthorized land seizure, the individual ensured the production of land management documentation for the plot, registered it in the State Land Cadastre, and registered permanent usage rights for the enterprise he led. As a result, the true owner of the property, the village council, suffered damages amounting to more than 460,000 hryvnias.
The perpetrator was exposed by investigators of the department handling crimes in the field of economic and official activities of the Lviv police’s investigative department, together with operatives of the Security Service of Ukraine’s Lviv Regional Directorate, under the procedural guidance of the Lviv Regional Prosecutor’s Office. He has been informed of suspicion in committing a criminal offense as per part 2 of article 197-1 (Unauthorized occupation of a land plot and unauthorized construction) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine and part 1 of article 209 (Legalization (laundering) of property obtained by criminal means) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. The maximum penalty provided by the articles’ sanctions is imprisonment for up to six years, with a prohibition on holding certain positions or engaging in certain activities for up to two years, and confiscation of property.
The pre-trial investigation is ongoing, and at the request of law enforcement, the court has seized the specified land plot.