Members of the groups organized the sale of methadone on the territory of the region and in places of deprivation of liberty. The drug dealers’ business was interconnected — members of one of the groups were regular wholesale buyers of “goods” from another group.
As determined by the operatives of the Strategic Investigation Department in the Lviv region together with the investigators of the regional police, the “wholesalers” were directly involved in the supply, packaging and sale of large batches of narcotic substances in the territory of the Lviv region. The criminal group consisted of residents of Lviv and Vinnytsia regions. Each figure was responsible for his own line of work in the “drug business”: organizing the supply of large batches of methadone to the region, issues of logistics, distribution and sale of narcotic substances both to individuals and to members of other criminal groups specializing in the sale of prohibited substances among the population.
Each month, the accused sold methadone in the amount of 2 to 5 million hryvnias. The funds received were used to purchase new batches of narcotic substances and pay for the illegal actions of drug gang members.
Individual items of this income were provided by members of the second criminal group, who constantly bought drugs from them. The perpetrators sold part of the purchased goods to prisoners in prisons and to representatives of crime in exchange for the so-called “crushing” of their business.
One of the members of this group ensured the transportation of methadone to penitentiary institutions in the territory of Lviv Region. Later, the trustees packed the “goods” into separate doses and distributed them among the prisoners.
The law enforcement officers conducted 13 authorized searches of residences and detention cells of the accused, as well as vehicles. Two members of the group were detained directly during the transportation of another batch of purchased “goods”. In total, 1.2 kg of methadone was seized, the value of which on the black market is about UAH 2.2 million.
So far, eight members of the two groups have been charged under Articles 2 and 3. 307 (Illegal production, manufacturing, acquisition, storage, transportation, forwarding or sale of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (committing a crime as part of an organized group). Precautionary measures were chosen for them in the form of detention.
The extras face punishment in the form of deprivation of liberty for a term of nine to twelve years with confiscation of property.
Procedural management in criminal proceedings is carried out by the Lviv Regional Prosecutor’s Office. The events were held with the participation of the Security Service of Ukraine in the Lviv region.
Department of Strategic Investigations
National Police of Ukraine