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VB Partners has developed a successful strategy and provided support to the Austrian lawyers representing the former Deputy Chairman of the Management Board of Ukrgasbank, one of Ukraine’s systemically important banks with a capital of over UAH 8.9 billion, in a high-stakes extradition case involving allegations of large-scale misappropriation.
The Ukrainian authorities alleged that the Client was involved in creating a criminal organization that unlawfully diverted over UAH 206 million of the bank’s funds through payments to individual entrepreneurs and companies for agency services that were never rendered.
Our team developed a comprehensive legal position that highlighted the inadmissibility of the Client’s extradition due to:
1. The ongoing war in Ukraine, and
2. The substantial risk of serious violations of the Client’s rights to defence and a fair trial – with over 20 procedural violations documented during the pre-trial investigation by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, and the investigating judge.
Result – the court in the Republic of Austria refused to extradite the Client in a landmark decision, marking a significant victory for the VB Partners White-Collar Crime and Extradition practice.