In the Kamen-Kashira region, an illegal logging scheme was exposed. The damage is estimated at 10 million hryvnia.
Volyn police exposed a criminal group of massive timber theft. According to preliminary estimates, the damage may reach at least 10 million hryvnias. The press service of the National Police reported this on Thursday, December 7.
The director of a private enterprise specializing in the manufacture of sawmills and officials of local state forestry enterprises organized a scheme for the systematic illegal cutting of trees from forests in the Kamen-Kashirsky district .
To implement his idea, the businessman organized his own group of hired workers who carried out illegal harvesting of spruce and pine trees. The cut wood was taken to a sawmill controlled by the defendant and, after processing, sold in the form of pallet boards.
We sold manufactured forest products in Ukraine and abroad. To cover up their criminal activities, the defendants involved a private businessman in the scheme. He officially bought small quantities of wood, thus ensuring the conditional legality of illegal transactions.
The cutting of wood was carried out with the permission and help of local forest workers – for a fee, the officials did not interfere with the illegal actions of the “black” loggers. Criminals illegally export about 250 cubic meters of wood worth more than 600 thousand hryvnias from state forest farms every month. According to preliminary estimates only, the damage to the environment caused by the illegal activities of the defendants may amount to at least 10 million Hryvnias.
Law enforcement officers conducted searches at the addresses of forest enterprises in the Kamen-Kashirsky district, at the sites of illegal band sawmills and storage of forest products, as well as at places of the residence of the defendants. Seized were computer equipment, “draft” records and more than 500 cubic meters of unaccounted wood, some of which had marks that underestimated the grade of the wood and had obvious signs of forgery. The value of seized raw materials is more than 2 million hryvnias.
Currently, steps are being taken to confiscate the confiscated forest products. After completing all procedural steps, it is planned to notify the members of the criminal group about the suspicions. Fraud participants face a prison sentence of 5 to 8 years.
Let us remind you that in the Chernigov region the director of the forestry enterprise is suspected of logging worth 39 million Hryvnia. And in the Carpathian region, the SBU blocked a large-scale timber smuggling channel.
Source: korrespondent
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