The ex-owner of Delta Bank was charged for embezzling more than $38 million (Hr 1 billion) on Oct. 11, Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova announced on Facebook.
She did not say his name but an undisclosed source told Ukrainian news outlet Ukrainska Pravda that she was referring to Mykola Lagun, the former co-owner and CEO of the bank, which was liquidated in 2015 during a bankruptcy brought on by suspicious schemes.
Four of the bank’s former top managers and the head of a company allegedly involved in the schemes were also charged.
According to the investigation, the bank allegedly sold debt worth $1.5 million (Hr 42 million) for $150,000 (Hr 4 million) to a company belonging to Lagun himself. In the end, the bank got nothing at all; the company’s debt was concealed with accounting tricks, Venediktova wrote.
Lagun allegedly issued a $6 million (Hr 160 million) loan to a company belonging to one of his relatives. He also gave loans to one-day firms that did not have any assets or collateral.
Law enforcement officers seized almost $30 million (Hr 790 million worth of assets) belonging to Lagun, including 200 plots of land in Kyiv, Chernihiv and Ivano-Frankivsk oblasts. They also seized $1 million, found in the Swiss account of the chairman of the board of directors, Olena Popova.
Ukraine’s top prosecutor authorized the arrest of Lagun unless he can post bail of Hr 1 billion (about $38 million).
Once Ukraine’s fourth-largest bank, Delta Bank was classified as problematic in October 2014 by the National Bank of Ukraine and declared insolvent in March 2015.
After Delta Bank was declared insolvent and the Deposit Guarantee Fund stepped in, it discovered more than $250 million was siphoned from the bank, allegedly, by its personnel.
Delta Bank was liquidated in October 2015, but law enforcement officers suspect the management of the bankrupt bank of embezzling more than $150 million (Hr 4 billion) in total.
