Security Service of Ukraine or SBU detained Valeriy Chornobuk, a fugitive ex-head of the Court of Appeal of Crimea, on Nov. 3 in Kyiv, Slidstvo.info investigative news website reported. The judge is suspected of high treason.
Reached by the Kyiv Post, the SBU spokesperson Olena Gitlyanska confirmed the detention, adding that Chornobuk has been wanted since July. Back in July, prosecutors and SBU searched his office and apartment in Dnipro, but the ex-judge escaped and was in hiding.
Chornobuk was accused of high treason as he allegedly was encouraging other judges in Crimea to turn to the Russian side, and betrayed his oath to Ukraine after Russia occupied Crimea in 2014.
Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko published online two fragments of Chornobuk’s 2014 video interview to Slidstvo.info, where the judge says that the courts in Crimea must start working according to the law and constitution of Russia.
Ex-judge Valeriy Chornobuk is detained in Kyiv on Nov. 3. (Video by Slidtvo.info)
The judge had also denied he betrayed the oath to Ukraine. He said that the oath of a judge that he gave had nothing about being faithful to the Ukrainian people or government.
Chornobuk was appointed the head of Crimean Court of Appeal in 2011.
On the day of arrest, Chornobuk had a thick beard he didn’t wear before and was dressed in a cap and a hoodie, covering his face and head, shows Slidstvo.info video from the site.
Valeriy Chornobuk, then-head of the Court of Appeal of Crimea, pictured in 2014. (Courtesy)
In March 2014 Chornobuk was allegedly cooperating with Russian occupation authorities and had openly called other judges to start learning the legislation of Russian Federation in a message, published on the Court of Appeal website on March 25, Slidstvo.info reported on Nov. 3.
Chornobuk denied the allegations and said Russian authorities forced him to leave Crimea after the occupation.
Indeed, after annexation, he moved to Dnipro, an industrial city halfway between Kyiv and Crimea, and worked as a judge in the Court of Appeal of Dnipro until September 2016.
On Sept. 29, 2016, the day before the start of the court reform, the Verkhovna Rada fired Chornobuk, along with 18 other judges, who led politically motivated trials against the anti-government activists during the EuroMaidan Revolution in winter 2013-2014.
After the arrest, Chornobuk was taken to the Holosyivsky District Court of Kyiv where he will have a bail hearing.
