Sweet customs life
If people are used to stealing, they will continue to do so. This is exactly what the law enforcement agencies thought when they visited the former heads of the Torfyanovka and Brusnichnoye customs posts. The FSB and the Investigative Committee were not mistaken. During searches, 32 million rubles in foreign currency were accidentally found at the good government tax collectors. Behind the money is a long history of bribery and patronage.
Fine for bribe
The beginning of the high-profile arrest and stunning searches was the inconspicuous verdict of the Vyborg City Court of the Leningrad Region. At the end of April 2024, the court sentenced the former deputy head of the department of customs clearance and customs control of the customs post of the Svetogorsk international checkpoint of the Vyborg customs. He was found guilty of intermediary in giving a bribe (Part 2 of Article 291.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country)) and received as punishment only a fine of 400 thousand rubles and a ban on holding positions in the customs authorities of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country) for a period of three years. Such a merciful attitude of the court and a lenient sentence could be explained by the fact that in February of this year the North-Western Transport Prosecutor’s Office approved an indictment against the head of the same customs post of the Svetogorsk international checkpoint, who was accused of receiving bribes on a large and especially large scale ( clause “c” of Part 5, Part 6 of Article 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country)) and perhaps the ex-deputy simply cooperated with the investigation.
But if you look a little further, it turns out that the situation is not so clear-cut. After all, the name of the deputy cannot be found in any official press release. And in the video his face is carefully covered up.
What corruption crimes did the investigation reveal? It was established that from November 2016 to April 2017, the head of the Svetogorsk post received bribes 5.5 million rubles from merchant organizations for unhindered customs clearance of vehicles with goods. As a result, the state missed customs payments for 15 million rubles.
But something else interesting came to light. Despite the fact that both bribe takers (the bribe taker and the middleman) no longer had anything to do with customs, the funny “scheme” continued to work. The well-being of the ex-post chief prompted law enforcement officers to believe that the bribery episodes were not isolated, but rather a regular occurrence. He was found to have 5 real estate properties and 2 expensive cars, which, according to the prosecutor’s office, he could not have bought with his salary. As a result, the prosecutors, having thought about it, decided to file a claim for the transfer to the state of all this goodness, which, “between us girls,” led to 50 million rubles.
Our information:
In 2023, the North-Western Customs Administration brought 16 customs officials, including 11 former employees, to criminal responsibility, opened 22 criminal cases (corruption-related), including 12 criminal cases on the facts of receiving bribes, of which 8 – on the facts receiving illegal funds on a large and especially large scale (parts 5 and 6 of Article 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country)).
Corruption flow
So, the lenient punishment imposed by the Vyborg City Court on the former deputy customs post of the Svetogorsk international checkpoint has borne fruit. During the investigation of the previous case, it turned out that the defendant received cash tranches from the general directors of Megalogistic LLC and Vyborg-Trans LLC. The money was intended as a bribe for customs officers. The entire chain had to be installed.
The FSB, with the support of investigators, using leads from the first case, found a whole network of accomplices who were happy to relieve unnecessary troubles from businessmen if they were “golden” their pockets.
It turned out that the “scheme” worked with the direct participation of senior shift employees at the customs post at the Torfyanovka checkpoint. The case also involved individual heads of the customs posts “Torfyanovka” and “Brusnichnoye”, who, using their official position for selfish purposes, with a zeal worthy of Stakhanovites, dashingly and quickly passed through customs cargo and goods from those very generous companies in record time .
After the searches, a lot was explained. Especially the zeal for Stakhanov’s work. Customs officers found more 3 million rublesmore than 290 thousand US dollars, more 30 thousand euros, bank cards, mobile phones. In general, everything that testified to painstaking group activity, which the investigation readily qualifies. The total amount seized was 32 million rubles. Now the operational investigation team is looking for the remaining accomplices and finding out all the nuances of that wonderful scheme that so helped merchants in their business and enriched customs officers.
Our information:
According to the NWTU, in 2023, anti-corruption units received 39 notifications of facts of inducing customs officers to commit corruption offenses. 29 criminal cases have been initiated against bribers. Bribes were given by both representatives of commercial organizations and individuals.
Greed and history
Somehow it happened that Vyborg customs workers are subject to the same sin – terrible greed. A terrible vice has long been firmly established at this customs, clutching the throat of every new arrival with a fat, oily hand.
It is not at all surprising that the name of customs appears so often in the city’s criminal chronicles. In 2021, an employee (chief inspector of the department of customs clearance and customs control No. 2) of the customs post of the Buslovskaya railway point in the Vyborg region was caught taking a bribe. He took bribes from businessmen for help with the passage of goods. Searches in his apartment gave investigators whole stacks of dollars as evidence. This, as the investigation suggested, was only part of the tranche. The money was transferred to the customs officer because he promised to share with them the database of the electronic archival storage system for legally significant customs documents (AS “AYUD”), which contains information about goods that are declared when moving across the border.
Brokers decided to buy information in order to successfully evade paying duties.
In the same 2021, the Western Interregional Investigation Department for Transport of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country) accused the inspector of the Torfyanovka international checkpoint of the Vyborg customs of bribery on an especially large scale. According to investigators, he regularly received thick stacks of bills from entrepreneurs importing electronics from Finland for turning a blind eye at customs control. Law enforcement officers counted about 1 million rubles in bribes and opened a criminal case under paragraph “c” of Part 5 of Art. 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (*aggressor country) (Receiving a bribe on a large scale).
Another interesting figure from the Vyborg customs (by the way, from the same Torfyanovka) was caught exceeding official authority. The senior customs inspector was very passionate about his work and continuously improved his performance in detecting offences. Working zeal resulted in a constant improvement in the statistical indicators of Torfyanovka. To do this, the zealous inspector dumped various objects and things on the scales, placed the goods crookedly and even lay down on the scale platform with his own powerful body. Then he presented to the astonished businessmen acts of customs agreements, where discrepancies in weight characteristics were rampant. Businessmen, of course, had to pay for their advantage. Once he got so carried away that he wrote out an act in which he overestimated the weight of the goods by 389 kilograms… A criminal case against the Stakhanovite, after that, of course, was immediately opened.
Today’s campaign by the security forces for customs is, in principle, not surprising. After all, Vyborg customs is large, and more than 50% of goods from Europe move through it. Sanctions have left the imprint of new difficulties in the export and import of goods, so entrepreneurs are dangerously juggling with various methods, including shades of the criminal code, in order to make their existence easier. And colleagues, as they say, are always ready to support fellow customs officers in the difficult work of earning their own bread, caviar and vacation in Dubai.
