According to statistics National Policeover the past year, the number of recorded cases of drug trafficking in Ukraine has increased sharply. Thus, compared to 2022, the number of drug crimes exposed increased by 13% (from 33,8 to 38,3), in particular, the sale of narcotic substances increased by 41% (from 9,9 to 14). related to the legalization of funds received from drug trafficking - by 56% (from 34 to 53), the organization of drug laboratories - by 69% (from 61 to 103) and drug dens - by 95% (from 231 to 450).
These are general statistics for the country. It is not known exactly what exactly falls on Kyiv: the situation with drug trafficking in the capital is shrouded in darkness, because since last year, the Kyiv police stopped publicly publishing annual and quarterly statistics on drug trafficking in the capital. Currently, only the report on the results of countering drug crime for 2022 is available on the website of the State Police of Kyiv. Two weeks ago, as reported "Chestnut NEWS", a journalistic request was sent to the GUNP with a request to provide information on the current situation with drug trafficking in Kyiv, but no response has been received yet.
Therefore, it is necessary to focus only on open sources. After analyzing the messages of law enforcement agencies in social networks, you can try to make a general picture of what is happening in "narcotic" Kyiv.
At the crossroads of drug routes
Since Kyiv is the capital, it accounts for a significant share of the activity of interregional and international drug trafficking networks. In particular, in just one and a half months (from the beginning of March to the middle of April), four gangs were exposed in the city, which were engaged in the production, transportation and sale of drugs.
In particular, at the end of March, the metropolitan police blocked the interregional drug sales channel and closed two telegram channels through which psychotropic drugs were sold. This "business" was founded by four Kyivans aged 24 to 35: they distributed their goods through bookmarks or by mail. During the search, almost 4 kg of alpha-PVP, 2,5 kg of amphetamine, MDMA pills, LSD brands and cannabis were seized from them - in total, UAH 3,5 million at "black market" prices. Every year, the "business" brought its founders more than 10 million hryvnias in profit.
A 36-year-old resident of the capital and his 30-year-old friend were detained almost simultaneously with this group. This couple was engaged in a more "elite" direction: they arranged the supply of cocaine from the territory of the European Union and received more than 12 million hryvnias in profit every month. According to the message of the National Police, cocaine was sold to a "trusted circle of persons". During the investigation, a kilogram of cocaine with an estimated value of more than 250 US dollars was seized from a man and a woman.
At the beginning of April, the National Police announced the liquidation of a large-scale interregional drug network that operated in 19 regions of Ukraine, including Kyiv. As a result of the investigation, 26 people were detained, 5 drug laboratories were liquidated, more than 85 kg of drugs and psychotropic substances worth more than 150 million hryvnias, as well as weapons, grenades and ammunition were seized.
Also, at the beginning of April, seven people were detained in the capital, who organized four drug laboratories on the territory of Kyiv region. Every month, the laboratories produced more than 50 kg of precursors, which were then used to produce almost 40 kg of amphetamine. The finished "product" of the plot was stored in a warehouse in the market, where one of the members of the group worked as a security guard. In total, almost 400 liters of nitroethane were seized during the searches, from which 1,2 million doses of amphetamine, 25 kg of precursors, more than 4 thousand MDMA pills, amphetamine, cannabis, laboratory equipment, weapons and ammunition could be synthesized. According to "black market" prices, the value of the confiscated amount is almost 122 million hryvnias.
Telegram channels "advertise"
Except in the "elite" cases where expensive drugs like cocaine are distributed among a limited circle of customers, drug dealers in the capital usually sell their goods in two standard ways: through bookmarks and mail. Social networks, in particular, Telegram channels, the addresses of which are "advertised" through inscriptions on fences and walls of buildings or underground passages, serve as trading platforms. These inscriptions with the words "spices", "salt" and "PVP" can be seen everywhere in Kyiv: city utilities occasionally paint over this drug advertisement, but very quickly the inscriptions appear again.
Hand-to-hand sales are somewhat less popular, as in this case the dealer has a greater chance of being caught off guard. Judging by the reports of law enforcement agencies, the majority of those arrested on the street with drugs are not sellers, but customers who did not make it to the house and took a dose, so to speak, without leaving the cash register.
However, the most desperate or more conservative dealers continue to prefer direct communication with buyers. So, at the beginning of April, a 55-year-old man was detained in the Dnipro district, who was selling cannabis just from the window of his own apartment, located on the first floor. At the time of the visit of the law enforcement authorities, the man managed to haggle for 8 thousand hryvnias, which were found in his apartment along with 79 packages of cannabis, which he did not manage to sell.
Grandpa made a mistake
However, unpleasant embarrassments also occur among drug fighters themselves. At the end of January 2024 NAZK reported that it had found signs of illegal enrichment in the head of the Department for Combating Narcotic Crime of the Metropolitan State Police Oleksandr Dybov.
Before that, the official website of the National Police advertised Dybov (who, by the way, is a world champion in bodybuilding) as a "policeman with steel muscles." However, NAZK, which studied the incomes and expenses of the drug fighter-bodybuilder, was not impressed by the steel muscles, but by the "steel horse" Dodge Durango worth 697 hryvnias. In 2022, Dybova's wife Tetiana received the right to use and dispose of this car and formally sold it to her own mother-in-law Olena Dybova, although she continued to use it.
A year later, on the basis of a power of attorney from her husband's mother, Tetiana purchased a plot of land with an area of 0,12 ha in the Kyiv region for over 3 million hryvnias. It is interesting that Dybov's mother bought two apartments in Kyiv in 2018, although she herself lives elsewhere. Judging by her son's declaration for 2023, pensioner Olena Dybova, in addition to a Dodge Durango car, has a 72-meter apartment in the capital, where the Dybov family actually lives. Also, in 2023, grandmother Olena gave her grandchildren Daniella and David Dybov a monetary gift of 400 hryvnias. The previous year, the gifts were somewhat more modest: in 000, she gave her granddaughter "only" 2022 hryvnias.
"NAZK established that the savings and total official incomes of the police officer, his mother, and his wife are significantly lower than the value of the acquired assets," the National Agency reported.
The total value of the suspicious assets of the capital's chief drug fighter amounted to 3,9 million hryvnias. After the publication of the NAZK, Oleksandr Dybov wrote a report about his dismissal, and the police announced that they would conduct an internal investigation against the former chief.
