If the property is transferred to the management of the ARMA: what business should know Andriy Trigub

Investigating corruption crimes, the prosecution has recently begun to actively use the transfer of property to the management of ARMA (the National Agency for the Identification, Tracing and Asset Management). Since this tool turned out to be very painful for the owners, in Ukraine started talking about “state raiding”.

How can a business protect its own property interests within the existing legal framework? Experts and representatives of state bodies discussed this and other related issues at the round table of the Ukrainian Bar Association “Practice of the National Agency for the Identification, Search and Management of Assets Derived from Corruption and Other Crimes”. The moderator of the event, which took place in Kiev on February 27, was Andriy Trigub, an associate partner of "Skliarenko, Sydorenko and partners".

He outlined and analyzed several steps that will help counteract possible abuses of officials during the procedure for transferring property to the ARMA.

“Of course, first of all, all the efforts should be made to abolish the arrest of property,” the lawyer said. - At the same time, it is necessary to constantly monitor the results of the automated distribution of applications of the owner of the property in order to attract them for consideration. If the value of the property can exceed the threshold of 200 sizes of the subsistence minimum for able-bodied (now it is 384.2 thousand UAH), it is worth getting a report in advance on its assessment. It is also necessary to keep the situation around the property in the state registers under control, for which purpose we use notification systems about registration actions. ”

In the event of a threat that an unfriendly person, for example, a business competitor, may be elected as a property manager, the expert advises to provide evidence of such a conflict of interest directly to ARMA.

According to official statistics, as of the end of 2018, by definitions of investigative judges, 646 objects arrested in criminal proceedings were transferred to the Agency’s management. Of them:

57% - transferred to the management of the contract;

42% stay at different stages of processing;

1% - implemented.                                                              

Besides lawyers, participation in the round table took: the investigating judge of the Pechersk District Court of Kiev Olesya Batrin, Head of the National Agency for the identification, investigation and management of assets derived from corruption and other crimes Philip Pronin and Vitaly Riznyk.

During the event, practical issues of consideration by the courts of applications for the transfer of property to the ARMA department, the execution of relevant definitions of investigative judges, the election of managers for seized property, the identification and search for assets, and cooperation with foreign authorities were raised and analyzed.