Kyiv traffic accident

When Rudkovskyi ran over a 22-year-old cyclist on 14 August 1996, the prosecutor's office in Kyiv filed a criminal complaint against him in May 1998. The cyclist died at the site. A few days later, the case was abruptly closed. The Kyiv prosecutor's office noted that only a superficial inspection was conducted, the inquiry inspector actually came to a conclusion based on his testimony, and the inspector failed to find out important facts at various stages of the development of the road situation.^[2]

Kuchmagate

On 18 January 2001 at the Rudkovsky's and his brother's apartment, officials of the General Prosecutor's Office and the Security Service conducted a search when he was suspected of forgery of tapes of the State Security Administration major Mykola Melnychenko. The search was carried out on the basis of a “report” that Mykola Rudkovsky “organizes the production of fake audio and video recordings with the voices of the President of Ukraine and other officials.”

On February 2 Mykola Rudkovsky filed a claim with the Pechersky District Court of Kyiv regarding the protection of honor, dignity and business reputation. In his statement, he appealed the statement of Prosecutor General Mykhailo Potebenko, published in the media, that Mykola Rudkovsky allegedly had a laboratory adapted for the production of audio fakes.

On February 7 Deputy Prosecutor General Oleksiy Bahanets said that files “with the same names and the same content, but different in size, which may indicate falsification” were seized from Mykola Rdkovsky’s computer during the search. Oleksiy Bahanets also reported that during the search a CD was seized, on which there are recordings of different voices and, in particular, two similar voices of persons featured in the cassette scandal.

Later, this version was neither confirmed nor denied officially.

It is also known that on October 6, 2006, speaking at PACE to European deputies, Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada Volodymyr Lytvyn said: “...The international examination, which was carried out officially, as far as I know, established that the tapes were edited from September 18 to October 15 [2000], phrases were compressed there, and the corresponding words were inserted into the corresponding sentences.” Rudkovsky himself always categorically denied his involvement in the editing of the “Melnychenko tapes.”

It is interesting that in November 2005, Mykola Rudkovsky announced his readiness to cede his deputy mandate to Major Mykola Melnychenko, who by that time had returned to Ukraine.

Embezzlement and abuse

Rudkovsky was charged in 2007 with misusing his position of authority and embezzling a sizable sum of money. On December 14, 2007 the Security Service of Ukraine summoned Mykola Rudkovsky for questioning in the case of illegal use of public funds in the Ministry of Transport in the amount of 390 thousand hryvnia during an alleged official trip “Kyiv - Paris - Kyiv” on a private charter plane from June 9 to 12, 2007 of the year. The flight, according to investigators, was paid for by the Ministry of Transport. He was specifically accused of using public money to travel abroad.^[10]

A criminal case was initiated under Part 5 of Article 191 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine - “misappropriation of funds on an especially large scale”, then reclassified to Article 364 part 2 (abuse of power and abuse of official position). Mykola Rudkovsky was given a written undertaking not to leave; he faced a sentence of up to 12 years in prison. As it became known during the investigation, the three-day tour of the acting Minister of Transport carried out in the company of one of the former “Miss Ukraine-Universe” Oleksandra Nikolayenko.^[11]

Judge Oleg Bilotserkivets of the Pechersk Court in Kyiv terminated the case on 26 May 2010, at which time the state declared that it was dropping all charges and the prosecutor was changed.^[12][13]

Russian embassy attack

Rudkovsky was arrested in September 2018 after landing in Moscow and charged with the assault on the Russian embassy on 14 June 2014. According to the Russia's prosecutor's office, the former minister carried out this action alongside Right Sector activists. The case was transferred to the Moscow court on 1 November 2019.^[14] The Moscow court considered mitigating factors (compensation for material damage in the amount of 2 million rubles and remorse), imposing a sentence of two years in prison and a fine of 5.750 million rubles for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia and 8.289 million rubles in favor of the Sogaz insurance company. The prosecution had requested a sentence of six years in prison. The court also counted the time spent in the pretrial detention facility starting on 28 September 2018, at a daily rate for one and a half days.^[15]

Kidnapping case

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) revealed the details of a well-known kidnapping that took place in 2012 on 25 February 2021. Oleh Valeriyovych Seminskyi, the head of the gas extraction firm at the time and, as of 2019, a deputy of the pro-government Servant of the People Party, was abducted at that time.^[16] On 3 March, Rudkovsky left for Ukraine, and the following day, he was charged with being the person who had ordered the kidnapping.^[17] The inquiry found that Seminsky was held captive for over three years, subjected to relentless torture, and forced to pay the crime's mastermind a bogus debt of $200 million. In March, Mykola Katerynchuk was hired as Rudkovsky's attorney.^[18]