The Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv has rejected a motion by Alla Zinevych (Prygunova), a judge of the Kyiv Commercial Court, to dismiss the criminal proceedings against her. The defendant requested the closure of the bribery case due to the expiration of the statute of limitations, but refused to accept that such a dismissal is non-rehabilitating (meaning it does not clear her name). Meanwhile, the case against the second defendant, a defense lawyer, was closed following a similar motion.
In May 2026, two of the three defendants in the case—which has been stuck in the court of first instance since 2017—filed motions to be exempted from criminal liability. More than 10 years have passed since the alleged crimes were committed. Judge Alla Zinevych stated that she does not plead guilty and labeled the non-rehabilitating grounds for closing the case as a «relic of the Soviet period,» citing a 2025 ruling by the Cassation Criminal Court.
The Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv dismissed the judge’s arguments, pointing out her flawed interpretation of legal precedents.
«The case is closed solely because the timeframe for criminal prosecution has expired and the person can no longer be sentenced, not because the person did not commit the crime,» the court emphasized.
The panel of judges further explained that such a dismissal does not equate to rehabilitation and entails future restrictions, such as the inability to hold certain public offices.
Regarding the second defendant (the lawyer), who did not contest the non-rehabilitating nature of the dismissal, the judicial process was terminated. However, the court refused to return more than $22,000 USD seized during office searches back in December 2014.
The cash was found packed into envelopes marked «Borys,» «Estet,» and others. The question of returning the money remains open because, according to decade-old search records, a third party had claimed ownership of the funds, and traces of luminescent paint were detected on some of the bills.
According to investigators, in 2015, a lawyer incited a representative of a private company to bribe a judge. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) documented that the judge received $7,000 through an intermediary in exchange for a ruling in a corporate bankruptcy case. Another episode involved $22,000 for invalidating a state institution’s title to a land plot.
The criminal proceedings have been plagued by several controversies over the years:
One of the accused lawyers, Roman Romanyshen, is the husband of Inna Romanyshena, a judge at the very same Shevchenkivskyi Court. Due to this conflict, the prosecution attempted to transfer the case to a different court, but the court of appeals kept it at Shevchenkivskyi (Judge Romanyshena is not part of the panel handling this case).
In 2015, Prygunova claimed the case was fabricated against her by Artur Yemelyanov, then-Deputy Chairman of the Higher Commercial Court of Ukraine.
In 2017, the High Council of Justice suspended Alla Prygunova from her duties. Later, in 2018, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that her suspension violated her rights and ordered Ukraine to pay her €1,200 in compensation.
The trial involving Alla Zinevych (Prygunova) is currently ongoing