When former anti-corruption fighter Bolatbek KANIEV told me this financial and criminal story, I did not believe a single word. Not only because in the history of Kazakh justice there has never been such a case, at least not publicly. This simply shouldn’t happen in principle. But the anticorrosive pensioner posted a hefty folder of supporting documents, including the court verdict that came into force.

In October 2019, police officers of the Zhambyl district of the Almaty region suddenly began writing collective complaints - they were no longer paid their salaries.An audit was ordered, the result of which was the initiation of a criminal case for the misappropriation or embezzlement of entrusted property of others on an especially large scale. The first suspect was accountant of the Zhambyl regional police department Aida DZHUMADILOVA. Soon the list of defendants was supplemented by financiers of the Ili and Karasai district unitary enterprises, the reception center attached to it, and the police departments of the Koksu, Raiymbek, and Kegen districts of the Almaty region.

For the investigation, an interdepartmental investigative and operational group of the National Security Committee and the Ministry of Internal Affairs was created, headed by the “important” from the internal security department Rustem MALKENOV.

For almost five years, the budget allocated for salaries, travel expenses and bonuses for personnel of seven divisions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs has been embezzled! But administrators of budget programs, heads of the financial support department of the police department, and district police chiefs seemed to have suddenly gone blind.

The investigation established: Aida Dzhumadilova lost 186,826,545 tenge from 2015 to 2019 in the Kapshagay casino alone. Her husband, police escort Baktygali MATIKHANOV, with a salary of less than 150 thousand tenge, squandered 25,513,828 tenge there. Another gambling addict accountant from Koksu ROP Aruzhan MERTAI enriched the casino by 12,963,438 tenge. By the way, her salary is less than 100 thousand. Looking ahead, we note: Aruzhan, working as an accountant for the special security service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Almaty, managed to steal employees’ salaries in the amount of 4,234,374 tenge in just one week of November 2019. This has already been proven by the verdict of the Turksib District Court.

The facts of police gambling addiction were confirmed by the heads of gambling establishments, providing answers to Malkenov’s official requests.There were other names of regular players. For example, the general director of Macau not only indicated the names of Dzhumadilova, Matikhanov, Mertai and Nurzhan SAMIYANOV, deputy head of the Karasai RUP, but also the dates of visits and the amounts of their large bets.

Gamblers in uniform have repeatedly appeared at the Kapshagai Palace and ASTORIA casinos. For years, the accountant of the Karasai regional unitary enterprise Daniya DUMSHEBAEVA and the head of the Zhambyl RUP Marat BOSTUKBAEV, the husband of the head of the financial support department of the regional DP Rakhima KASENOVA, played big.

Rustem Malkenov wrote a letter to the head of the internal security department of the Almaty Region Police Department, Aset KARMENOV. The document says: “It has been established that officials of the Almaty region DP have repeatedly visited the Kapshagay casino.” The lieutenant colonel asked Colonel Karmenov to conduct an internal audit and resolve the issue of bringing these persons to justice.

We will return to this topic later, but now we will present the arguments of those who were accused of theft of almost a billion tenge.

According to Dzhumadilova, she was appointed accountant of the Zhambyl ROP in 2017. In May of the following year, Bostukbaev became the head of the police department, and almost immediately police officers began to receive bonuses every month.

Bostukbaev said that the accountant should bring him cash every month. He didn’t mention the amount, but Aida gave her boss 500 thousand monthly “bonuses.” Another envelope was taken to the Ural Federal District, where his wife served as the chief. Aida kept the rest of the “bonuses” for reporting and auditing. The scheme is simple to the point of banality: the accountant transferred money to the cards of not only employees, but also people who had never served in the police for a day. According to the documents, it was carried out like this: the amounts were transferred to accounts, half was taken by one of the deputy heads of the ROP, and then the money was cut.

Another scheme - police officers were regularly sent on business trips based on documents, Aida's husband Matikhanov went to the police department, where he stamped the documents. The money fell into the accounts of police officers, who, of course, did not go on any business trips, but regularly carried cash to the personnel officer.

Car fuel was also stolen.13 tons of gasoline were allocated monthly for the official transport of the Zhambyl regional police department. Aida immediately gave half of the coupons to the boss, the rest - to the police drivers. For example, the Niva was allotted 380 liters per month, Aida gave out only 160. Of the 260 liters of gasoline for the Nexia, the driver received only 140. It is clear that this was not enough, and the police were forced to refuel at the expense of the violators, from whom they collected fines on the spot. Bostukbaev once told Dzhumadilova that he spent the coupons he received on the construction of a front office for receiving citizens and equipped the office of the prosecutor on duty.

The accountant prepared three statements at once for fuel and lubricant expenses in order to mislead the inspectors. But this scheme was discovered by an auditor from the DP named Almas. Aida invited him to lunch and put 700 thousand tenge in Almas’s car. After giving another 200 thousand, Bostukbaev himself gave 300 to the auditor. And the topic of theft is closed! Dzhumadilova admitted during interrogation that she was not worried about the possible consequences - the wife of the head of the DP was the main financier of the DP.

But law-abiding auditors were found, and soon the shortage in the small police department began to grow by leaps and bounds: 54, 91, 125 million.Then - more. In a confrontation with Bostukbaev, Dzhumadilova once again confirmed the amounts and patterns of thefts. Approximately the same schemes were used in other police departments. In total, gambling addicts in uniform stole more than 707 million tenge. Later, the Almaty region anti-corruption agency identified another 92 million, stolen by the same accountants in 2012-2014.

And so 11 people found themselves in the dock. Gulvira KANIEVA, chief specialist of the Federal District Department, accountants of the receiver-distributor of the Karasai RUP Alma DZHUMADILOVA (Aida’s mother), Dzhumadilova Jr., Daniya Dumshebaeva, Aruzhan Mertai, Ainur APBASOVA from the Koksu RUP, Ernar KASENOV, financier of the Karasai RUP, Zhuldyz KLYSHBAEVA from Raiymbeksky OP, Eskendir TUGELBAY from the Ili district unitary enterprise, Raikhan KANTARBAEVA from the Zhambyl district OP and Lieutenant Colonel Nurzhan Samiyanov, already familiar to us.

The verdict of Karasai District Court judge Amangeldy MAKHANBETOV barely fit on 128 pages. The document details the criminal acts of all participants. Kanievoy's court sentenced her to eight years in prison; the Dzhumadilovs' mother and daughter received the same amount of time. But Aida was given a five-year reprieve - a small dependent child. Dumshebaeva was sent to jail for eight years. Mertai, Apbasova and Klyshbaeva were given seven years each, and also with a five-year deferment of the sentence - they have minor children. Kasenov and Tugelbai each received seven years of real prison sentences, Kantarbayeva was given four years of restricted freedom, Samiyanov was sent to a colony for eight years. They jointly and severally recovered the damage caused to the state.

Meanwhile, at one of the meetings, the judge instructed prosecutor Dauren RAIMKULOV to consider the issue of bringing to criminal responsibility the heads of police units where there were systemic thefts.The video of this process captured how the state prosecutor wrote down the judge’s instructions in his diary. But in the end, all seven heads of the RUP and ROP successfully escaped punishment. Bostukbaev, for example, moved from the post of chief of police to the post of deputy head of the colony in the village of Zarechny.

“Defending my wife, I conducted my investigation,” said Bolatbek Kaniev. - For some reason, the court did not take into account that we also have four minor children. In addition, the investigation considered Gulvira to be the administrator of budget programs, although this is exclusively a government agency - the regional DP and its leaders. But not a leading specialist without the right to sign any documents.

By the way, Kaniev’s arguments were confirmed in court by Rakhima Kasenova. Answering the judge’s questions, she stated that Gulvira cannot be considered a budget administrator - this includes the head of the DP and his deputy, who oversees finances. In addition to them, the head of the Ural Federal District and his deputy have the right to sign financial documents. No one else. These are the norms of the Budget Code.

  • My wife was convicted only on the testimony of the Dzhumadilovs, their niece Mertai, Dumshebaeva and Apbasova. They said that part of the stolen money was transferred to Gulvira, but there is not a single documentary evidence of this in the case. But there are other documents proving that there were facts of pressure on Apbasova and Tugelbai from the Dzhumadilovs and Mertai so that they would slander Kanieva. This is recorded in the NSD of the National Security Committee. There is testimony from Klyshbaeva - during interrogation Alma Dzhumadilova put pressure on her, convincing her to leak my wife. Another fact: when the money was stolen in 2015, my wife was on maternity leave. And during the trial she had a miscarriage,” Bolatbek can barely contain his emotions.

His numerous complaints about judicial arbitrariness have finally been heard. The prosecutor of the Almaty region, Berik ADAMOV, having studied the materials of the criminal case of Gulvira Kanieva, sent a petition to the Prosecutor General's Office to initiate proceedings on newly discovered circumstances.

Alma Dzhumadilova and Daniya Dumshebaeva died almost simultaneously in February of this year. They say that the convicts suddenly fell ill in the women's colony and were urgently hospitalized at the district hospital. But they could not be saved...

Tokhniyaz KUCHUKOV, photo by Vladimir ZAIKIN, Almaty region

Source: time.kz Tokhniyaz KUCHUKOV

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