The US Department of Justice has filed complaints for forfeiture in rem of real property located in Louisville, Kentucky and Dallas, Texas, on the grounds that the assets were involved in and are traceable to an international money laundering conspiracy. According to the August 6, 2020 complaints filed in US District Court for the Southern District of Florida, the properties, worth approximately $70 million, were purchased with funds misappropriated from PrivatBank, a Ukrainian financial institution, by its former primary owners, Ihor Kolomoisky and Gennadiy Boholiubov. The complaints describe a scheme by Kolomoisky and Boholiubov in which, between 2008 and 2016, over $5 billion were embezzled from PrivatBank through the issuance of fraudulent loans; the proceeds of the loans were transferred through the bank’s Cyprus branch and a network of companies, and some of the proceeds were invested in the United States with the help of two US businessmen, Mordechai Korf and Uriel Laber, via their Optima family of companies.
DOJ press release | Complaint (Louisville) | Complaint (Dallas)