The family of Oleh Trofimenko, a 40-year-old colonel in the State Border Guard Service, has accumulated the property, approximately worth over UAH 13 mln. Yet, you will not see it in his income statements, otherwise, there could be embarrassing questions about the origin of this money, because his official income isn’t enough to afford such purchases.
These investigations are possible thanks to the support, including financial support, of the participants of the NGL.media community, who have access to special content and possibilities.
November 2019. A user named Aleksandra joins the Telegram chat of the residents of the Kyiv residential complex, “Medovyi”. This is Oleksandra Trofimenko, the wife of Oleh Trofimenko, the head of the 7th Border Guard Carpathian squad of the State Border Guard Service. Officially, the couple hasn’t had any apartment in the RC “Medovyi”, at least Oleh Trofimenko never mentioned it in his income statements.
Judging by Trofimenko’s income statements, the only thing, connecting the couple to the prestigious residential complex in Kyiv, is a parking place, acquired by Oleksandra Trofimenko for UAH 480 thousand. This is the very fact that attracted the attention of NGL.media, because it would be rather strange to buy a parking place in a house where you don’t own any property. So, we had to examine the messages of Trofimenko’s wife in the house chat. It soon became clear from her messages that the couple actually does own an apartment in the RC “Medovyi”.
The RC “Medovyi” is situated on the right bank of the Dnieper in the Solomianskyi district of Kyiv (the photo by the real estate developer)
For instance, in 2021, Oleksandra Trofimenko was anxious about a pipe in the apartment and sought advice from her neighbours. “Good afternoon. Please tell me (investors who bought apartments on the 25th floor), whether you have faced a problem with the “runoff water system” passing through your apartment?” the message is written in Russian she asked and attached the picture of the troublesome pipe.
The sales department of the developer informed us that all the apartments on the 25th floor of the RC “Medovyi” are duplexes, and their cost starts from UAH 40 thousand per one sq.m. The Trofimenkos chose one of the largest, with an area of 143 sq.m., so it is currently worth UAH 5.6 mln without the interior work.
Oleh Trofimenko attracted the attention of NGL.media during the monitoring of electronic income statements. After numerous cases of abuse in border crossings, the NGL.media analysts started checking the income statements of high-ranking border guards and customs officials. If you have information about real estate or vehicles not declared in the income statements, or inconsistencies between their lifestyle and income, please write to hubytska@ngl.media (we guarantee your anonymity). You can also support this work financially.
It should be noted that the real estate register doesn’t state any apartment in the RC “Medovyi”, belonging to either Oleksandra or Oleh Trofimenko. There are two possible variants: either the apartment stands in another person’s name, or it was purchased via an agreement on the sale and purchase of property rights. This is the kind of agreement which was signed by Trofimenko’s wife with Kyivmiskbud in November 2021, but the act of acceptance and transfer of property rights was dated only June 2023. In that year, this parking space appeared in Oleh Trofimenko’s real estate register and income statements.
Anyway, both the parking place and the apartment should be declared since the year when the agreement on acquisition of property rights was signed, as explained by Serhii Mytkalyk, the chairman of the board of the NGO “Anti-Corruption Headquarters”.
“The purchase of an apartment via signing the agreement on acquisition of property rights should be declared in the section ‘construction-in-progress assets’ in the income statement for the year in which this agreement is signed,” he says. “Also, a section ‘expenses’ should be filled in, if the total cost, non-recurring expense, or amount of the financial obligation exceeds 50 exemption limits UAH 151.4 thousand in 2025.”
In another RC “Medovyi” house chat with a telling name “Owners”, Oleksandra Trofimenko writes about the debts for communal services and says bluntly that she paid the cost of the apartment without taking any loans.
The data from the court register confirm the information about the debts for communal services. In 2022, the Solomianskyi district court of Kyiv ruled that Oleksandra Trofimenko should pay over UAH 16 thousand of debts. The court ruling in this case states that she is the owner and consumer of services for the apartment, the number of which is concealed. The managing company, “RC Service Centre” LLC, acted as the levier.
It was three years ago. The apartment in the RC “Medovyi” still didn’t appear in Oleh Trofimenko’s income statements.
“Friends” in Novi Bezradychi
Actually, this is by far not all the property found by NGL.media during this investigation. Let’s start with the fact that in 2017-2023, Oleh Trofimenko didn’t mention any residential building his family used. Only in 2025 did he state that his family lives in the official apartment in Lviv.
Oleh Trofimenko, a 40-year-old colonel, was born in the Kharkiv region. In 2006, he graduated from the National Academy of the State Border Guard Service in Khmelnytskyi; in 2010, he was awarded a master’s qualification from the National Academy of Internal Affairs in Kyiv. He holds a PhD in Law and has been decorated with departmental and state awards.
Colonel Oleh Trofimenko (a photo by the Western regional department of the SBGS on Facebook)
His career as a border guard started at the border point Malniv in the Lviv region. In 2014, Oleh Trofimenko headed the border guard division at the Donetsk airport and took part in active combat actions. For four years, he headed the separate border checkpoint “Kyiv”, taking care of the airports of Kyiv. In November 2023, he became the commander of the 7th Border Guard Carpathian squad, which protects almost 300 km of the border in the Lviv region, dealing with the crossing of people, vehicles, cargo, and other property, among other tasks.
According to the Facebook post of the separate BCP “Kyiv”, it was Trofimenko’s desire to serve in uniform since his childhood, as his parents were law enforcement officers.
His father, 72-year-old Volodymyr Trofimenko, indeed worked in the structures of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, this is stated in the court case, initiated by him regarding the recalculation of his pension. And it was he, the pensioner of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, who bought almost 13 hundred square metres in the village of Novi Bezradychi near Kyiv in January 2022.
The land in Novi Bezradychi is expensive; these are Kyiv’s suburbs, popular among politicians and businessmen. Yet the MIA pensioner somehow managed to buy 0.13 ha for symbolic UAH 57.2 thousand this cost is specified in the sale and purchase agreement, the copy of which is at the disposal of NGL.media. In 2024, Volodymyr Trofimenko obtained a permit to buy the summer cottage “with his own resources”, the area of which, judging by the building scheme, should be over 200 sq.m.
In fact, it is not just merely one summer cottage, but an entire suburban settlement, called “Druzi’ [Friends]. And the whole construction is being done behind a closed fence.
A construction in the suburban settlement “Druzi”, August 2025 (a photo by NGL.media)
It is possible to settle in the suburban settlement “Druzi” for UAH 6.5 mln, according to the announcements about sales. Yet one would have to invest a lot in interior works. As the real estate agent explained, the cottages here had been built by some “acquaintances” for themselves, but one just decided to leave the project, so they put it on sale.
As one could almost expect, the owners of land plots in “Druzi” were no random people – several co-owners of “Bubibo” company Bubibo is an online tool for animal owners to communicate with various specialists. According to YouControl data, the company is part of the group led by Daniil Privalov, the son of Hennadii Kernes, the late former head of the Kharkiv City Council. Privalov owns 21% in the statutory capital of the company and the land in the suburban settlement “Druzi” . This is the company where Oleh Trofimenko’s wife started working last year.
The income of Volodymyr Trofimenko and his 67-year-old wife, Oleh Trofimenko’s mother, for the last ten years isn’t enough to afford such a house As per the data of the tax service, obtained by NGL.media. They have no business, only his mother was a sole entrepreneur with the main KVED code of retail trade in 2001-2008. In 2024, Halyna Trofimenko sold a house with a land plot in the village of Blyzniuky in the south of the Kharkiv region, but according to the agreement, the sale price was only UAH 49 thousand. Probably, this cost is conditioned by the fact that Blyzniuky is situated practically close to the active combat zone – 70 km away from Pokrovsk, which Russians are trying to seize.
The vehicle park of the border guard
If one were to trust Oleh Trofimenko’s income statements, at first, the commander of the border guard squad drove an old Volkswagen Polo 2012, which belonged to Halyna Trofimenko. In 2018, his wife started using a two-year-old Toyota Camry, registered in her mother’s name, Cheslava Lopata.
According to the register of income statements, the Trofimenkos’ income started increasing in 2021. Next year, they had a new Toyota Highlander. And this year, the commander’s wife became the owner of a new Skoda Superb. Halyna Trofimenko is also a registered owner of two cars – Skoda Octavia 2020 and Toyota Camry 2023.
By the minimal estimates, the total cost of all the vehicles, owned by the Trofimenkos, exceeds UAH 4 mln.
Despite such a large family vehicle park, it turned out that Oleksandra Trofimenko used another car – Audi E-Tron S, which cost over UAH 60 thousand. Officially, this car belongs to Oleksandr Persunov, who owns the premises in Kyiv’s suburbs together with Cheslava Lopata, Oleh Trofimenko’s mother-in-law. NGL.media attempted to speak with him, but as soon as Persunov heard a question about the Audi E-Tron S and Oleksandra Trofimenko, he replied, “No comments” and hung up.
For several weeks, NGL.media tried to receive at least some explanations from Oleh Trofimenko himself. Yet he sent only one laconic comment in writing , the essence of which is that he declared everything he had to declare, and he wouldn’t disclose the information about his parents or mother-in-law because it “can violate their rights for inviolability of private property.”
Author Oleksandra Hubytska, editor Oleh Onysko, translation Nelya Plakhota, cover Viktoria Demchuk
