Ukraine’s Security Service detained four Kherson residents who collaborated with Russian forces during the occupation of the right-bank part of Kherson Oblast, the SBU reported on 30 May.
Russian forces occupied the city of Kherson on 1 March 2022, shortly after invading the Kherson Oblast from Crimea on 24 February 2022. Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson on 11 November 2022, ending a 255-day occupation.
Among those arrested is a chief specialist from one of the Kherson city council departments. The woman worked as a private accountant before voluntarily joining Russia’s local occupation administration, where she headed a unit called the “labor and social protection management,” according to the SBU.
Law enforcement established that the woman transferred personal data of local residents to occupation “election commissions” for conducting Russia’s fake referendum. After Kherson’s liberation, on 11 November 2022, the woman “went underground” and later returned to work at the city council, hiding her collaboration with Russia, the SBU said.
Two other suspects are local residents who joined the administration of occupation prisons after the regional center was captured. One became an “assistant on duty” to the head of the so-called “investigative detention center.” His duties included guarding prison cells where Russians brought resistance movement participants from the region, investigators found.
The second man voluntarily agreed to guard the perimeter of an occupation prison that Russians opened on the basis of a captured correctional colony, the investigation said.
The fourth detainee is a Kherson resident who joined the occupation Russian Interior Ministry at the start of the full-scale war. She became an “inspector of the analysis, planning and accounting group of the Korabelny department.” She guided armed Russian units to the homes of Ukrainian patriots, law enforcement noted.
All suspects received charges of collaboration and are held in custody without bail. They face up to 15 years in prison with property confiscation.
On 29 May, a taxi driver was detained in Dnipro for correcting Russian strikes on the city. On 30 May, the SBU detained a Russian agent from Khmelnytskyi Oblast who guided missiles to military airfields.