The HCJ covers obvious violations of influential dishonest judges
The HCJ delays as much as possible, refuses to punish or simply closes its eyes to obvious violations of the law committed by influential judges or children of influential parents. Even when it punishes, it applies clearly disproportionate punishment.
It should be noted that the list of the High Council of Justice failures described below is not full and comprehensive. The project contains only the most outrageous and notorious examples of the bias of the current composition of the HCJ. The list of failures is regularly updated and expanded.
Former head of the Council of Judges of Ukraine and judge of the Supreme Court Valentyna Symonenko has made great efforts to keep positions of tainted judges after the Revolution of Dignity. Under her leadership the Council of Judges refused to dismiss head of the State Judicial Administration Zenoviy Kholodnyuk due to the lustration although the law directly required it. During the competition to the Supreme Court many observers were impressed by primitive and illiterate text of her cover letter.

The Public Integrity Council declared Valentyna Simonenko dishonest. One of grounds was non-disclosure of her husband's corporate rights in the declaration. The biggest scandal arose when it turned out that after the occupation of Crimea the judge Simonenko received Russian tax number from the occupying power. She publicly explained that occupier's tax authorities had automatically assigned her this number using old data. However, it turned out that this was a lie, because this number was issued on the passport that the judge had received in 2015. That means that without her application, issuance of this passport was impossible.

The number of complaints were filed to the HCJ in 2018 for violation of rules of submitting declarations, obvious public lie and recognition of occupation authorities. However, the HCJ refused to punish the judge for lying in the declaration. And the complaint regarding obtaining the tax number of the Russian Federation has been laying without any reaction for almost two years.

The judge Olga Stupak won the competition to the Supreme Court thanks for the lie. In particular, during the interview to the HQCJ she stated that she had not written the statement to remove the status of corporate apartment. This turned out to be the lie. She also "forgot" to disclose in the declaration quite large house near Kyiv. It is registered in the name of the mother-in-law, but the judge lives there with her family. The NABU launched investigation of the criminal case regarding these facts. Detectives found that the judge did not disclose in the declaration the mother-in-law's house, which was, in fact, purchased at her husband's expense. And the judge forgot to disclose in the declaration about 20.000 USD on the husband's bank accounts.

For more than two years complaints against Stupak have been laying in the dust at the HCJ. Only in 2020 the Second Disciplinary Chamber opened the proceeding on the fact of lying about the service apartment and non-submission of property in the declaration.

Children of influential parents also receive protection of the HCJ. In particular, the judge of Economic Court of Kyiv Yuriy Tsyukalo is the son of Nataliya Shuklina, the Vice-Rector of the National School of Judges. During the qualification assessment it turned out that the judge Tsyukalo forgot to submit in the declaration three land plots. According to the judge's explanations, he did not know (!!!) that he was the owner of almost one hectare of land near Kyiv. He allegedly received it while he was working in the Prosecutor's Office and the leadership of the Prosecutor's Office was in charge of its registration. This is clearly illegal and usually had corrupt character, as the Prosecutor's Office closed its eyes to land deribans in exchange for receiving land plots.

However, lying during the interview to the HQCJ and using the prosecutor's authority in order to obtain land is not the violation of judicial ethics for the HCJ. The HCJ even refused to initiate the disciplinary proceeding (speaker - Malovatskyi O.). Finally, by the decision as of January 13, 2020, the HCJ submitted the petition to the President to appoint Tsyukalo Y. as the judge for the unlimited time.

Often violations are so gross that it is impossible to close eyes on them. Then the HCJ brings the judge to responsibility, but in the way to keep his position. This is what happened to the judge of District Administrative Court of Kyiv Yevhen Ablov. In April 2019, the Second Disciplinary Chamber filed the appeal regarding his dismissal. Till December Ablov had been suspended from administering justice. But on December 10, 2019, the HCJ upheld Ablov's complaint and changed dismissal to strict reprimand.

Many people know the case of the NABU against the deputy head of the State Migration Service Dina Pimakhova, who is suspected of receiving bribes for issuing residence permits in Ukraine to citizens of other countries. The NABU established that this scheme was implemented thanks to court decisions, which, in particular, were made by the judge of Vasylkivskyi City District Court of Kyiv region Kovbel Maksym Mykolayovych. Back in December 2018, the NABU filed the complaint to the HCJ against this judge. Finally, in March 2020, the Second Disciplinary Chamber of the HCJ confirmed facts provided to the NABU. However, despite gross violations of the judge, he was not dismissed, but suspended only for the period of 6 months. He was sent to receive education at the National School of Judges.