Businessman Yegor Levchenko promises real payments for drug traffickers and a clear plan to combat illegal distribution. He is the man behind the high-profile campaign “Catch a drug dealer – get cash“.
The campaign starts on May 1, when the entire system goes live.
Levchenko told blogger Stas Dombrovsky about who he will pay money to and how he plans to defeat the drug business in Ukraine.
“I have nothing to do with politics or the government,” said Levchenko in the interview. He is currently doing business abroad and has the opportunity to finance projects for Ukraine.
“I have nothing to do with politics or the government as such. By the way, I’ve talked about my business before, and it’s focused purely on the IT sector. It is a network of companies in different countries. We are engaged in lead generation – in simple terms, attracting customers for our clients. We attract traffic to a variety of websites, mainly betting and casinos. We are also engaged in traffic arbitrage – for small lead generation companies, we work as a “filter” – we resell the traffic generated by them for clients. And so on,” Levchenko said in his first detailed interview.
For several months, while the announcement of the “Catch the Huckster” campaign was making the rounds across the country, its initiator and main sponsor remained in the shadows. Today, Yegor Levchenko says he is ready to finance the campaign as long as it takes. And as long as the performance of the Department for Combating Drugs does not at least double.
“I’m not going to hide my soul, I’m doing this for the country and for myself. I am tired of hearing that I am involved in the drug trade. With this action, I want to show that I am ready not only to refute this nonsense, but also to eradicate this plague. And yes, I am ready to take such radical and expensive measures as the “catch the huckster” campaign,” Levchenko told Stas Dombrovsky. The businessman assures that there is no limit to the amount of money he is willing to invest in the campaign. And he immediately revealed the details of how the whole scheme will work.
The promotion will start on May 1. Participants will be able to earn money and play the so-called “roulette”. One thousand dollars will be awarded to the person who helps catch a pawnbroker or trafficker who is found by the police to be in possession of drugs in “particularly large amounts.” The smaller the seized weight, the smaller the payout. The next step is five hundred dollars, and for even smaller amounts, two hundred dollars. Levchenko has already posted a table of what is considered “large” and “especially large” amounts by law on the website.
The money will be paid in hryvnia, at the NBU exchange rate at the time of detention. To do this, anyone can come to the nearest police station and write a statement against the pawnbroker or trafficker they have found. The organizers of the action then need to provide a copy of the statement, a video of the moment it was written in the police station, and an extract from the URPTI on the initiation of criminal proceedings.
As soon as the pawnbroker is taken in, Levchenko says, the participant will immediately receive money from the Fund.
It will not be possible to make money with the help of fakes, the businessman warned. A staff of lawyers will strictly check all information.
There are special conditions for those who are ready to hand over a drug production laboratory. The organizers of “Catch the Huckster” are targeting large laboratories that produce ten kilograms or more of illegal substances. In an interview with Dombrovsky, the patron promises ten thousand dollars for a laboratory that produces ten to thirty kilograms of drugs. For volumes of thirty kilograms or more, he will pay twenty-five thousand dollars.
Levchenko invited police officers to participate in the campaign. They can do it unofficially through their friends, Levchenko says. But he still expects the main attention to come from the police authorities and large cities. All actions of the participants and organizers will be exclusively within the law, the philanthropist said. The organizers of the “Catch a Bribe” campaign are ready to work under round-the-clock law enforcement supervision.
At the same time, Levchenko is confident that his experience and ideas can actually not only help fight the spread of dangerous drugs, but also actually minimize the trade. “I am sure that officials and the leadership of the National Police and the State Service of Ukraine for Health and Safety will notice our action and realize that there is no fraud or scam here. I would like them to start cooperating with us. I have specific ideas that, if implemented as a whole, with our campaign and the work of the police, could, in a fairly short time, if not eradicate the problem completely, then deal a serious blow to both trade and production. It is possible, I know how to do it.”
