Maksym Shynkarenko, who has been charged with 32 counts of advertising child “adult content” to child exploitation enterprise and money laundering, has retained the Bukh Law Firm, P.C. of New York as his criminal defense counsel in his upcoming trial. He was arrested in Thailand in 2009 and had been fighting extradition to the United States since that time. Mr. Shynkarenko was extradited from Thailand earlier this summer (June 2012) and was allowed by the court to have time to prepare for trial in the Federal Court.

The investigation of the 33-year-old Ukrainian and his alleged child pornography network by U.S. investigators has claimed 560 child pornography convictions across the country since it first began. Mr. Shynkarenko was indicted in New Jersey (case #2:2008-cr-00625) as that is where U.S. investigators first uncovered his alleged website on the computer of a New Jersey resident which was then shut down in 2005. The trial will take place in the U.S. District Court in that jurisdiction.

Mr. Shynkarenko is a native of Kharkov, Ukraine and the indictment has charged him as running a worldwide network of several child pornography sites with two co-conspirators, one from the Ukraine and one from Russia. While this is alleged to be a very profitable enterprise for all involved, Mr. Shynkarenko was granted the services of a public defender by the Judge at the time of his indictment. He is now represented by federal criminal defense attorney, Arkady Bukh.

At the time of the hearing after his extradition, the Associated Press reported that a spokesman for Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry stated that detectives had found absolutely no evidence that Mr. Shynkarenko had committed a crime and they are concerned about the “rights of our citizen”. The Shynkarenko family is very concerned and they do presume him innocent. Ukranian officials are quite concerned about this case as they feel that U.S. prosecutors have a poor reputation regarding the rights of their citizens. If convicted, Maksym Shynarenko could face up to 20 years in prison on each count.

U.S. District Court Judge William H. Walls has set the pre-trial conference in this case to March 26, 2013. The Bukh Law Firm, P.C. has several criminal defense attorneys experienced in the defense of this type of case in Federal Court.

Via EPR Network
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