Ex-Anti-Corruption Official Sentenced to 11 Years for Bribery in Shymkent

A court in Shymkent has sentenced former deputy head of the anti-corruption department, Daurenbek Kozhabayev, Orda.kz reports.

He was accused of accepting a 42 million tenge bribe from a school principal in exchange for helping her avoid criminal charges.

The school principal died before facing trial, while Kozhabayev fled. He was arrested in November 2024 in a village in the Turkestan region, where he had been hiding.

On April 2, the specialized inter-district criminal court of Shymkent found him guilty of taking a bribe on a particularly large scale.

The court found him guilty under Part 4 of Article 366 of the Criminal Code and sentenced him to 11 years of imprisonment with a lifelong ban on holding positions in the civil service. Kozhabayev will serve his sentence in a medium-security facility, the court's press service reported.

The verdict has not yet entered into legal force.

Daurenbek Kozhabayev is the younger brother of Maksat Kozhabaev, former Deputy Chairman of the Anti-Corruption Agency, who was convicted of fraud in November 2023 and sentenced to five and a half years in prison.

Original Author: Dinara Bekbolayeva