The plenum of the Supreme Court of Ukraine on Tuesday voted to fire the head of the court after he was detained by anti-corruption authorities as part of an investigation into the largest-ever $2.7 million bribe. Ukraine, reports News.ro with reference to The Guardian.

The vast majority of judges, 140 out of 142, supported the dismissal of Vsevolod Knyazev after a secret vote. His dismissal from the leadership of the Supreme Court does not mean automatic deprivation of the status of a judge.

Police have detained the chief justice of the country’s supreme court as part of an investigation into a $2.7 million bribe.

“The head of the Supreme Court has been detained,” Oleksandr Omelchenko, the prosecutor of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office of Ukraine (NABU), confirmed on Tuesday. Omelchenko said that two people were detained as part of the investigation, including the chairman of the court, Knyazev, but he refused to name the second person.

“At the moment, this is the biggest case” regarding the judicial system, said NABU head Semyon Krivonos, who called a “criminal group” among the judges of the Supreme Court.

A bribe from a Ukrainian billionaire

Anti-corruption activists claim that Ukrainian billionaire Konstantin Evago bribed Supreme Court judges to obtain favorable decisions through a law firm. Jevago allegedly transferred $2.7 million to lawyers, $1.8 million of which was to be paid to Supreme Court justices and $900,000 to attorneys for their “brokerage services.”

Jevago wanted a court order that would allow it to retain control of shares in the mining company, which is at the center of a dispute with former shareholders. A former member of the Ukrainian parliament and one of the richest people in the country, Zhevago, is currently in France, Kyiv is seeking his extradition. In December, he was detained in France on suspicion of money laundering and embezzlement of funds related to his banking business in the country.

Ukraine, which wants to start negotiations on joining the EU, has intensified the fight against corruption, as this is one of the conditions it must fulfill before joining.

On Monday, NABU announced it was investigating massive corruption in the Supreme Court system and released a photo of stacks of dollars neatly laid out on a sofa. “We show on real cases, on real facts, what is our priority: it’s about corruption at the top, criminal organizations at the highest levels of power,” said the head of NABU.