Award-winning author Grand Chief Ron Derrickson tells the story of his
personal fight against Ukrainian political and economic forces alongside
the larger story of the wider struggle for Ukraine to end the corruption
that has plagued the country since the 1990s
Ron Derrickson watched the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the country
where he had spent much of the past 20 years, with a kind of anguish,
knowing the country had been systematically shut out of the EU and left
on its own. While doing business there, he had entered the rabbit hole
of Ukrainian political and economic life, a land where gangsters
controlled not only the heights of the economy but also the police, the
courts, and the national parliament. At stake was his $28 million
company stolen by a cast of characters that included a former governor
and members of the national parliament.
In the end, Derrickson spent a dozen years fighting for justice in the
courts, in political and diplomatic spheres, and even with automatic
weapon-toting mercenaries. Ukranian Scorpions tells not only the story
of his personal battles but the much wider struggle of Ukraine to find
its footing and shake off the gangsterism that has plagued it since the
1990s. In the end, Derrickson searches for signs that after the recent
cataclysm, a new Ukraine might rise from the ashes.
