Latvian national Svethana Bahtijeva pleaded guilty to four counts of possessing the proceeds of criminal conduct after Garda searches led to more than 18kg of gold bullion, hundreds of thousands of euro in cash, two cars and other property. A court heard that the principal figure was her husband, who had absconded while on bail. Judge Martin Nolan nevertheless found Bahtijeva was an active participant who benefited directly or indirectly and imposed five years in prison.

18kg+Gold bullion found through the investigation.
5 yearsCustodial sentence, backdated to October 2024.
€495,360Gross nominal five-year prison-space benchmark.

Keys connected the Lucan home to the vaults

Gardaí searched Bahtijeva’s home at Earlsfort Court, Lucan, on 26 September 2024 after receiving information about her husband’s suspected involvement in drug dealing. Five keys were found. Three opened safety-deposit boxes and two related to safes later found at her mother’s home.

The deposit boxes contained more than 18kg of gold bullion valued at about €1.3 million, more than €399,000 in cash, bank cards, authenticity documents and false identification documents belonging to Bahtijeva’s husband. A second search of the Lucan house located more than €58,000 in a lunch box behind the stairs.

The assets were the subject of the conviction

Bahtijeva pleaded guilty to four counts of possessing the proceeds of criminal conduct. Reports of the sentencing identify the property as including the gold, cash and two Audi vehicles. Section 7 of the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act 2010 covers possessing or handling property while knowing, believing or being reckless as to whether it is the proceeds of criminal conduct.

Her mother, Jelene Idele, pleaded guilty separately to three proceeds-of-crime counts and one count of knowingly permitting drugs to be kept at a property. Idele received a four-year sentence that was fully suspended. This file concerns Bahtijeva’s conviction and does not combine the two women’s sentences or attribute every item found to Bahtijeva personally.

Five years after mitigation

On 17 December 2025, Judge Martin Nolan set a nine-year headline sentence for Bahtijeva. After considering substantial mitigation, he imposed five years and backdated the term to October 2024, reflecting time already spent in custody. She had no previous convictions.

The judge described her as an active participant who benefited directly or indirectly. That finding matters: the court did not treat her simply as an unwitting key-holder. Equally, the final sentence reflected the mitigation and evidence about the unequal and controlling marriage.

The court heard evidence of control and fear

Bahtijeva said her husband was 17 years older, controlling and abusive, that he had instructed her to register and manage the boxes, and that she did not know their full contents or origins. Her mother said she regarded him as dangerous. Later reporting states the court accepted that the marriage had ended and that neither woman remained in contact with him after he left Ireland.

Those facts are not erased by the conviction. They explain why the sentence fell from the nine-year headline to five years and why the mother’s sentence was suspended. Reporting the coercive-control evidence alongside the guilty pleas is necessary to present the court record fairly.

The absent husband was not convicted in this proceeding

Bahtijeva’s husband is variously reported as Farhats Bahtijevs, Farhat Bahtijeva and Farhats Bathijevs. He was charged in 2024 with drug, money-laundering and false-document offences, was later granted bail and then left Ireland. Reports say he is believed to have returned to Kazakhstan and remained wanted as of April 2026.

The sentencing judge said the main culprit was not before the court and might never be. Those statements concern allegations and the status of an accused person: they are not an Irish conviction against him. This file does not pronounce on the unresolved charges.

The State later auctioned the gold

RTÉ and The Irish Times reported in April 2026 that Gardaí were auctioning 18.8kg of seized gold, described as the largest gold seizure in the history of the State. Garda reporting said the sales were expected to return about €2 million to the Exchequer after the final lot.

The auction proceeds are a recovery of suspected criminal assets, not a measure of the investigation’s cost and not a credit mechanically deducted from Bahtijeva’s prison benchmark. Gold valuations also changed between seizure, sentencing and auction. This file therefore records the seized and recovered values separately instead of presenting an invented net taxpayer bill.

Nationality and immigration record

Court reporting identifies Bahtijeva and her mother as Latvian. Bahtijeva told Gardaí she moved from Latvia to Ireland in 2006 at age 19 and later met her husband here. She worked as an accountant and had two children.

The reviewed sources do not establish the precise immigration permission held on arrival or later, any application for citizenship, any deportation or removal process, or her status after completion of the sentence. As a Latvian citizen, she is an EU national; no immigration consequence is inferred from the conviction.

Chronology

  • 2006: Bahtijeva says she moved from Latvia to Ireland at age 19.
  • 26 September 2024: Gardaí search her Lucan home and find keys connected to safety-deposit boxes and safes.
  • September 2024: Searches recover gold bullion, cash, documents, vehicles and drugs at several Dublin locations.
  • October 2024: Bahtijeva enters custody; the later sentence is backdated to this month.
  • September 2025: Sentencing reports state she pleaded guilty to four proceeds-of-crime possession counts.
  • 17 December 2025: She receives five years after a nine-year headline sentence and mitigation.
  • April 2026: The seized gold is auctioned, with proceeds returned to the State.

Public-cost boundary

Applying the Irish Prison Service’s 2024 average of €99,072 per available staffed prison space to the five-year sentence produces a €495,360 gross nominal face-value benchmark.

This is not an invoice, an audited marginal cost or proof of time actually served. The sentence was backdated to October 2024, more than a year before it was imposed, and remission or later sentence administration could reduce custody. Garda, prosecution, court, legal-aid, auction, family-support and post-release costs are unquantified and excluded. The gold, cash, vehicles and auction receipts are asset values or recoveries, not taxpayer expenditure, and are not added to or subtracted from the custody benchmark.

Questions left by the record

  1. How much of the five-year term will be served after backdating and remission?
  2. What was the final amount returned to the Exchequer through all gold and asset sales?
  3. What investigation, storage, security and auction costs did the State incur?
  4. What safeguarding assessment was made for the children after both parents became unavailable?
  5. Will the husband face the unresolved Irish charges, or will they remain outstanding?

Sources

Record checked: 1 August 2026. Name variants in coverage include Svetlana Bahtijeva and Svethana Bahtajeva. The conviction, the coercive-control evidence, the husband’s unresolved charges and asset recovery are kept distinct.