>The American Immigration Control Foundation (AICF) commissioned a study by >Don Barnett, and one of its conclusions was that "According to the FBI, >about half of the 4,000 'Russian' mobsters operating in the United States >arrived as refugees under the Lautenberg Amendment." The article states >further, "it should be noted that U.S. officials call refugees from Russia >and from the ex-USSR 'Russian.' Most aren't." > >July 5, 1998, Miami Herald > >Russian mob makes S. Florida a base >Task force, FBI fight uphill battle >By Juan O. Tamayo, Herald Staff Writer > >When Russian nightclub owner Oleg Kirillov decided to fly to Miami last >December and spend his New Year's vacation in the sun and surf, the FBI got >ready to celebrate, too. > >Pegged as the head of a powerful Russian crime gang, the 31yearold Kirillov >was arrested by FBI agents soon after he arrived and was charged with >conspiracy to export cocaine from Miami to Moscow. Yet the bust got >little publicity, perhaps because Kirillov was only one of scores of >Russian mobsters who visit South Florida, perhaps because his is only one >of the dozen or so Russian gangs known to operate here. > >With little fanfare, Russianspeaking mobsters regarded as the most >sophisticated criminals ever to hit America have turned South Florida into >one of their main U.S. bases, behind only New York and maybe San Francisco. >They are holding internal summits and meeting with Italian Mafia and >Colombian drug cartel leaders, buying luxury condos and running scams, >according to a dozen FBI, DEA and local officials and private >moneylaundering experts interviewed by The Herald. > >``What elevates Miami to the top of Russian organized crime in the U.S. is >the access to banks in the Caribbean and drugs in Latin America,'' said >Hardrick Crawford Jr., head of the FBI's organized crime branch in Miami. > >Some clear evidence of the Russian mob's presence here: > >+ Sergei Aksyonov, reputed head of Russia's secondlargest and most violent >gang ``No. 2 with a bullet,'' one FBI official joked recently bought >several luxury condos on north Collins Avenue through two relatives. >+ Anzor Kikalischvili, a Russian businessman denied a U.S. entry visa last >year for alleged ties to crime gangs, bragged in a 1996 FBI wiretap that he >had 600 employees in Miami alone. >+ Four of Russia's highestranking mobsters met in Miami in 1993 to decide >how their gangs would split up the governmentowned hotels and factories >that were privatized that year, law enforcement officers who watched them >say. "There are definitely a lot of major league players here ... who want >that Miami Vice lifestyle," said Bob Levinson, who retired recently as the >FBI's top expert in Miami on Russian mobsters. > >Bosses and underlings > >Law enforcement agents in Miami say they have grown used to seeing lots of >young Russian men in luxury beach hotels, a few of them apparently bosses >who bring bodyguards and even satellite phones. But most appear to be foot >soldiers, athletic young men who sport the homemade tattoos that denote >prison experience and the track suits that are the virtual uniforms of >lowlevel Russian hoodlums. ``They are on allexpensespaid vacation, perhaps >rewards for a whacking [killing] well done,'' said Kenneth Rijock, a >Miamibased law enforcement consultant on financial crimes. > >The Russians' arrival in South Florida has clearly worried law enforcement >agencies. The FBI's Miami office created a 13person ``RussiaEurasia'' >squad last July after a threatassessment study put Russian organized crime >in fourth place behind Colombians, La Cosa Nostra and ``other Caribbeans'' >and ahead of the Sicilian mob. The FBI has Russia squads in only five >other U.S. cities. > >Task forces watches mob > >That squad is in addition to Odessa, a joint task force of Miamiarea U.S. >and local law enforcement agencies, financed with federal funds, that began >monitoring the Russian mob in South Florida around 1993. Odessa has scored >some victories, most notably last year's arrest of Ludwig Fainberg, >Ukrainianborn owner of the Porky's strip club in Hialeah, and 20 others on >drug, weapons, counterfeit money, prostitution and stolen liquor charges. > >But both the FBI and Odessa face an uphill battle against mobsters who are >extremely clannish, have rogue KGB veterans advising them on security >precautions, and speak a relatively uncommon language. None of the new >FBI squad's 13 members speak Russian. And the lack of major indictments >since the Fainberg case which generated about 15,000 taperecorded >conversations indicates the depth of the difficulties. > >Russian mobsters some law enforcement officers jokingly call them >Redfellas come to South Florida for the same reasons as other retirees, >other tourists and other criminals. ``Miami's climate is perfect for guys >who have spent a long time in Siberian prisons,'' said Lee Lamothe, >publisher of a Torontobased newsletter on financial and organized crime. > >A dealmaking center > >Lamothe isn't talking about just the weather: From their perch in South >Florida, an international banking center and hub of U.S. trade with Latin >America and the Caribbean, the Russian gangsters can negotiate and monitor >all sorts of deals. ``If you're a Russian crook, you get a condo in Miami >and a bent bank in the Caribbean and you're in heaven,'' said Mike >McDonald, the IRS's top money laundering expert in Miami before he retired >early this year. > >Russian criminals began arriving in America after President Mikhail >Gorbachev relaxed emigration controls in the late 1980s. But they were >largely petty thugs running lowlevel scams that police call ``disorganized >crime.'' Russian organized crime gangs blossomed only after the Soviet >Union collapsed in 1991, sparking powerful alliances among traditional >mobsters, corrupt bureaucrats and even KGB veterans. > >Their penetration of America began after top mobsters met near Moscow in >1992 and voted to send one of their own, Vyacheslav Ivankov, to explore >opportunities in New York's huge Brighton Beach emigre community. Within >months, Ivankov was spotted in Miami. And soon afterward, the mob began >popping up in other U.S. cities, including Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit >and Philadelphia. > >Exposing Russians' role > >The FBI's Miami office had infiltrated Ivankov's gang by 1994 and literally >``wrote the book on Russian organized crime'' a report detailing the >names and practices of a group until then all but unknown in the >West. ``It was like the Valachi case in the Mafia the first real look >inside the organization,'' said Levinson, who now works for Decision >Strategies/Fairfax International, a private U.S. security consulting firm. >Joe Valachi was the first Italian Mafia member to break its code of silence >and give law enforcement a rundown on its inner workings in the 1960s. > >Ivankov was arrested in 1995 and sentenced to nine years in prison for >trying to extort money from two Russian businessmen. But others have since >followed his path to Miami. The head of Russia's single largest crime >group until his arrest in Switzerland last year, Sergei Mikhailov, and >other top mobsters met in a luxury Miami Beach hotel in 1993 to divide up >Russian properties about to be sold to private investors, law enforcement >officials said. > >An FBI affidavit in Kirillov's case file described him as head of the crime >gang in Nishni Novgorod a powerhouse industrial city that manufactures >everything from nuclear submarines to MiG warplanes. Convicted of fraud in >Russia, he is awaiting trial here on charges that he conspired to buy nine >pounds of cocaine a month from Peruvian dealers in New York, bring the >drugs to Miami and smuggle them to Moscow. "Totally unfounded charges," >said Kirillov's lawyer, Alan E. Weinstein. > >Vyacheslav Sliva, deported from Canada to Russia last year as a top >mobster, and the reputed bosses of Russian gangs in Los Angeles and >Denver have all been spotted in Miami in recent years, Lamothe said. And >the wife and daughter of Aksyonov, reputed head of Moscow's powerful >Ismailova gang, have bought several condos here even though he has been >denied a U.S. visa. > >The dozen Russian gangs in Miami have been spotted running health insurance >frauds, counterfeit money and prostitution rings, visa scams and extortion >attempts on Russian emigres. > >But while Russians and Colombian drug smugglers have been spotted meeting >several times in Miami, Drug Enforcement Administration officials believe >the cocaine is destined for Europe, not the U.S. market. > >"Presently we do not feel the impact of any Russian influence as far as the >narcotics industry in South Florida is concerned," said William Mitchell, >the DEA's South Florida office chief. > >Other law enforcement officials in Miami admit, however, that they still >don't know as much as they would like to about the Russians. "I'm not >embarrassed to say we are still learning," Crawford of the FBI said. Among >the puzzles: A growing number of Russians are working in the janitorial >staffs of area hotels, stores and office buildings jobs the mob has >sometimes used for largescale thefts in cities like Chicago and Los Angeles. > >When police raided a Russian moblinked shop in Chicago last year that was >selling luxury goods such as Armani clothes and Coach handbags, many of the >items turned out to have been stolen in the Miami area. When federal >prosecutors in New York charged 25 Russian emigres in 1995 with pocketing >$140 million in fuel sales taxes due the U.S. government, the main firm >involved turned out to have an office in Miami. When Ukrainian police >arrested two British men who tried to cash counterfeit bank drafts worth $7 >million in January, the documents carried the name of a nonexistent >"Florida's Ocean Bank." And after reputed mobster Eugene Susker pleaded >guilty to tax fraud in Ohio in 1995, he asked for leniency in sentencing >because he was working on a big business deal: a floating casino based in a >Florida port he never named. > >"The real problem is that we're not seeing 99 percent of what [the Russian >mob] is doing in Miami right now," consultant Rijock said. Added >Levinson: "They are weaving their webs right now, testing authority to see >what they can do. We are learning, but they are learning, too." > >Copyright 1998 The Miami Herald > <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! 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