Russian Mafia

20/10/2013

Northern California Auto Theft Group - A Northern California auto theft group came to the attention of law enforcement personnel in Sacramento and other parts of Northern California, Oregon, and Washington State in early 1993. This group is primarily made up of blue collar type workers from the Ukraine and Western Russia. Specializing in auto theft and VIN switching, younger members of this group steal vehicles while the older members operate body shops. This group utilizes Interstate 5 to travel to Oregon and Washington to sell the stolen vehicle parts to other Ukrainian and Russian criminals. Additionally, this group is becoming involved in extortion, cellular telephone fraud, prostitution, and trafficking small amounts of narcotics. Group members have been known to carry weapons and are becoming increasingly violent. This group does not appear to have any clear cut, well defined structure, though its members appear to have formed networks and cooperate with each other in their criminal endeavors.

Odessa Mafia - The Odessa Mafia is considered the dominant Russian organized crime group in the United States. This group established itself in the Brighton Beach area of New York City between 1975 to 1981. In the early 1980s the Odessa Mafia sent two sub-groups to San Francisco and Los Angeles with their leadership remaining in Brighton Beach. The San Francisco Bay Area Odessa Mafia group, unlike their southern counterpart, appear to be highly structured and well organized. This crime group is believed to be involved in extortion, money laundering, fraud, loan sharking, and homicide.

Armenian Organized Crime Groups - The Hollywood area of Los Angeles and the city of Glendale are the focal points for Armenian organized crime activity. This area has the largest Armenian population outside of the Republic of Armenia. These crime groups are involved in extortion, fuel frauds, credit card fraud, murder, kidnap, and narcotics trafficking.

19/10/2013

The "thieves in law" formed as a society for ruling the criminal underworld within the prison camps, who govern the dark gaps in Soviet life beyond the reach of the KGB.They adopted a system of collective responsibility, and swore to a code of "complete submission to the laws of criminal life, including obligations to support the criminal ideal, rejection of legitimate employment must support oneself through criminal enterprises and refusal to participate in all political activities.

26/06/2013

~COP killer Dale Cregan paid Russian Mobsters to protect him while on the run in Spain, the Sunday People can reveal. While police searched Manchester for him after his first slayings, the one-eyed gangster sheltered in the Med protected by former Soviet Mafia.

One-eyed cop killer sheltered in the Med protected by mobsters from former Soviet Union while police searched Manchester for him

26/06/2013

Shortly after the Soviet Union was officially dissolved on December 26, 1991, Russia’s doors opened to private enterprise in an explosion of capitalist activity. Fresh money flowed in to the country, of course still tightly regulated by a still highly controlling government. As such, most of the money tended to pool within the government. Since the Russian mafia and the Russian government were basically the same thing, the mob grew very rich, very quickly. And when there’s new money flowing through the mafia, people start dying.
The mid 1990s unleashed a full-scale mafia war. A former FBI director once called the Russian mafia the greatest threat to U.S. national security in the mid 90s. Flush with cash and muscle to flex, the mob started a new trend of building idols to their fallen crew in the form of some of the ritziest gravestones imaginable.

26/06/2013

Russian Prisons

For the first time, three prisons across Russia unlock their doors to an international film crew. Go inside a top security facility where cannibals, terroris...

12/06/2013

LIKE if you would play/

12/06/2013

The he**in flooding Britain's streets is threatening the lives of UK troops in Afghanistan, an Independent investigation can reveal.

Russian gangsters who smuggle drugs into Britain are buying cheap he**in from Afghanistan and paying for it with guns. Smugglers told The Independent how Russian arms dealers meet Taliban drug lords at a bazaar near the old Afghan-Soviet border, deep in Tajikistan's desert. The bazaar exists solely to trade Afghan drugs for Russian guns – and sometimes a bit of s*x on the side.

The drugs are destined for Britain's streets. The guns go straight to the Taliban front line. The weapons on sale include machine guns, sniper rifles and anti-aircraft weapons like the ones used in the attempt to assassinate the Afghan President Hamid Karzai last weekend.

"We never sell the drugs for money," boasted one of the smugglers. "We exchange them for ammunition and Kalashnikovs."

The drugs come mostly from Helmand, where most of Britain's 7,800 troops are based. The o***m grown there is turned into he**in at factories inside Afghanistan, sold into Tajikistan and smuggled to Europe. The guns are broken down into parts, smuggled back into Afghanistan and delivered to the Taliban. One kilogram of he**in can buy about 30 AK-47 assault rifles at the bazaar.

Nato claims the Taliban get between 40 and 60 per cent of their income from drugs. The smugglers' claims suggest the real cost could be far higher.
..

This should give the Brits a greater incentive to smash the poppy production. They have been ignoring it for the most part since they were stationed in Helmand. Their relations with Russia have deteriorated to the point that it is unlikely that they will get any kind of cooperation in stopping the trade, but the US and the UN should put pressure on Russia to stop the trafficking.

It is in Russia's interest to stop the trade in arms and drugs.

12/06/2013

Forsake his relatives--mother, father, brothers, sisters...
Not have a family of his own -- no wife, no children; this does not however, preclude him from having a lover.
Never, under any circumstances work, no mafter how much difficulty this brings-, live only on means gleaned from thievery.
Help other thieves -- both by moral and material support, utilizing the commune of thieves.
Keep secret information about the whereabouts of accomplices (i.e. dens, districts, hideouts, safe apartments, etc.).
In unavoidable situations (if a thief is under investigation) to take the blame for someone else's crime; this buys the other person time of freedom.
Demand a convocation of inquiry for the purpose of resolving disputes in the event of a conflict between oneself and other thieves, or between thieves.
If necessary, participate in such inquiries.
Carry out the punishment of the offending thief as decided by the convocation.
Not resist carrying out the decision of punishing the offending thief who is found guilty, with punishment determined by the convocation.
Have good command of the thieves'jargon ("Fehnay").
Not gamble without being abie to cover losses.
Teach the trade to young beginners.
Have, if possible, informants from the rank and file of thieves.
Not lose your reasoning ability when using alcohol.
Have nothing to do with the authorities (particularly with the ITU [Correctional Labor Authority]), not participate in public activities, nor join any community organizations.
Not take weapons from the hands of authorities; not serve in the military.
Make good on promises given to other thieves.

12/06/2013

Mafia Tattoos:
THE CATHEDRAL: A cathedral (or monastery, church, castle or fortress) tattooed on the back, hand or chest tends to denote the amount of time the bearer has been in prison, with each steeple representing a year. It can also indicate the number of times the bearer has been incarcerated, if he's served time for multiple offenses.
THE COBWEB: A spider's web, usually found on the shoulders, says the bearer has or had a drug addiction. A spider on the shoulders denotes that the bearer has a high rank.
THE CAT: Cat tattoos serve as the mark of a thief. A single cat means the thief acted alone; multiple cats say the thief was part of a bigger gang.
THE DAGGER: A dagger through the neck means that the bearer killed someone while incarcerated. It also indicates that he is available to be hired for a "hit". If there are drops of blood tattooed on the blade, those indicate the number of murders the bearer committed.
KNUCKLE DOTS: The number of dots on the bearer's knuckles correlate to the number of years the bearer served in prison.
STARS: Stars tattooed on the knees mean the bearer will bow down to no man. On the shoulders, they can mean the bearer is one of discipline, high status and tradition, or they denote that the bearer has been promoted to captain of the mafia.
THE BULL: A bull tattooed on the chest or forearm means the bearer is a hitman, and has been hired by their mafia boss to kill.
THE PIRATE: A pirate tattoo means the bearer has committed armed robbery.
THE TIGER: A tiger tattoo is usually found on the neck, arms or back. It typically signifies that the bearer has killed a law enforcement officer, like a policeman or prison guard.

08/06/2013

Organized crime existed in Russia since the days of the Tsars and Imperial Russia in the form of banditry and thievery, known as Vory v zakone or "thieves in law". This class of criminal had to abide by certain rules in the prison system. One such rule was cooperation with the authorities of any kind was forbidden. During World War II some prisoners made a deal with the government to enlist in the armed forces in return for a reduced sentence, but upon their return to prison they were attacked and killed by inmates who remained loyal to the rules of the thieves.
During the Leonid Brezhnev era when the Soviet economy took a downhill turn, the Vory would take control of the black market with the help of corrupt officials, supplying products such as electronics which were hard to reach for the ordinary Soviet citizen.
The real breakthrough for criminal organizations occurred during the economic disaster and mass emigration of the 1990s that followed the fall of the Soviet Union. Desperate for money, many former government workers turned to crime, others joined the Soviet citizens who moved overseas, and the Mafia became a natural extension of this trend. Former KGB agents, sportsmen and veterans of the Afghan and Chechen Wars, now finding themselves out-of-work but with experience in areas which could prove useful in crime, joined the increasing crime wave. Widespread corruption, poverty and distrust of authorities only contributed to the rise of organized crime. Contract killings reached an all-time high with many gangland murders taking place, a substantial number remaining unsolved. The new criminal class of Russia took on a more Westernized and businesslike approach to organized crime as the more code-of-honor based Vory faded into extinction.
The former Soviet Bloc's opening up to the world and the internationalization of its economy also gave the Russian mafia connections to other criminal organizations around the world such as the Chinese Triads or the Sicilian Cosa Nostra. Connections with Latin American drug cartels allowed the Russian mafia to import co***ne into the country.
Widespread emigration in the 1990s allowed Russian criminal organizations to spread themselves further around the world. Prior to the collapse of communism Russian Jews were allowed to emigrate from the Soviet Union, and many criminals took advantage of this if they were themselves Jewish, or if not, acquiring a Jewish passport to be granted permission to leave. In the United States a key location for Russian organized crime was the Russian-Jewish community of Brighton Beach in Brooklyn, New York. Vyacheslav "Yaponchik" Ivankov was the first major Russian organized crime figure prosecuted by the U.S. government, running his extortion operations out of Brighton Beach. Russian organized crime has spread to many other countries as well including Israel, Hungary, Canada, South Africa and Spain.

07/06/2013

RIP. Aslan Usoyan, you will be avenged.