Posted on 06/01/2011 9:43:03 AM PDT by TheDingoAteMyBaby
When the feds busted a syndicate of Russian-speaking nightclub owners and their so-called Bar Girls, it seemed like just another titillating tale from South Beach.
But the April bust showed that the FBI is taking the Eastern European mob a lot more seriously these days than the Italian Mafia. La Cosa Nostra is no longer the bureau’s Public Enemy No. 1 when it comes to organized crime in South Florida.
“Eurasian organized crime is our No. 1 priority,” said FBI supervisory special agent Rick Brodsky of the Miami office.
In April, six reputed members of an Eastern European network — along with a Sunny Isles investor and 10 Bar Girls imported mostly from Latvia and Estonia — were charged with conspiring to seduce and fleece unsuspecting South Beach tourists by running up their credit card bills for booze at private clubs on Washington Avenue. The prosecution’s case has moved so quickly that two of the “B-Girls’’ girls plan to plead guilty on Thursday in Miami federal court.
One defense lawyer quipped that they’re about to become “G-Girls,” as in guilty.
Sunny Isles Beach, where some of the reputed mobsters live, has so many immigrants from the former Soviet Union that it has earned the nickname “Little Moscow.’’ The high-rise coastal cities of Hollywood and Hallandale Beach also are home to many Russian-speaking nationals.
The alleged B-Girl scam was hardly the first time the Eastern European mob struck South Florida. In February, 13 South Florida members and associates of an alleged Armenian crime organization were charged with extortion and other offenses as part of a series of indictments against more than 100 suspects from Miami to Los Angeles.
The main extortion charge accused ringleader Aram Khranyan, 41, of Sunny Isles Beach, and others of threatening...
(Excerpt) Read more at miamiherald.com ...
The russian mob has been causing a lot of problems ever since clintoon let them into the country. If the feebs are just now recognizing the problem we are in a world of hurt.
The former KGB/Spetnatz were killing people in Brooklyn for
$ 100.00 twenty years ago. I am sure the FBI knows about them-they are just understaffed and don’t have their priorities straight.
The Russian mob can count on ex Soviet Special Forces and KGB people to do their dirty work.
Look around. Everything you see on the domestic front is basically a massive turf war.
They staff most of the hotels with eastern block workers
.
I jump in it.
Yes they can, courtesy of clintoon who let a boatload of those types into the country.
I heard from Paulie that they use some Czechoslovakian interior decorators.
Sounds like they paid off the Mavs to throw last night’s game to the Heat.
Really? His place looked like sh!t
“Aram Khranyan” - that name is more Armenian than Russian, no?
It’s about time. The feds have been after the Italian mob in Philly for decades, but one hardly hears anything about all the others.
Well, for some reason any mob from Kazakhstan and Chechnya to Ukraine and Estonia considered as Russian mob.
Russians might be disappointed since these mobs consists of little to none of them but so it does.
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