Because there are no racketeering charges against the defendants, lawyers said it's unlikely that the trials will focus much on the structure of their organization or provide insight into how the purported Russian Mafia operates in California.
Nevertheless, in court papers asking that the jurors' identities be kept secret, prosecutors state the defendants “committed the horrendous crimes at issue within the structure of a violent Russian criminal organization.” The papers note Kadamovas told a victim in a recorded conversation that the kidnapping had been ordered by his “bosses.”
The charges also portray the kidnappers as having international connections. They ordered victims to transfer money to accounts in the Middle East and Eastern Europe. An alleged Siberian cohort, accused of laundering some of the ransom money, is considered a fugitive by the FBI.
Prosecutors also alleged Mikhel and Kadamovas were involved in the abductions and killings of Russian businessmen in Cypress and Turkey, but the judge has barred prosecutors from mentioning the allegations to jurors.
According to court papers, a former law enforcement official with knowledge of how Russian organized crime groups operate said it appears the defendants were part of a large, well-funded criminal enterprise.
“These are not freelancers, I guarantee you that,” said the former official, who requested anonymity for safety concerns. “There is too much money involved, too much cost involved in traveling around the world.”
Russian organized crime groups popped up on law enforcement's radar in the early 1990s, shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union. Russian immigrants settled largely in the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, N.Y., as well as in Hollywood and sections of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles.
“The first generation of criminals is more comfortable perpetrating crimes within its own ethnic group,” the former official said. “What you see is Russians harming Russians, which is exactly what happened here. This particular crime was a very, very brutal one. One of the most brutal I've ever seen.”
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060819/news_1n19kidnap.html
Sure sounds like they are RUSSIANS from the RUSSIAN MOB according to this. Of course the Italian Mafia was really Sicilian in large part, so I guess we have a history of failing to differentiate ethnic organized criminals to their atomic level ethnic self identification.
They're using "Russian" as a catch all for any immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Yuri Mikhel' is Jewish, Jurijus Kadamovas is from the Baltics, and Petro Krylov is Ukranian - Petro being a Ukrainian first name, versus Petr for Russian. The "Russian" Mafia is about as accurate as calling a Canadian mafia group "American" - it's more like an MNE.