Category Archives: Department of Homeland Security

Did Megyn Kelly ask Vladimir Putin About these Items?

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Image result for megyn kelly vladimir putin Business Insider

LONDON — Vladimir Putin again denied that Russia interfered in last year’s U.S. election, joking to NBC News’ Megyn Kelly on Friday that even her “underage daughter” could have been behind the hacking.

The journalist asked the Russian president about what American intelligence agencies say is evidence that he became personally involved in a covert campaign to harm Hillary Clinton and benefit Donald Trump.

“IP addresses can be invented — a child can do that! Your underage daughter could do that. That is not proof,” Putin replied.

He also said that U.S. accusations about Russia were reminiscent of “anti-Semitism and blaming the Jews,” describing them as “disinformation.”

*** Hummm, okay, but he also said this:

Moscow (CNN)Russian President Vladimir Putin seemed to suggest Thursday that “patriotic hackers” may have meddled in the US election, but insisted that none of their potential activities were state-backed.

It’s the first time the Russian leader has conceded that any election-related hacking attacks may have emanated from his country.
In comments to reporters at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, Putin likened hackers to “artists,” who could act on behalf of Russia if they felt its interests were being threatened.
“(Artists) may act on behalf of their country, they wake up in good mood and paint things. Same with hackers, they woke up today, read something about the state-to-state relations.
“If they are patriotic, they contribute in a way they think is right, to fight against those who say bad things about Russia,” Putin said.
*** Typical Kremlin, squishy on truth and commitment. Now…how about this mess that the Trump White House is working a deal with the Kremlin to return the two dachas in Maryland and New York that Obama ordered shuttered in December? It is said that the Kremlin did not respond to this action by Obama, but actually they did by terminating the construction of our diplomatic post in St. Petersburg. C’mon Tillerson really? Why should we be so hard on Putin and the Kremlin? Let’s go deeper shall we? We may also have to wait for the full Putin/Kelly interview to be aired.
Image result for megyn kelly vladimir putin  There are many more Russia vs. United States issues like Russian bombers buzzing U.S. military aircraft or that Russian spy ship that hovered off the Atlantic coast….moving on….
***
How many Russian spies are inside the United States? Answer unknown, but the estimates are in the tens of thousands. One such former FBI sleuth explains the condition here:

A national-security expert who has worked as a double agent for the FBI against Russian intelligence operations says the bureau’s current model for identifying Russian assets relies too much on a Cold War-era style of human-asset recruitment.

Naveed Jamali, who secretly reported to the FBI for four years while pretending to work for a Russian spy, was invited by Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell to brief the House Intelligence Committee last week on Russia’s techniques for recruiting foreign spies. More here.

***

Politico: Russian diplomats, whose travel was supposed to be tracked by the State Department, were going missing.The diplomats, widely assumed to be intelligence operatives, would eventually turn up in odd places, often in middle-of-nowhere USA. One was found on a beach, nowhere near where he was supposed to be. In one particularly bizarre case, relayed by a U.S. intelligence official, another turned up wandering around in the middle of the desert. Interestingly, both seemed to be lingering where underground fiber-optic cables tend to run.

According to another U.S. intelligence official, “They find these guys driving around in circles in Kansas. It’s a pretty aggressive effort.”

It’s a trend that has led intelligence officials to conclude that the Kremlin is waging a quiet effort to map the United States’ telecommunications infrastructure, perhaps preparing for an opportunity to disrupt it.

“Half the time, they’re never confronted,” the official, who declined to be identified discussing intelligence matters, said of the incidents. “We assume they’re mapping our infrastructure.”

As the country — and Washington in particular — borders on near-obsession over whether affiliates of Donald Trump’s campaign colluded with the Kremlin to swing the 2016 presidential election, U.S. intelligence officials say Moscow’s espionage ground game is growing stronger and more brazen than ever.

It’s a problem that’s sparking increasing concern from the intelligence community, including the FBI. After neglecting the Russian threat for a decade, the U.S. was caught flat-footed by Moscow’s election operation. Now, officials are scrambling to figure out how to contain a sophisticated intelligence network that’s festered and strengthened at home after years’ worth of inattention.

“We’ve definitely been ignoring Russia for the last 15 years,” another intelligence official said, calling the Kremlin “resurgent.”

POLITICO spoke with half a dozen current and former U.S. intelligence officials about Russian spy strategies. All requested anonymity to openly discuss espionage.

“They’ve just got so many bodies,” the first intelligence official said of the Russians. “It’s not about what we know [is happening]. It’s about what we don’t know.”

It’s one of the most poorly kept secrets in the intelligence community: The Russian effort is a startlingly open and aggressive one, and often falls in a complex legal gray zone.

For example, the second official said, diplomats wandering around the desert might be in violation of certain travel requirements, but it’s not necessarily illegal.

Most U.S. intelligence officials can relay stories of run-ins with Russian intelligence operatives — often moonlighting as lobbyists, diplomats and businessmen — hanging around popular Washington happy hours. It’s an open assumption that they use Capitol Hill and its public office buildings as a farming ground for potential recruits. And the presumed agents aren’t hard to spot, according to officials: An oft-traded joke is to go to one of Washington’s handful of Russian restaurants and look for the guy in a tracksuit.

As the Russians continue aggressively pushing legal boundaries in both the United States and Moscow, there’s a tangible frustration among U.S. intelligence officials and on Capitol Hill that the U.S. has consistently missed its chance to crack down on Moscow’s spy games.

For years, lawmakers from both sides of the aisle pressed a hesitant Obama White House to crack down on some of the Kremlin’s more brazen stateside maneuvers.

“There was a general feeling that this was not getting the attention it deserved,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee who has supported the panel’s efforts in pressing the White House to tow a harder line with the Kremlin.

Around last summer, that tension reached a fever pitch.

Lawmakers, frustrated by Russian diplomats’ repeated violation of travel rules, inserted a provision in last year’s intelligence authorization bill that would have required Russian diplomats to provide ample notice to the State Department if they planned to travel more than 50 miles from where they were based, and further, would have required the FBI to validate that travel. According to several sources involved in the discussions at that time, the administration fought desperately — and failed — to get those provisions taken out of the bill.

Around that same time, two key Democratic lawmakers informed the White House of plans to publicly finger Russia as the foreign power behind a widespread effort to manipulate the ongoing U.S. election — something no official U.S. government entity had yet done. Fearful of escalation, the administration tried to get Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Adam Schiff, then the two leading Democrats on the Senate and House intelligence committees, respectively, to back off. The California lawmakers didn’t, and they released the statement. Backed into a corner by Congress, the administration released a statement saying the same a week later.

The Obama administration’s tentativeness in the weeks leading up to Nov. 8 — especially in the high-stakes context of a presidential election — is something that still bewilders corners of the intelligence world. Some speculate that Secretary of State John Kerry, desperate for a peace deal in Syria, urged the White House to lie low. Some blame it on fear of igniting a cyberwar, and still others say it stemmed from a generalized underestimation of the Russian threat.

Blaming one factor, one of the officials said, is “oversimplified.” But the frustration — and regret — is tangible.

Underscoring all this is that the Kremlin shows none of the same reluctance at home, nor does it show any propensity to abide by the gentlemen’s espionage rules that the U.S. tends to uphold, sometimes to the chagrin of its own spy corps.

“We can’t even leave the compound over there without being followed,” the first U.S. intelligence official said.

One well-publicized incident continues to agitate officials in Washington. In June of last year, a U.S. diplomat was returning to the embassy in Moscow when a guard with the FSB, the domestic Russian security service, exploded from his booth on the compound’s perimeter and assaulted him. A surveillance video shows the guard tackling the man and throwing him to the ground before the U.S. diplomat was able to drag himself inside the doors of the embassy to safety.

The U.S. diplomat, whom POLITICO confirmed was actually a CIA officer, had done the impossible — he had lost his tails as he maneuvered in Moscow. Infuriated, the Russians sent an FSB guard the man wouldn’t recognize to wait outside the embassy for his inevitable return. The officer was beaten so badly he was immediately flown out of the country for urgent medical attention.

The account was confirmed by another person familiar with the incident.

“They are far more aggressive on counterintelligence issues in Russia than we are here,” one of the officials said.

It’s these incidents that worry and frustrate the Americans. The unspoken rules of spying mean nothing to the Kremlin.

“They agree to rules, and then break them,” another U.S. official said.

Former CIA Director John Brennan made reference to this frustration in recent congressional testimony. Though he stopped short of explicitly discussing the June 2016 incident in Moscow, he told lawmakers that he had brought up the broader harassment issue to his Russian counterpart at Russian state security services last August.

“I first told him, as I had several times previously, that the continued mistreatment and harassment of U.S. diplomats in Moscow was intolerable and needed to stop,” Brennan said.

The CIA declined to comment. The FBI did not respond to an official request for comment by deadline.

7 Subpoenas Issued for ‘Unmasking’ Activities

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In April:

Then-National Security Adviser Susan Rice did at times ask that certain names in intelligence reports be “unmasked” in order to understand the context in which they were mentioned in intelligence reports, a former national security official told CBS News.

Rice asked for the identities of those Americans picked up during surveillance of foreign nationals when it was deemed important context for national security, and she did not ask that the information be disseminated broadly, according to this former official. A Monday report by Bloomberg’s Eli Lake said that Rice requested the unmasking of Trump officials. Names of Americans swept up incidentally in the collection of intelligence are normally masked, or kept redacted, in intelligence briefings. However, the law provides for much leeway when it comes to unmasking by National Security Council officials, which suggests that Rice’s request was legal. More here.

CBS: The House Intelligence Committee issued seven subpoenas — four related to the investigation into Russian meddling in the presidential election and three to the “unmasking” of Trump associates during the presidential transition.

The committee announced late Wednesday afternoon that it would subpoena former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and the Flynn Intel Group LLC, and Trump lawyer Michael Cohen and Michael D. Cohen & Associates PC as part of its investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign.

The committee’s statement, released by Chairman Rep. Mike Conaway and ranking member Rep. Adam Schiff, said that the subpoenas were for “testimony, personal documents and business records.”

The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the subpoenas, said that the committee also subpoenaed the National Security Agency (NSA), FBI and CIA for information about “unmasking,” that is, the exposure of Trump campaign officials mentioned in classified intelligence reports, based on intercepts of conversations. Names of Americans swept up incidentally in the collection of intelligence are normally masked, or kept redacted, in intelligence briefings, but under the law, national security officials can request that these names be revealed, or unmasked.

The subpoenas related to unmasking, according to the Journal, seek information about requests made by then-National Security Adviser Susan Rice, then-CIA Director John Brennan and then-U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power to unmask names contained in classified documents.

*** Image result for unmasking subpoenas Susan Rice

Image result for john brennan John Brennan

Image result for samantha power Samantha Power

In part from Rosen at FNC:

The inclusion of Power’s name on the subpoenas marks the first appearance of the former U.N. ambassador in the controversy surrounding the Obama administration’s use of unmasking. Capitol Hill sources told Fox News they are devoting increasing scrutiny to Power – a former historian and winner of the Pulitzer Prize who worked as a foreign policy adviser in the Senate office of Barack Obama before joining his administration – because they have come to see her role in the unmasking as larger than previously known, and eclipsing those of the other former officials named.

Rice has previously denied any improper activity in her use of unmasking. “The allegation is somehow Obama administration officials utilized intelligence for political purposes, that’s absolutely false,” Rice told MSNBC on April 4. President Trump said at that time that he personally believed Rice had committed a crime. None of those named on the subpoenas has been formally accused of wrongdoing.

Inquiries placed with representatives of Power and Brennan were not immediately returned.

That Nunes signed the seven subpoenas, as is standard practice, underscored the chairman’s continuing influence over key aspects of over his committee’s probe, despite the fact that Nunes in early April “stepped aside” from his panel’s Russia probe. He insists his decision was not a formal recusal, and he is still awaiting a hearing by the House Ethics Committee, which agreed at the time to investigate whether Nunes had improperly shared classified data with the White House before presenting it to Schiff and the rest of the intelligence committee.

Nunes told Fox News in an exclusive interview on May 19 that he is an active chairman, including continuing to preside over the unmasking angle of the investigation

Investigative sources on the committee’s Republican majority staff told Fox News that the unmasking subpoenas do not reflect a “fishing expedition,” but were issued because documentary evidence already in hand warranted demands for additional documents relating to Rice, Brennan and Power.

Where NSA had previously complied with the House panel’s investigators, sources said that cooperation had ground to a complete halt, and that the other agencies – FBI and CIA – had never substantively cooperated with document requests at all. The investigators believe that even rudimentary document production as a result of the subpoenas will enable them to piece together a timeline linking the unmasking activity to news media reports, based on leaks, that conveyed the same information provided to the officials requesting unmasking.

President Trump and the White House have dismissed the long-running allegations of collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign, and possibly the transition team, as “fake news,” a scandal ginned up by supporters of President Obama and Hillary Clinton to explain the Democratic nominee’s stunning loss to Mr. Trump last November.

However, the Trump administration belatedly acquiesced in the appointment of former FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III as a special counsel to investigate the allegations “and related matters.” Critics of the administration have also pointed to sustained reporting alleging undisclosed contacts between key Trump aides and various Russians – Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the probe at an early stage because of such contacts – and to a memorandum prepared in February by former FBI director James Comey, leaked a few days after his termination by President Trump, in which Comey alleged that the president had personally importuned him to abandon the FBI’s probe of Flynn.

Global Dark Money in Condos of Secrecy

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Federal money laundering cases generally take place within the context of a larger racketeering case governed by the RICO Act. Money laundering is typically only one aspect of a pattern of organized crime which may be nationwide or international. That being the case, money laundering is often the lesser offense in a pattern of crimes that can result in lifetime imprisonment.

Image result for money laundering UNODC

Money Laundering Quick Links & References

A few years ago, Peter Schweizer  wrote:

Throw Them All Out

ttao_cover

How politicians and their friends get rich off insider stock tips, land deals, and cronyism that would send the rest of us to prison.

(If you have not read the book, try it out. It lays the ground work not only for politicians but international civilians also use the same model by gaining diplomatic status of obscure countries with bribes)

Now for the rest of the story.

Federal money laundering laws are guided by the RICO Act and there are a handful of countries with criminals operating under shadow corporations that clean money via real estate investments. London, New York and Miami are the prime cities where billions are spent on luxury real estate and the actual owner is never known.

Money laundering has a wide range of criminals that include Mafia, drug cartel leaders, Russians, Cypriots, business owners and even Kazakhstanis.

Some investigative journalists have done a remarkable job at tracking this phenomenon and there was even a documentary produced in 2015. This condition is actually a global shadow economy that has an estimated value in the range of billions of dollars. The New York Times has somewhat of a collection of related cases that you may find interesting where even Malaysia is included.

The Miami Herald did a story in 2015 on how Miami is but one crown jewel for offshore dollars fueling the real estate boom there. Ever heard of Isaias 21 Property or Mateus 5 International Holding? No? You’re not supposed to know.

Miami has a long history of money laundering. Its financial institutions report more suspicious activity than any other major U.S. city besides New York City and Los Angeles, according to FinCen data. And a recent case of money laundering involving fancy condos and the violent Spanish drug gang Los Miami drew further scrutiny to South Florida.

Jack McCabe, an analyst who studies the booming local housing market, said it’s impossible to know how many homes are purchased with dirty money.

“But I think many people believe it could be a sizable portion of the new condominium market in Miami,” McCabe said. “Even though developers and real-estate professionals suspect many of these units are bought with illegal funds, they realize their projects may not be successful without that support.”

Much has been in the news recently about the Trump team and companies being involved with Russian officials and oligarchs. There is hard evidence and some cases have already been through the legal system. We certainly cannot dismiss Hillary and Bill Clinton when it comes to collusion with those inside the Kremlin either much less a handful of other countries through their foundations. It appears there is no ‘statute of limitations’ with regard to US Code law on RICO.

The Russians have been dirty for years and those inside the Russian Federation and oligarchs have been moving illicit millions to billions out of the home country. For example how about a certain prominent Russian as one of the named depositors is billionaire oligarch (and personal friend of Vladimir Putin) Gennady Timchenko, who was sanctioned by the United States in March 2014 for his role in providing “material or other support to” Russian government officials. (There’s a rumor that sometime in the 1990s, Putin and Timchenko, who holds Finnish citizenship, were arrested in Helsinki for drunk and disorderly conduct; a rap sheet is said to exist with the two men’s mug shots.)

Timchenko’s designation carried the blockbuster revelation that Gunvor, the Swiss commodities trader he co-founded, was itself a vehicle for Putin’s personal self-enrichment: “Putin has investments in Gunvor,” the U.S. Treasury notice stated, “and may have access to Gunvor funds.” Not long before the sanctions were announced, Timchenko, who is worth an estimated $14.1 billion, was said to have divested his stake in Gunvor. Then, in November 2014, it was announced that the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, helped by the Justice Department, was investigating Timchenko for money laundering. In 2013, Reuters disclosed that Timchenko had hired lobby firm Patton Boggs to persuade the U.S. Export-Import Bank, the export credit agency of the U.S. government, to finance his purchase of up to 11 Gulfstream luxury jets—a deal that was eyebrow-raising at the time and is now rendered illegal by sanctions. The rest of the story is here regarding one well known bank HSBC.

Image result for money laundering  Interfima

So…back to the scandal that just wont go away, the Trump people and Russians. There are a handful of names that include Paul Manafort, Carter Page, Oleg Deripaska, Michael Cohen (Trump’s personal lawyer), Jared Kushner (Trump’s son-in-law) dealing with Vnesheconombank, Felix Sater and more.

Considering the work of the FBI, the DoJ and State’s Attorneys General, the work appears to have a beginning but no end for both Trump and Clinton. As an aside, we need to ask officials where the Clinton investigation is, it at all. But moving on. This summary is not meant to take any anti-Trump position at all, in fact, we need him to succeed for the sake of America’s future. This is meant to be somewhat of a public service with all the chatter and investigations.

If you want to know what members of congress know and what the FBI is doing, here is but one clue:

NEW YORK

The net is closing around a duo of fugitive oligarchs and their kin accused of laundering Kazakh money in posh U.S. real estate — including Trump Organization properties.

In a complicated case with potential implications for President Donald Trump’s business empire and associates of the real-estate-developer-turned-president, Switzerland has revealed it is considering an extradition request from Ukraine to hand over the son of a former Kazakh energy minister — and both men are facing money-laundering allegations in the United States and charges in Kazakhstan.

It’s the latest development in a saga that is reaching into Bayrock Group, an international real estate and investment company that paid the Trump Organization a license fee for the use of its name and an 18 percent ownership stake in the New York hotel and condo project.

The Khrapunov family is accused in U.S. lawsuits of “cleaning” illicit money through the purchase and quick resale of U.S. luxury properties, including daughter Elvira Kudryashova’s purchase of three Trump-branded condos in New York and a 9,000-square-foot Studio City mansion flipped in months to pop singer Bruno Mars for $6.5 million.

An investigation by McClatchy and reporting partners, involving interviews with officials representing legal matters against the accused in four countries, reveals:

▪ Ukraine has recently asked Switzerland to extradite Ilyas Khrapunov, son of former Kazakh Energy Minister Viktor Khrapunov, for alleged computer hacking.

▪ Ilyas Khrapunov and his wife secured unusual diplomatic posts representing the Central African Republic in Geneva, a move that helped provide them with a means of travel.

▪ Court documents tie Felix Sater — a Trump associate, Bayrock partner and twice-convicted Russian émigré — to some of the Khrapunovs’ transactions.

▪ Kazakh authorities asked the United States for information on Bayrock as part of the ongoing attempt to recover funds.

▪ A New York court decision may further reveal details about the Kazakh family’s financial flows into condos in the Trump SoHo building, developed and sold by Bayrock. Bank records include large transfers from a now-sanctioned Cyprus lender.

Federal lawsuits brought in Los Angeles by the city of Almaty and former business partners in New York are advancing against Ilyas and Viktor, who is also a former mayor of Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city. Both Khrapunovs and Ilyas’ father-in-law, Mukhtar Ablyazov — an uber-wealthy fugitive banker who owned BTA Bank until it was seized by regulators in 2009 — face criminal charges in Kazakhstan. Authorities allege $10 billion went missing from the bank, Kazakhstan’s third largest, and that Ablyazov moved out at least $4 billion.

The trio say they are the victims of political persecution by President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who has ruled oil-rich Kazakhstan since 1990. The country ranks in the bottom quarter on transparency measures, and Nazarbayev’s family is accused of stashing money in offshore companies.

The gathering legal drama is shining light on Trump business associate Bayrock Group, which involves Kazakh partners who helped develop the Trump SoHo building in New York and projects in Arizona and South Florida. This at a time when Donald Trump’s Russian and foreign ties are under greater scrutiny.

Crucial to Trump and his businesses — and the ability of lawyers to establish whether the Trump Organization had any knowledge of or benefit from any illegal money flows — is whether the United States or Switzerland hears the lawsuits against the Khrapunovs. If prosecutors convince a California court to hear the case, lawyers will have much greater ability to dig for evidence through a process known as discovery; Switzerland’s rules are far more restrictive.

Kudryashova
This New York City Department of Finance document shows Elvira Kudryashova as the manager of SoHo 3311 LLC, which bought a unit in the Trump SoHo building. She is the daughter of Viktor Khrapunov, a fugitive Kazakh politician facing money laundering charges abroad and two civil lawsuits in the United States.

TheUkrainian extradition request from March shows that Ilyas Khrapunov is sought there for allegedly orchestrating a computer hack of a law firm representing BTA Bank.

“The allegations against me are preposterous,” Ilyas Khrapunov said in an interview, dismissing as “political” the accusations that he used malware in an email to gain access to and publish contents from a hard drive.

The Swiss are weighing the matter.

“In the Khrapunov case, an international assistance procedure and a national procedure for money laundering are currently underway at the Geneva Public Prosecutor’s Office,” said Henri Della Casa, a spokesman, confirming two Swiss probes. “We are making no further comments.”

Ablyazov, who uses his Facebook page as a protest site, was arrested by French police disguised as gardeners outside his home in Cannes in 2013. He was freed last December after France dropped an extradition order, determining he could not receive a fair trial, and he remains there.

California connection

The net tightening began here. According to allegations in the California lawsuit, Viktor Khrapunov arranged for rigged auctions of state property during his term as mayor of Almaty from 1997 to 2004. He and his wife, Leila, allegedly purchased property at substantially below-market rates using shell companies they controlled, then sold off the properties for a profit estimated at $300 million.

Documents published by the self-described transparency group WikiLeaks show that Viktor Khrapunov was a kleptocracy concern for U.S. diplomats.

“Many observers are puzzled as to how Khrapunov, who is known to be quite corrupt . . . has managed to stay in government,” Kevin Milas, the U.S. embassy’s second in command, wrote back to agency headquarters in a Jan. 17, 2007, confidential memo about a political reshuffling.

The internal note cited an industrialist who had complained of being hit up for a bribe by Khrapunov.

The family fled to Switzerland in early 2008, where Ilyas already lived, seeking political asylum a few years later.

Viktor Khrapunov faced an Interpol detention request beginning in 2012, yet the family was able to buy the property in Los Angeles and the three Trump SoHo condos in New York. Ilyas Khrapunov was put under the same request in 2014.

The Khrapunovs say their fortune is clean and comes from family matriarch Leila, a businesswoman and TV anchor who became owner of Kazakhstan’s first private TV station.

“Switzerland has refused twice to extradite Viktor Khrapunov on the grounds that he would not have an equitable trial in Kazakhstan,” said Ilyas Khrapunov. “Switzerland proposed instead to have the trial delegated to them but Kazakhstan refused, fearing that the truth would come out.”

Friends in low places

The investigation by McClatchy and partners also found that Ilyas Khrapunov and his wife, Madina, Ablyazov’s daughter, were appointed to unusual diplomatic posts representing the Central African Republic at the U.N. Mission in Geneva.

A source tied to the Central African Republic, granted anonymity, said the couple had been appointed by former ruler Francois Bozizé before he was toppled and fled his troubled nation in 2013. Through a land acquisition the couple obtained dual citizenship in the Caribbean haven of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

“Due to refusal of Kazakhstan to renew passports of the family, we were forced to apply through legal process to obtain secondary citizenships in order to exercise our rights to travel,” said Ilyas Khrapunov.

The diplomatic appointments and the recent extradition request are just chapters what’s been a complex, decade-long legal battle that is slowly providing more detail on Trump Organization associate Bayrock Group.

Trump’s associate

Bayrock is an international real estate and investment firm that worked with Trump on at least three known joint projects, and involves Kazakh businessmen.

Trump personally dealt with Bayrock, giving the developer a one-year exclusive right to build a Trump International Hotel and Tower in Moscow. In exchange he’d get a 20-25 percent stake in it.

“I am delighted at having the opportunity to partner with Bayrock Group LLC on yet another world-class development,” Trump wrote in a Jan. 1, 2005, letter to Tevfik Arif, a Kazakh partner of Bayrock, that was entered into evidence in a New Jersey lawsuit. “Moscow is one of the fastest growing cities in the world and offers the best location for a Signature Donald J. Trump development.”

At the time it entered the condo-branding deal with Trump, Bayrock was co-run by a twice-convicted Russian émigré and Trump associate named Felix Sater.

Court documents in New York involving the Khrapunovs tie Sater to multiple transactions by an investment firm in Luxembourg called Triadou SPV S.A., which invested in the United States and elsewhere. People close to the transactions, speaking privately because of ongoing businesses, say Sater had access to Trump and bragged about his Trump connections, even calling him “Mr T.”

In a 2013 videotaped deposition, Trump suggested he barely knew Sater.

“If he were sitting in the room right now, I really wouldn’t know what he looked like,” Trump said under oath as witness in a Florida lawsuit against Bayrock Group.

A prospectus shows Triadou was fully owned by SDG Capital S.A., a company on Lake Geneva that operates as Swiss Development Group, founded at the time the Khrapunovs fled to Switzerland. They say, in court documents, that it was sold in March 2013 to a Swiss businessman, who retained Ilyas Khrapunov through 2015.

Former Triadou Director Nicolas Bourg testified under oath last year that his company belonged to the Khrapunovs, who ordered him to sell assets and move money out of the United States after the California lawsuit was filed in 2014. The Khrapunovs say that is not true and that they’ve kept Swiss authorities informed of their purchases.

Bourg further testified that the Khrapunovs and Ablyazov co-mingled investments and used offshore shell companies to camouflage the purchase and sale of properties in the United States and elsewhere.

Another Triadou associate, New York developer Joseph Chetrit, settled with lawyers for the city of Almaty in 2015 and pledged to support their effort to recover what the city calls more than $300 million in stolen funds.

Sater was named in a lawsuit against a Triadou-owned company that was settled in December 2013. He is also being sued by one former Bayrock partner, Jody Kriss. And according to a recent story by The Wall Street Journal, Sater has issued veiled threats to dish on other Kazakhs because of a dispute he has over legal fees with another Bayrock partner of Kazakh origin, Tevfik Arif.

Arif gained international notoriety when he was arrested in 2010 while throwing what Turkish authorities called a lavish sex party on a luxury yacht involving teenage girls. The charges were later dropped.

Leila Khrapunov briefly did business with Arif and Bayrock in a joint venture called KazBay, which was going to invest in Kazakh natural resources but never got off the ground, in part because of revelations in a New York Times story in late 2007 that Bayrock’s Sater had a checkered past.

Kazakh authorities have alleged in their criminal case that Viktor Khrapunov’s stolen money was deposited at Eurasian Bank in Almaty and then transferred to Switzerland. That bank is owned by Alexander Mashkevich, a strategic partner in Bayrock and someone who, according to a report by McClatchy last month, is linked in sealed British court documents to organized crime groups. Mashkevich is not named in the U.S. lawsuits against Khrapunov, and the Khrapunovs banked with several lenders.

U.S. vs. Switzerland

The battle over which court should hear the high-stakes California lawsuit could determine whether the plaintiff’s lawyers establish any involvement in alleged money laundering by Trump associates.

I am convinced that Switzerland could become a model for countries that have recently embarked on the path of democracy.

Viktor Khrapunov on his website

“Switzerland is a perfectly adequate venue for my client,” said John Kenney, Khrapunov’s legal counsel in New York with the firm Hoguet Newman Regal & Kenney.

A federal court in California agreed in July 2015, but that decision was overturned this past March 30 on appeal by lawyers for the city of Almaty, allowing the case in Los Angeles to proceed.

“The city of Almaty is confident that when the court reviews the evidence, it will find that Viktor Khrapunov unjustly enriched himself to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars by abusing his position as mayor, and with the assistance of his son Ilyas and others, laundered it throughout the world,” said Matthew L. Schwartz, a lawyer with Boies, Schiller & Flexner, which is representing Almaty in the New York case.

The Khrapunovs have until later in June to decide whether to appeal, but for more than two years they’ve avoided sitting for depositions in the U.S. cases.

“The defendants have sought to delay the case at every turn,” said David Schindler, a lawyer who represents Almaty in the California case. “Nevertheless our client remains committed to holding the Khrapunovs accountable for the money they stole from the people of Almaty.”

Trump’s licensing deals on properties typically involved payment of a fee for the use of his name and a Trump property management firm on-site, and Trump often got a small percentage from the first-time sales of condos too.

Depositions could shed light on whether and how the Trump Organization, through Bayrock Group and its Kazakh investors, benefited in any flow of illicit money.

One court document in a related British case shows Kazakh authorities filed a legal assistance request in 2013 to the U.S. government seeking details on the corporate structure of 15 companies it said were tied to the Khrapunovs, including Bayrock Group Inc. and Bayrock Group LLC.

Thus far, Ilyas Khrapunov has resisted providing evidence, but we look forward to the opportunity to question him about his role in his family’s crimes.

Matthew Schwartz, lawyer for the city of Almaty

The Financial Times reported last October that it had seen documents showing Sater had worked closely with Elvira Kudryashova in 2012, a year before she signed the documents for the three Trump SoHo condos. Kudryashova and Ilyas Khrapunov bought the condos so they could vacation in New York, with the properties offered as hotel rooms when they were not there.

Condos in the Trump SoHo building were developed and sold by Bayrock, which also vetted buyers.

Alan Garten, executive vice president and chief legal officer of the Trump Organization said it “was not responsible for the sale of units at Trump SoHo.”

The condos were bought by three companies that were registered in April 2013 within days of each other with the New York Division of Corporations: Soho 3310 LLC, Soho 3311 LLC and Soho 3203 LLC. They were dissolved the following year after the properties sold.

Court records show Kudryashova transferred a total of $3.1 million from a Wells Fargo account for the condo purchases. Bank documents also show her receiving large sums from an offshore company that used the Cyprus lender Federal Bank of the Middle East, which was headquartered in Tanzania. The Treasury Department blacklisted that bank as a “Primary Money Laundering Concern” on July 22, 2014.

A New York court decision in early May granted Almaty access to certain Khrapunovs-related bank transfers from abroad, and that could provide more details about the flow of their money into luxury properties that were held for short periods.

These sorts of purchases led the U.S. Treasury Department last year to begin a project to identify the true owners of shell companies that held luxury real estate in Miami and New York. It was later expanded to large cities in California and Texas.

Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, cautioned that “these efforts have a long way to go before the federal government has the tools it needs to stop money laundering through shady real estate deals and anonymous shell companies.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article gave the wrong law firm for John Kenney, who is with Hoguet Newman Regal & Kenney.

This story involved collaboration between McClatchy and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, a global journalism network that investigates transnational corruption.

Paluch is a special correspondent.

 

 

 

The FBI Finally Addressing Chicago, Murder Capitol

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FBI, Chicago Police Department Work to Combat Violent Crime

Tuesday, April 18, 8:15 a.m.: Along the 5100 block of Halsted Street on the South Side of Chicago, a quiet spring morning is interrupted by gunfire. Police respond to a gas station and discover a drive-by double homicide. As they secure the crime scene and work to identify the bodies and recover evidence, distraught family members of the victims begin to arrive, their faces full of anguish and disbelief. They will not be alone in their grief. By the end of the day in a city reeling from violent crime, there will be 13 more shootings and another murder.

Chicago’s extreme gun violence—762 homicides last year and more than 4,000 people wounded—has been described as an epidemic. Primarily gang-related, the shootings are often spontaneous and unpredictable, and the toll on victims, families, and entire communities cannot be overstated. That’s why the FBI’s Chicago Division, working with the Chicago Police Department (CPD) and other agencies, has undertaken significant measures to address the problem.

***

“The FBI sometimes battles a perception that we are only interested in terrorism or public corruption or large drug-trafficking organizations,” said Michael Anderson, special agent in charge of the Chicago Division. “The fact is, we are interested in those things, but in Chicago we are also getting down to the street level to address violent crime, and we are specifically going after the trigger-pullers and shot-callers.”

That street-level focus is in response to a city homicide rate that has “increased exponentially,” Anderson said. “The number of shootings is at a level that hasn’t been seen here since the early 1990s.” As a result, he explained, “what you are seeing and will continue to see in Chicago is a sustained FBI effort to support and supplement our local partners.”

That effort involves three major areas:

  • The creation in 2016 of a homicide task force—in addition to the FBI’s existing violent crimes squad—in which agents work alongside CPD detectives and other law enforcement officers to assist in solving the city’s murder cases;
  • Increased intelligence-gathering efforts to identify shooters and “directors of violence,” which includes embedding FBI analysts at CPD headquarters; and
  • Stepping up community outreach efforts to gain the public’s trust and enlist their help in solving crimes and making communities safer.

Chicago Police Department personnel monitor activity at the Crime Prevention Information Center on April 17, 2017.

At Chicago Police Department headquarters, personnel in the Crime Prevention and Information Center monitor violent crimes throughout the city using surveillance video and other sophisticated tools. FBI analysts assigned to the center offer additional real-time intelligence that helps police officials deploy resources as efficiently as possible.

“Simply put,” said CPD Superintendent Eddie Johnson, “the FBI has more resources than we do. We combine the resources we have with the ones they have to fight these crimes.”

FBI and CPD personnel working together in the city’s most violent neighborhoods “has helped quite a bit,” Johnson said. “And we get real-time intelligence from the FBI that we didn’t get before. They can look at our crime picture and help us figure out where to best deploy our resources.”

Johnson, a Chicago native and 29-year veteran of the police force who spent many years as a patrol officer, believes a key reason for the city’s current violence is inadequate gun laws.

“The flow of guns into Chicago is just insane,” he said. “You will find that gang members would rather be caught with a gun by law enforcement than caught without one by their rivals. What we have to do through legislation is create a mentality where gang members won’t want to pick up a gun,” he explained. “You create that by holding them accountable for their actions. We simply don’t do a good job of that right now.”

Johnson recalled that when he joined CPD in 1988, he and fellow officers responded daily to calls of gang fights in progress. “We rarely hear that call anymore,” he said. “What we hear now is a person with a gun or a person shot. They just go straight to a firearm and they resolve their disputes with a weapon.”

“What you are seeing and will continue to see in Chicago is a sustained FBI effort to support and supplement our local partners.”

Michael Anderson, special agent in charge, FBI Chicago

“Communities are being hijacked by a relatively small percentage of people,” Anderson said. “The overwhelming majority of residents are hard-working citizens going to work, going to school, trying to go about their daily lives. These communities are under siege, and they are desperately looking for help.”

Of Chicago’s 22 police districts, the majority of violent crimes are taking places in a cluster of neighborhoods on the South and West Sides. “A handful of districts—probably five or six—are responsible for the disproportionate number of homicides and shootings,” Anderson said.

FBI and CPD investigators have focused considerable effort on two of the city’s most historically violent areas—the 11th District on the West Side and the 7th District on the South Side. “Since we put the task force in place,” Johnson said, “we’ve seen significant drops in gun violence in these two districts. We are making some real positive gains,” he said. “By no means are we declaring success, but we have seen some really encouraging results.”

Driving through the city’s most violent neighborhoods—Austin, Englewood, North Lawndale, Auburn Gresham—the streets and parks appear peaceful, and often they are. But when the violence comes, it is sudden and usually without warning. One gang member might have disrespected a rival gang member—increasingly through social media (see sidebar)—and they go looking for each other to settle matters with their guns.

“When I started as a cop,” Johnson said, “if you had a gang of 10 guys, maybe two of them at most would be armed. Now if you have a gang of 10 guys, probably nine of them are armed. And we’ve seen kids as young as 10 and 11 with firearms.”

Investigators agree that gang members are arming themselves at younger ages. “Based on what I’ve seen over the last year,” one FBI agent said, “these guys are carrying around guns as if it’s a symbol of their pride or who they are—and the bigger the gun, the better. We are seeing handguns with extended magazines and ammunition drums attached. It’s like guns are a part of them, a part of their culture. And they are not afraid to use them.”

“We get real-time intelligence from the FBI that we didn’t get before. They can look at our crime picture and help us figure out where to best deploy our resources.”

Eddie Johnson, superintendent, Chicago Police Department

FBI Special Agent Rob Fortt speaks to students at Plato Learning Academy in Chicago on April 18, 2017.
In addition to working closely with the Chicago Police Department to stop gun violence, the FBI has a strong community outreach program. At the Plato Learning Academy middle school in the Austin community, Special Agent Rob Fortt speaks to students about the dangers of joining gangs.

The FBI is working to reach some of these youngsters before they get involved with gangs—it’s one part of the Bureau’s larger community outreach effort in the campaign to stop gun violence. At the Plato Learning Academy middle school in the Austin community recently, Special Agent Rob Fortt spoke to sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders about the choices they make and the consequences of those choices.

The school’s principal, Charles Williams, welcomed the opportunity for the FBI to give students a fresh perspective on law enforcement and a positive message about making good decisions. Describing the neighborhood’s reputation for violence, Williams said he has heard gunshots in the middle of the day from his office, and violent crime is a fact of life. “Our students are surrounded by it, unfortunately. It’s just something that permeates the neighborhood.”

Gang-related homicides in Chicago are most easily solved when witnesses come forward. But in the city’s violent neighborhoods, many who witness shootings or have information don’t cooperate with law enforcement, either because they distrust the police or they want to engage in “frontier justice” and seek their own retaliation, the FBI’s Anderson said. “So we are putting a lot of resources into community outreach. We are really focusing on going out in the community and building trust. If folks trust law enforcement, they are more likely to report crimes.”

***

“We have to acknowledge that we have a fractured relationship with the community,” the CPD superintendent said. “But we’re working hard to rebuild that, and the FBI is helping us do that.” Johnson added, “I haven’t been to a community meeting yet where people have said they want less police. What they want is the police to be fair, respectful, and to get the bad guys out of their communities. That’s what they want. And you start that by having a constant dialogue with them, which we are doing.”

Community activist Andrew Holmes represents another important part of law enforcement’s outreach efforts. Holmes, who has experienced the tragedy of gun violence firsthand, has been working with the FBI since 2013 on issues involving gun crimes and the human trafficking of children. He is known to law enforcement and residents of violent neighborhoods as a rapid responder when a homicide occurs. He arrives on the streets at all hours of the day and night to counsel and comfort the families of victims. And he encourages witnesses to come forward.

The work is meaningful to Holmes because his daughter was killed in Indiana when she was innocently caught in the crossfire of a gang shooting. And he recently lost an 11-year-old cousin in Chicago who was killed by a stray bullet meant for a gang member. Holmes also visits high-crime neighborhoods, going street to street to hand out pamphlets urging residents to report gun crimes. In the troubled Auburn Gresham community recently, he spoke to Betty Swanson, block captain of her neighborhood watch group.

Andrew Holmes talks with Betty Swanson in Chicago
Community activist Andrew Holmes has been working with the FBI since 2013 on issues involving gun violence. He regularly visits high-crime neighborhoods to urge residents to cooperate with law enforcement. In the Auburn Gresham community recently, he spoke to Betty Swanson, block captain of her neighborhood watch group.

On the porch of her tree-lined street, Swanson told Holmes that one of her grandsons had been murdered a few months ago. “He was going to visit his mom … after he got off work. Somebody walked up to the car and shot him. He was 28 years old.”

Although her street is largely violence-free now because so many of the residents are senior citizens, Swanson said her block group works hard to keep the area safe, and—like Holmes advocates—that means speaking up when necessary.

“One thing we try to do is to let witnesses know that it’s okay to talk,” Holmes said. “We ask people to engage with law enforcement. You’ve got to work with law enforcement. I don’t care who it is—FBI, state police, U.S. Marshals, Chicago Police—you have to.” Otherwise, the help needed to save a loved one might come too late. “You’ve got to reach over and get that phone, call the FBI,” he said. “Show these criminals—not this block, it’s not happening.”

Murder and Social Media

For those unfamiliar with Chicago’s rampant gun violence, it would be easy to think that shootings happen because of traditional turf battles—one gang trying to muscle in on a rival’s street-corner drug business. But that reality occurred in a time before social media. The new reality is increasingly virtual, and social media is playing a prominent role in the murder rate.

Violence can indeed result from “gang-on-gang and some narcotics territory disputes,” said Chicago Police Department Superintendent Eddie Johnson, “but a lot of our gun violence now is precipitated by social media.”

One gang member disrespects a rival on social media, and the rival responds in kind. The virtual argument escalates, and the gang members look to settle things with weapons. Using their electronic devices, gang members can often pinpoint their rivals’ location.

“Gun in one hand, smartphone in the other,” said Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Chicago Division Michael Anderson. Too often, that makes for a deadly mix. And in many cases, the time between the online dispute and actual shots being fired, Anderson said, “is very short.”

After Trump’s Saudi Arabia Speech, Iran Responds

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After President Trump delivered his speech in Saudi Arabia that included harsh words, rightly so regarding Iran, it was predicted by the owner of this site that Tehran would respond. Responses are beginning to surface and militant operations are probable.

Primer:

Iran’s Motivations for Supporting Terrorist and Militant Groups

In part from Byman: Iran has supported terrorist and militant groups in the Islamic world since the 1979 revolution. In his 2016 testimony, Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper warned: “Iran—the foremost state sponsor of terrorism—continues to exert its influence in regional crises in the Middle East through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—Qods Force (IRGC-QF), its terrorist partner Lebanese Hizballah, and proxy groups” – an assessment that has stayed roughly constant for many years.

Iran has long sought to “try hard to export our revolution to the world,” in the words of Ayatollah Khomeini, the clerical regime’s dominant revolutionary leader. This goal is embedded in Iran’s constitution and in the missions of organizations such as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a military and paramilitary organization that oversees Iran’s relationships with many substate groups. More here.

***   ArmControl.org

Iranian President: ‘We Need Missiles’ to Confront Trump Admin, Enemies
Recently re-elected Rouhani takes aim at Trump administration as Congress passes new sanctions

Recently re-elected Iranian President Hassan Rouhani lashed out at the Trump administration this week, describing it as ignorant and saying that Iran “needs missiles” to confront the United States and its allies, according to recent remarks certain to rile leaders in Washington, D.C.

Just days after President Donald Trump blasted the Islamic Republic for its illicit ballistic missile program and support of terrorism in the Middle East, Rouhani confirmed that Iran would not cease its missile activity, despite repeated calls by U.S. officials.

“We need missiles and the enemy should know that we make everything we need and we don’t pay an iota of attention to your words,” Rouhani was quoted as saying on Wednesday during a meeting with Iranian cabinet members. “The remarks by the enemies of the Iranian nation against Iran’s missile power are out of ignorance.”

The Iranian leaders remarks support recent comments by senior military leaders in the country, who have repeatedly declared that Iran will “never stop” developing ballistic missiles, a program that has raised concerns with the U.S. intelligence community, which assesses that Iran’s missile program could be used to carry a nuclear weapon.

The remarks came as Iran announced the construction of a third underground ballistic missile production factory, helmed by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC.

Iranian General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, and IRGC leader, said the factory is meant to boosts Tehran’s “missile power” and intimidate the United States and “Zionist regime,” or Israel.

“We will increase our missile power. Our enemies, the United States, and the Zionist regime (Israel) are naturally upset and get angry at our missile production, tests and underground missile facilities because they want Iran to be in a weak position,” Hajizadeh announced on Thursday.

The facility was built in the last few years, according to the IRGC. Iranian military leaders also are working on building Iran’s first “ground-to-ground” ballistic missile.

Iran’s repeated test firing of ballistic missiles, as well as its multiple space launches—which are believed to be cover for an intercontinental ballistic missile program—have riled the Trump administration and leaders of both parties on Capitol Hill.

A bipartisan delegation of nearly 50 senators announced on Thursday that it is moving forward with new legislation to increase economic sanctions on Iran as a result of its missile program, as well as the Islamic Republic’s support for terrorism and illegal weapons trade.

Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), a chief sponsor of the legislation, said that it is part of a larger effort to ensure that “Iran’s leaders understand they do not enjoy blanket impunity as the United States continues to live up to its commitments under the” nuclear agreement.

“Independent of the nuclear portfolio, and as President Rouhani starts his second presidential term, our broader policy towards Iran must be one that holds Tehran accountable for their destabilizing efforts in the region, illegal and dangerous missile technology development, and nefarious activities as the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism,” Menendez said. “As the administration continues to review its Iran policy, Congress must set out clear markers that impose real consequences to Iran’s illicit behavior that runs counter to our national security and that of our allies in the region.”

The legislation would impose mandatory sanctions on all individuals associated with Iran’s ballistic missile program, as well as those who perform transactions with them.

Sanctions also would be applied to those who support Iran’s terror operations, including the IRGC, which is not currently designated as a terror organization by the United States.

The legislation also requires President Trump to block the property of all individuals and entities involved in supplying, selling, and transferring prohibited arms and other weaponry to Iran.

A State Department official, speaking on background, told the Washington Free Beacon that the Trump administration is moving closer to finishing its comprehensive review of the Iran deal and dealing with Iran’s provocative actions in the region.

“As Secretary [Rex] Tillerson said, the Trump administration is currently conducting a comprehensive review of our Iran policy,” the official said. “Once we have finalized our conclusions, we will meet the challenges Iran poses with clarity and conviction.”

One veteran foreign policy adviser who is close to the White House told the Free Beacon that the Trump administration would not stand by as Iranian leaders mock and threaten the United States.

“The Obama administration treated the Iranians with kid gloves because that was to get the nuclear deal,” the source said. “That ended last January but the Iranians are still acting as if they have a friend in the White House. They threaten and mock the United States, our leaders, and our allies, and they expect us to roll with it. This president is not going to roll with it, and neither is Congress.”

Meanwhile, senior Iranian military leaders continue to criticize the Trump administration for its efforts to stop Iran’s missile program.

Iranian Armed Forces Brigadier General Massoud Jazzayeri offered harsh words for Secretary of State Tillerson following his call for Iran to cease its ballistic missile work.

“The U.S. secretary of state’s expectations of the Iranian president indicate the U.S. officials’ non-understanding of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Jazzayeri was quoted as saying in the country’s state-controlled press.