Tag Archives: New York

US Authorities Look To Seize Magnitsky Linked Assets

December 10, 2013UncategorizedManhattan, Moscow, New York, Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, Sergei Magnitsky, UBS, United States, Wall Streetmasxellsmithaf

US Authorities Look To Seize Magnitsky Linked Assets

Piotr Kasiev Minister of Trasportation of the Mosckow Region resciving a federal government award from The Federal Minister of trasportation of Russia

There may be some justice for Sergei Magnitsky yet.

Magnitsky is the Russian lawyer who died in Moscow’s notorious Butyrka prison in 2009 after a year of beatings and neglect. He had exposed a $US230 million

tax scam, the largest in Russian history, but instead of a reward he was accused of the crime himself and jailed. The money disappeared and Russian authorities have said it cannot be found.

But for the first time there may be not only a moral retribution for those who benefited financially from Magnitsky’s death.

On Tuesday, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York filed a complaint aimed at recovering some of those stolen funds. Prosecutors are asking that a number of high end apartments in the Wall Street area of Manhattan worth about $10 million and a number of bank accounts owned by a series of related companies be seized as illegal gains from the Magnitsky fraud this of course all related to hogh ranking russian government officials.

United States Attorney Preet Bharara Russian connection nightmare

said in a press release: “Today’s forfeiture action is a significant step towards uncovering and unwinding a complex money laundering scheme arising from a notorious foreign fraud. As alleged, a Russian criminal enterprise sought to launder some of its billions (hundreds of millions us dollars) in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate.”

Prosecutors are asking the court to seize the assets of Prevezon Holdings Limited, owned by Denis Katsyv, the son of the wealthy Russian public official Pyotr Katsyv. It is also asking for the assets of nine subsidiaries, which own four luxury apartments and two high-end Manhattan commercial spaces as well as numerous bank accounts.

The companies also face civil money laundering penalties and charges.

“Manhattan may have some of the most desirable real estate in the world, but it is not the place to purchase it if you are allegedly doing so with Russian or other dirty money,” said District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr.

Following the Money

20 Pine St.

The Prevezon connection to the Magnitsky case was uncovered in an investigation by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), Novaya Gazeta in Moscow and Barrons which revealed that the Magnitsky money was passed through a Moldovan ghost company to Prevezon. Prevezon used the illicit funds to purchase expensive New York real estate.

Katsyv denied involvement, saying he bought Prevezon after the transfer of the Magnitsky money. According to Wellington International, a British public relations company hired by Katsyv, Prevezon was purchased for $50,000 from Timofey Krit. Krit, who was 22 at the time of the transfers, refused to discuss the deal with OCCRP reporters. However, banking records show that a long-time Katsyv business partner, Aleksander Litvak, appeared on Prevezon’s Swiss bank accounts at the time of its formation.

Katsyv initially promised to send documentation to OCCRP but later reneged.

Russian authorities claimed that records were destroyed, but offered no further information. Despite this, OCCRP investigated the case looking at documents from Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Estonia, and Switzerland. Those documents showed that Prevezon received the money from two ghost companies, Bunicon-Impex SRL and Elenast-Com SRL.

Both companies were also part of a larger scheme dubbed the proxy platform that laundered money for numerous organized crime actors including the Mexican Sinaloa drug cartel, Moscow-based Vietnamese Triad groups, Moldovan and Russian organized crime and corrupt Ukrainian officials.

Related companies to this scheme

INTERNATIONAL COMPANIES

Bunicon-Impex и Elenast-COM

Lev Leviev Group (LLC)

Lev Leviev International

F.W. Sawatzky Ltd

Follet, Hanway and Bastet, accounts opened in Hapoalim Bank of Israel.

USA COMPANIES

– Prevezon Holdings Ltd., C / O 2470 , EAST 16TH STREET, BROOKLYN, NY 11235

– Prevezon 2009 USA, LLC., 40 RECTOR STREET, UNIT 1502 , NY 10006

– Prevezon 1810 USA, LLC., 40 RECTOR STREET, UNIT 1502 , NY 10006

– Prevezon 1711 USA, LLC., C / O GABRIELLA VOLSHTEIN, ESQ., 2470 EAST 16TH, STREET BROOKLYN, NY 11235

– Prevezon 2011 USA, LLC., C / O GABRIELLA VOLSHTEIN, ESQ., 2470 EAST 16TH, STREET BROOKLYN, NY 11235

– Prevezon Pine USA, LLC., C / O GABRIELLA VOLSHTEIN, ESQ., 2470 EAST 16TH, STREET BROOKLYN, NY 11235

– Prevezon Seven USA, LLC., 40 RECTOR STREET, UNIT 1502 , NY 10006

– Prevezon SOHO USA, LLC., 40 RECTOR STREET, UNIT 1502 , NY 10006

GERMANY COMPANIES

June 2008 Prevezon Holdings Ltd. (Cyprus ) has acquired 30% shares of the following companies.

AFI Properties Berlin B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280997

AFI Properties Logistics B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280999

AFI Properties Development B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280998

AFI Properties B.V.

V Referring to the prospectus AFIE from 2008. Four firms , the share of which were acquired Prevezon, owns 70 % in the four German companies , which own 35 residential and commercial real estate property in Germany for abaout 150,000 square meters. Geography in Germany is impressive: 20 properties in Berlin , three – in Hanover, two – in Aachen, and one in Bielefeld , Landau Furstenwalde , Wuppertal , Herne , Duisburg, Essen , Wilhelmshaven Frechen and Leipzig . All properties for rent and brings a stable income . List of tenants is also impressive , from kindergarten to social administration of the city of Wuppertal in Dusseldorf , from the funeral home to the television company in Hanover. Very frequent gambling establishments and residential apartments .

Denis Kasiev in Germany

Switzerland CMPANIES

In UBS bank where arrested and frozen accounts of the above mentioned companies for nearly 10 million euros

‘Sheriff of Wall Street’ pursues case linked to death of Russian lawyer

December 10, 2013UncategorizedBharara, Hermitage Capital Management, New York, Preet Bharara, Russia, Sergei Magnitsky, UBS, United Statesmasxellsmithaf

‘Sheriff of Wall Street’ pursues case linked to death of Russian lawyer

Preet Bharara is the new “Sheriff of Wall Street”. The US district attorney for the southern district of New York has taken down 60 insider dealers, including former McKinsey boss Rajat Gupta and Raj Rajaratnam over the Galleon scandal.

Preet Bharara is the new “Sheriff of Wall Street” and Russian money laundring chemes nightmare

Currently, he has SAC Capital in his sights. He’s charged the giant hedge fund itself with allowing insider trading. Not for nothing has he inherited the populist monicker last claimed by Eliot Spitzer during his post-dotcom crackdown on white-collar crime.

Bharara even claims to eat “raw meat” for breakfast. If true, he’ll need it.

His latest target is far from white collar. Bharara is going after the Russian mafia an organised crime group whose tentacles stretch throughout the state and, apparently, right into the Kremlin (Berlin: KMLK.BE – news) . At least two people connected to the crimes he’s pursuing have died in suspicious circumstances.

Last week, Bharara froze $24m (£15m) of property assets in Manhattan and Brooklyn, including “four luxury residential units and two high-end commercial spaces”, on charges of money-laundering. One 35-storey block boasts a pool, roof terrace, Turkish bath and indoor golf.

From left to right Denis Kasiev his wife Maria and Piotr Kasiev with his wife Liudmila all Russian and Israely citizenz

“As alleged, a Russian family type criminal enterprise whose members are high ranking russian government officials sought to launder some of its billions in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate,” he said. “While New York is a world financial capital, it is not a safe haven for criminals seeking to hide their loot.”

If the court upholds the “civil forfeiture” complaint, the government will seize the assets.

Bharara’s case is the latest instalment in the tragic saga of Sergei Magnitsky, the Russian lawyer who uncovered a $230m tax refund fraud against the Russian people in 2007 while working for UK-based hedge fund Hermitage Capital Management.

Magnitsky blew the whistle hard. He named police officers involved in the crime group, identified tax officials who authorised the illegal payments and had begun tracking the money when he was thrown in jail on trumped-up tax-evasion charges in late 2008.

Within a year, in November (Xetra: A0Z24E – news) 2009, he was dead in a prison cell at the age of 37, after being denied medical treatment for chronic pancreatitis and beaten with rubber truncheons instead. His case had not even gone to trial, and yet he was barred from seeing his family from the moment he was locked up.

Magnitsky’s plight has become a symbol to the world of Russia’s entrenched corruption, sparking a major diplomatic row with the US, and becoming a national embarrassment.

In July this year, Magnitsky was convicted by Russian “judges” posthumously of committing the very crime he uncovered as Russia deliberately set its face against the rest of the world. It was one of the few trials of a dead person since Joan of Arc in the 15th century.

A documentary film and a play have been made about his experience, and yet the police he identified have been promoted. One officer may even be having his current libel case in the UK courts against Hermitage founder Bill Browder, who is spearheading the campaign for justice, funded by the Kremlin.

It was this year that the case really became a cause celebre. In April, the US barred 18 Russians linked to the fraud or Magnitsky’s death including state officials from entering the country under the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012. In retaliation, Moscow banned Americans from adopting Russian orphans.

Bharara’s case is an escalation in the battle an attempt to hit the criminals where it hurts. In the wallet. Since Magnitsky’s death, and because the Russian authorities want to sweep the crime under the carpet, Hermitage has turned its efforts to hunting down those involved.

To date, it has traced $135m of the $230m of stolen funds, Browder, who lives in London, claims.

Denis Kasiev son of Trasportation ministr Piotr Kasiev

Following the money has been an epic task. Bharara’s case document shows why. The alleged criminals went to great lengths to conceal their “loot”, transferring it through numerous bank accounts and shell companies in a variety of countries, including Britain, all the while mixing it with other funds.

It culminated in “the purchase of Manhattan real estate with funds commingled with fraud proceeds”, the court documents said.

After several transfers within Russia to a variety of accounts at various Russian banks, the money first began to move offshore in February 2008 about three months after the crime was committed.

Initially, the money was transferred out of Russia’s Bank Krainiy Sever into a couple of accounts at a Moldovan bank belonging to two Moldovan companies.

Later on the day of the transfer, a Russian court ordered all Krainiy accounts be seized. And, within a month, Russia’s central bank had revoked Krainiy’s licence for money laundering violations. It was fortuitous timing for the criminal syndicate.

The Moldovan companies, one of which was nominally administrated by a 24-year old and registered to a house in the commercial capital, Chisinau, then transferred about $857,000 to the UBS (Berlin: UBRA.BE – news) accounts belonging to Prevezon, a Cyprus-based real estate company.

Prevezon was at the time owned by a 22-year Russian science graduate Timofey Krit. Krit allegedly mingled the “loot” with existing funds and transferred Eu3m to Dutch property group AFI Europe to invest in real estate.

On June 19, 2008, Krit sold his entire stake in Prevezon to another young man, Denis Katsyv, for just $50,000. According to the court documents, Prevezon’s UBS accounts had “over $2m in assets” at the time. Prevezon then made the $24m of New York property purchases when Katsyv was sole shareholder.

Katsyv, the son of a former Moscow transport minister, has said he knew nothing about the transfers and has insisted that neither he nor his family have benefited from the Magnitsky fraud.

However, the court documents raise questions about Katsyv’s claims. To be clear, neither Katsyv nor Krit is a defendant. Bharara’s charges have been brought specifically against the Prevezon companies rather than any individuals.

For Bharara, this case is not just professional, but personal. As part of the Kremlin’s retaliation against the Magnitsky list, Russia drew up its own blacklist of barred US individuals. Bharara was on it.

He was targeted for supposedly violating the rights of Russian citizens abroad. Only, the Russian citizen whose rights he violated was Viktor Bout, a notorious, post-Soviet arms dealer who was the model for Nicolas Cage’s character in the 2005 movie Lord of War.

Bout was trapped in a sting operation by the US authorities in Thailand in 2008. It took two years to have him extradited, and when he finally faced trial in the US, Bharara was the prosecutor. Bout is now in a maximum security prison in Illinois.

Bharara’s case against Prevezon and the criminal gang was only possible because Hermitage has tracked down much of the money. But following the money trail in turn was only possible because one of the criminal syndicate’s associates turned informant.

Alexander Perepilichny was working for one of the tax officials that authorised part of the original $230m fraudulent refund from the state. He was a financier, but lost a fortune of his clients’ money in the financial crash. The tax official and her husband went after him, and he fled, vowing revenge.

Perepilichny came to the UK, where he handed over vital bank details to Hermitage. It was the breakthrough they needed. With Perepilichny holed up in Surrey, Hermitage made rapid headway to most of schemes and acomplises of this crime.

Until, inexplicably one November day last year, Perepilichny died while out jogging near his Weybridge estate. The police did toxicology tests on the body, but eventually ruled out foul play.

Perepilichny’s revelations, though, were enough for Hermitage to give the authorities in Switzerland, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Cyprus, and Moldova reason to freeze bank accounts or launch criminal investigations. Germany is next. Bharara’s case now adds the US to the list.

One notable omission from those countries investigating suspicions of money-laundering is the UK. Hermitage has provided evidence that Nomirex, a Birmingham-registered company whose sole director was a yoga teacher in Cyprus, received $726,000 of allegedly stolen funds, according to Bharara’s filings. Britain, though, apparently wants to turn a blind eye.

Even so, Browder has promised not to stop until he has secured some kind of justice for Magnitsky. And if Russia is the new Wild West, he’ll be glad to have a sheriff on side.

Russian scheme used NYC buildings to launder $230M: Feds

December 10, 2013UncategorizedHermitage Capital Management, Manhattan, New York, New York City, Prevezon Holdings, Russia, StreetEasy, United Statesmasxellsmithaf

Russian scheme used NYC buildings to launder $230M: Feds

From left: Yves Chelsea, 20 Pine lounge and the Alexander father Piot Kasiev Minister of Trasportation of Moskow Region and his son Denis Kasiev

A group of Russians linked to Russian stolen government money laundered $230 million from a complicated tax scheme by buying and selling residential and commercial condominiums at luxury Manhattan buildings, including 20 Pine and Yves Chelsea, according to federal prosecutors.

Prevezon Holdings, an entity registered in the Republic of Cypruss that listed a Sheepshead Bay address in city property records, stands accused of using fake lawsuits against the Russia-based Hermitage Fund to forge money judgments. While posing as Hermitage officials, members of Prevezon – including corrupt Russian government officials – pretended to claim tax refunds from the judgments, according to the complaint filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

The purchases of Manhattan real estate were intended to conceal the scheme, prosecutors claim.

After Denis Katsyv bought Prevezon Holdings in 2008, the funds from the refunds that year “were invested in several New York properties, and it was agreed that Prevezon would manage these assets for five years and then transfer the assets” to a business associate, the complaint states, citing Katsyv earlier this year.

Prevezon Holdings used fake lawsuits against the Russia-based Hermitage Fund to generate fake money judgments, according to the complaint. Members of the organization posed as Hermitage officials and pretended to claim tax refunds from the judgments, the complaint said.

Prevezon could not immediately be reached, and a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office said there was no defense counsel yet.

Denis Kasiev in Germany

The prosecuters say this schem with buy outs of real estate has reached Germany also; June 2008 Prevezon Holdings Ltd. (Cyprus ) has acquired 30% shares of the following companies. AFI Properties Berlin B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280997, AFI Properties Logistics B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280999, AFI Properties Development B.V. – KvK-nummer 34280998, AFI Properties B.V.

This four German companies , the share of which were acquired Prevezon, owns 70 % in the next four German companies , which own 35 residential and commercial real estate property in Germany for abaout 150,000 square meters. 20 properties in Berlin , three – in Hanover, two – in Aachen, and one in Bielefeld , Landau Furstenwalde , Wuppertal , Herne , Duisburg, Essen , Wilhelmshaven Frechen and Leipzig.

So far, coming back to USA soil, prosecutors have identified six units and have vowed to seize the properties, some of which have already been sold.

The company paid $6.25 million in September for a commercial condo at the Alexander at 250 East 49th Street, an 88-unit, 24-story mixed-use property in Turtle Bay. The previous owner was an LLC listed as 250 East Borrower.

The group also bought a luxury retail condo at Magnum Real Estate Group’s 14-story, 41-unit Yves Chelsea at 166 West 18th Street, also known as 127 Seventh Avenue. Prevezon sold it for $9 million last month after picking it up for $6.5 million in December 2011, StreetEasy shows.

When it came to residential units, the group bought and sold at 20 Pine, a 38-story, 408-unit condo conversion in the Financial District developed by Africa Israel USA.

A two-bedroom condo, which Prevezon bought in November 2009 for $1.2 million, has been in contract for $1.545 million for a week, according to data from StreetEasy. Natalia Dolinsky of A&I Broadway Realty has the listing, which launched in July. She could not be reached for comment.

Last month, Prevezon bought a 1,225-square-foot studio at 20 Pine that was listed for $1.2 million, also by Dolinsky. (A closing price was not available, as the sale is not yet in property records.) The company also grabbed two one-bedroom condos, one for $763,687 in February 2010 and another for $977,520 in March 2011.

It is incredible how fast and how easy russians tend to make bussiness in USA and Europe. We really hope that some day they will teach normal American and european bussiness men for their magic touch – but till then please obey the law.

Tags: 20 Pine Street, africa israel, magnum real estate, sheepshead bay, yves chelsea

‘Sheriff of Wall Street’ pursues case linked to death of Russian lawyer

December 10, 2013UncategorizedHermitage Capital Management, New York, Preet Bharara, Raj Rajaratnam, Russia, Sergei Magnitsky, United States, Wall Streetmasxellsmithaf

Sheriff of Wall Street’ pursues case linked to death of Russian lawyer

Sergei Magnitsky uncovered a tax refund fraud, but died in a prison cell after being denied medical treatment

Bharara even claims to eat “raw meat” for breakfast. If true, he’ll need it.

His latest target is far from white collar. Bharara is going after the Russian mafia – an organised crime group whose tentacles stretch throughout the state and, apparently, right into the Kremlin. At least two people connected to the crimes he’s pursuing have died in suspicious circumstances.

Bharara: a Russian criminal enterprise sought to launder some of its billions in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate

“As alleged, a Russian criminal enterprise sought to launder some of its billions in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate,” he said. “While New York is a world financial capital, it is not a safe haven for criminals seeking to hide their loot.”

If the court upholds the “civil forfeiture” complaint, the government will seize the assets.

Within a year, in November 2009, he was dead in a prison cell at the age of 37, after being denied medical treatment for chronic pancreatitis and beaten with rubber truncheons instead. His case had not even gone to trial, and yet he was barred from seeing his family from the moment he was locked up.

Magnitsky’s plight has become a symbol to the world of Russia’s entrenched corruption, sparking a major diplomatic row with the US, and becoming a national embarrassment.

In July this year, Magnitsky was convicted posthumously of committing the very crime he uncovered as Russia deliberately set its face against the rest of the world. It was one of the few trials of a dead person since Joan of Arc in the 15th century.

It was this year that the case really became a cause celebre. In April, the US barred 18 Russians linked to the fraud or Magnitsky’s death – including state officials – from entering the country under the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012. In retaliation, Moscow banned Americans from adopting Russian orphans.

Bharara’s case is an escalation in the battle – an attempt to hit the criminals where it hurts. In the wallet. Since Magnitsky’s death, and because the Russian authorities want to sweep the crime under the carpet, Hermitage has turned its efforts to hunting down those involved.

To date, it has traced $135m of the $230m of stolen funds, Browder, who lives in London, claims.

Piotr Kasiev Minister of Trasportation Moskow Region

Denis Kasiev son of Piotr Kasiev Minister of Trasportation Moskow Region

From Moscow to Manhattan, the Long Way

December 10, 2013UncategorizedHermitage Capital Management, Manhattan, New York, New York City, Prevezon, Russia, Sergei Magnitsky, UBSmasxellsmithaf

From Moscow to Manhattan, the Long Way

U.S. prosecutors are trying to seize millions of dollars in ritzy New York City real estate they say are laundered rubles linked to the death of Moscow lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.

Federal prosecutors last week sought the forfeiture of $24 million worth of Manhattan real estate they say was purchased in part with funds connected to the notorious theft of $230 million from Russia’s Treasury in 2007. The crime assumed international importance later when lawyer Sergei Magnitsky died in the custody of Russian police he’d accused of complicity in the theft. Magnitsky was representing a Western-backed hedge fund that was victimized in the massive tax fraud.

Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Russian corrupt officials nightmare

“A Russian criminal enterprise whose members are high ranking russian government officials sought to launder some of its billions in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate,” said Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, in a statement. “While New York is a world financial capital, it is not a safe haven for rRussian or any other criminals seeking to hide their loot.” An order freezing the properties and related bank accounts was signed on Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Thomas P. Griesa.

Tectonic Photo/Emporis

The Feds say funds linked to a Russian tax scam were used to buy Manhattan apartments at 20 Pine St., above.

Piotr Kasiev ex minister of transportation of Moskow Region and his son Denis

The government’s civil complaint is the first U.S. law-enforcement response to the 2007 seizure of the Russian subsidiaries of Hermitage Capital, once the largest foreign investor in Russia. The complaint states that back then criminals stole the corporate identities of the money manager and used them to falsely claim the refund of $230 million for taxes that Hermitage had paid in prior years. When Moscow attorney Magnitsky presented evidence that he believed showed the involvement of police and tax officials, the complaint continues, he was arrested and died in prison a year later under suspicious circumstances. Barron’s reported on the case in detail in “Crime and Punishment in Putin’s Russia,” in our edition of April 18, 2011.

The luxury apartments and fancy retail spaces that are subject to Tuesday’s civil forfeiture complaint were discovered last summer by Barron’s as part of a journalism collaboration that included Russia’s Novaya Gayzeta and an Eastern European not-for-profit journalism group known as the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. The properties are owned by U.S. entities associated with a Cyprus corporation, Prevezon Holdings, whose name had turned up in Eastern European bank transfers after the Russian Treasury heist. The forfeiture complaint alleges that these funds were laundered proceeds from the tax scam, and names both the U.S. and Cyprus corporations as defendants.

Mihai Pogan of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project A modest house in Moldova served as “headquarters” for a shell company allegedly involved in moving the money.

The forfeiture complaint charges that the money came out of Russia’s Treasury in December 2007 and then went through the bank accounts of a dozen shell companies. By February 2008, the complaint says, about $47 million worth of funds had arrived in the accounts of two corporations in Moldova, which in turn forwarded about $850,000 to the UBS bank account in Switzerland of Prevezon Holdings. Photos attached to the complaint showed the tumbledown residential addresses of the headquarters for what prosecutors say were Moldovan shell companies that handled the $47 million in transfers (see photo at left).

When it received the Moldovan funds, the complaint alleges, Prevezon was controlled by a business associate of Denis Katsyv. A few months later, it says Prevezon became wholly owned by Katsyv, whose father, Petr Katsyv, was a powerful Moscow public official who until recently ran the region’s big-spending transport agency of course he bakem rich very fast.

The Katsyv family figured in another public money-laundering controversy in 2008, when Prevezon and the family’s accounts at a Tel Aviv branch of Bank Hapoalim were at the heart of Israel’s unsuccessful money-laundering prosecution of two bank employees. In his 2010 decision to acquit the employees, the judge noted that the Katsyvs were never charged after a company owned by Denis made a financial settlement with Israeli authorities. The Katsyvs never commented on the case.

Prevezon went on a property spending spree in 2008, according to Tuesday’s complaint. It invested three million euros with a Dutch affiliate of Africa-Israel Investments, the London- and Tel Aviv–listed development group run by billionaire Israeli-Russian diamond dealer Lev Leviev. Africa-Israel declined to comment, but a source close to it said Prevezon is no longer a shareholder.

THE COMPLAINT AND New York property records show that Prevezon and associated New York companies spent nearly $24 million that appeared from nowhere on the Manhattan properties, including five luxury condo apartments in a Wall Street landmark built in 1928 as Morgan Guaranty Trust’s headquarters and recently converted to luxury residences by Leviev a member of this group.

Foto Piotr Kasiev is mentioned in the money laundering case.

Prevezon has had most of these properties listed for sale in the past year or so, including a package offer of all five condos at 20 Pine St., at a $6 million asking price. The listings boasted of Sub-Zero kitchen appliances and “sybaritic” bathrooms appointed in stone, bronze, and exotic woods. In fact, Prevezon appears this year to have sold three of the properties covered by last week’s forfeiture demand, according to New York City records, including two retail spaces that brought Prevezon a combined total of $17.7 million—a nice gain over the $12.8 million that it paid. The government seeks forfeiture of Prevezon’s cash and real estate, plus penalties for money laundering.

The complaint cites a spokesperson for Denis Katsyv saying that the Moldovan transfers to Prevezon all predated his ownership and that Prevezon had no commercial dealings with the Moldovan companies. Denis Katsyv didn’t responded to questions Barron’s sent him by e-mail. Our inquiries with the New York lawyer who handled Prevezon’s real-estate purchases, Gabriella Volshteyn, also went unanswered.

The feds are essentially endorsing the evidence collected by Magnitsky and by Bill Browder, founder and chief of the Hermitage Fund. Browder’s voluminous evidence also sparked money-laundering investigations in Switzerland, Cyprus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Moldova. In December 2012, President Barack Obama signed into law the so-called Magnitsky Act, which barred U.S. visits or property ownership by those identified as having detained Magnitsky or having profited from the conspiracy that he alleged.

RUSSIA HAS STEADFASTLY denied that the Magnitsky affair was a case of corruption. Prosecutors there jailed a couple of low- level criminals for the $230 million scam and said that no government officials were complicit in the budget theft. In a posthumous prosecution, Magnitsky was convicted of tax fraud in July 2013. Also this year, Russia assembled its own list of Americans banned from Russia for purported offenses against the rights of Russians. That list includes Bharara, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney, because of the 2012 conviction obtained by Bharara’s office against Russian arms merchant Viktor Bout. Viktor Bout Prosecuted by Bharara, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney