Friedman, Robert I. Red Mafiya: How the Russian Mob Has Invaded America.
New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2000. 296 pages.
When Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson pushed through an amendment in 1972
that withheld most-favored-nation status from countries that restricted
Jewish immigration, the Soviets must have been amused. Brezhnev's KGB opened
the gulags and sent thousands of criminals to the U.S. and Israel. After the
collapse of the Soviet Union it got worse; in 1993 a Russian immigration
official estimated that five million criminals would end up in the West.
Now there are thirty Russian syndicates in seventeen U.S. cities, not to
mention the rest of the world. They launder drug money, counterfeit $100
bills, engage in stock market and Medicare scams, sell helicopters to the
Colombian cartel, and penetrate the National Hockey League. By controlling
more than 80 percent of Russia's banks, much aid money has been siphoned off.
In 1992, the FBI was still mopping up the Italian mafia, and only
beginning to realize that they had been ignoring a bigger problem. For one
thing, Russian mobsters aren't as well-behaved as Italians; they will even
go after journalists and cops. Author Robert Friedman should know -- the
biggest Russian mob put out a $100,000 contract on him after he wrote a
piece for the Village Voice. The magazine supplied him with a bulletproof
vest and some getaway money, but the FBI told him he was on his own, because
they couldn't jeopardize their "sources and methods."
ISBN 0-316-29474-8
Extract the names from this source
Back to search page