I must say this comes as a surprise to me , since I was under the impression that the vors are/were a ( mostly extinct ) subculture as opposed to a proper organized crime group .

Of course I imagine the usual American ignorance is to blame for this among other things .

When i went to miami evryones who works in the bars or hotels in south beach russian.

When i went to miami evryones who works in the bars or hotels in south beach russian.

I must say this comes as a surprise to me , since I was under the impression that the vors are/were a ( mostly extinct ) subculture as opposed to a proper organized crime group .

Of course I imagine the usual American ignorance is to blame for this among other things .

They are not extinct and not even near to be extinct. However numbers of crowned Thieves in Law have decreased since the creation and also a rising number of Thieves in Law from Caucasus have became bigger. But the people who are connected with this society is still big in numbers.

Thieves in Law by simple definition would be called a loose prison gang or more can be explained to be a Criminal Society that has went outside of the prison developing to the present day standards. In the very start Russian prison system had several different gangs emerging also, but Thieves in Law were the ones who overpowered the other gangs. There are clans of Thieves - simply Vory who work together and there can be gangs and groups ran by a Thief or many Thieves in Law.

The sub-culture which you are speaking about is currently popularized AUE(Arestantskoe Urkaganskoe Edinstvo - Arrested peoples Banditry Unity). The whole Thieves in Law live by the Ponyatiya(right ideas). This is a set of code and rules that each person must follow who enter prison or are associated with people who have been in prison and/or engaging into criminal activities. Usually people associated with the ponyatiya will judge others by their ideology even if those others are not connected with Vorovskoi Mir.

Any more explinations or questions about Thieves in Law are welcome. However, I am not informed about all the personas who are there in this society, but I can find the information in Russian if requested.

I see and thanks for the answer . As far as questions go , how much influence do you think vors have within the US based Russian speaking underworld ? Also do vors who operate in the US tend to be of the old school or new school variety or is it more of a mix ?

Razhden Shulaya was actually convicted on multiple charges by a jury in June, including racketeering conspiracy, conspiring to traffic in stolen goods, conspiracy to traffic in contraband tobacco, identification document fraud and wire fraud. This guy was allegedly a "lieutenant" in the Thieves-in-Law.

There is no such thing as a "lieutenant" rank in Thieves in Law. Shulaya is a crowned Thief in Law, that means he is the top boss or one of the bosses or a close person to the actual boss(like an adviser). If he ever decided to become a lower rank in any organization and take orders from someone that could be an end to his Vor V Zakone title.

TPV would you say it's accurate to state that no " mafia style " Russian/Russian speaking organized crime groups exist in the US ?

Please, ellaborate what you mean as "mafia style".

As in Solntsevskaya Bratva type groups . All the recent Russian OC busts in the States seem to involve small and relatively unsophisticated groups , as opposed to relatively large sophisticated ones that have important connections to the upperworld ( which is my personal definition of mafia style organized crime groups ) .

The Solntsevskaya isn't really a 100% centralized organization. It's composed out of a ton of independently operating brigades with origins in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova... (mostly ethnic Russian and Jewish criminals). The only thing which really ties them are their similar key money laundering contacts in Russia and the businessmen that provide them with the necessary political connections. There are often brigades feuding with one another.
Of course, the USA isn't really local territory for them so it's extremely difficult for them to penetrate politics in America. That's why they resort to strong-arm rackets and running scams in their own communities.

Yup the Solntsevskaya isn't a centralized organization at all , but neither are many ( if not most ) " mafia style " groups and I don't think it's much of a stretch to state that groups like the Solntsevskaya Bratva are comparable to ( say ) LCN . After all both groups have been known to engage in more sophisticated rackets ( like higher level fraud ) than the two Russian groups that got busted recently and I'm pretty sure that the Solntsevskaya Bratva has a dispute resolution committee like the Commission as well .

Truth be told, there isn't really a lot of reliable information available about the Bratvas. Sometimes I doubt if such thing as the "Solntsevskaya Bratva" really is as huge as we've been led to believe.
Organized crime within ethnic communities is always going to involve blue collar crime so I definitely think this is still a major source of income for the Russian groups. High level fraud isn't something many are capable enough of involving themselves in to. Most Russian (and by expansion other former Soviet Union) crews are gonna stick to black market fuel rackets and credit card schemes when it comes to fraud. You don't have to be a brainiac to pull them off and they're lucrative enough.

I think the two "Russian" groups that got busted most recently - which was actually one "Russian" (as in Slavic and Jewish thugs) crew and one Georgian crew - are a reasonably representative face of Eurasian OC. They might have seemed small compared to the "Russian Mafia Superpower" stories the media have been trying to feed us (which is a crock of bullshit if you ask me), but the rackets they were involved in were bountiful and they still made quite a bit of money.

Yup the Shulaya crew in particular must have made a killing from contraband cigarettes , if what was listed in the indictment is to be believed .


Fuel tax fraud seems to be going out of style though . Neither of the two indictments mentioned it and I'm not aware of any Russian/FSU group getting nabbed for it since ( roughly ) 2010 .

The Solntsevskaya isn't really a 100% centralized organization. It's composed out of a ton of independently operating brigades with origins in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova... (mostly ethnic Russian and Jewish criminals). The only thing which really ties them are their similar key money laundering contacts in Russia and the businessmen that provide them with the necessary political connections. There are often brigades feuding with one another.
Of course, the USA isn't really local territory for them so it's extremely difficult for them to penetrate politics in America. That's why they resort to strong-arm rackets and running scams in their own communities.

As in Solntsevskaya Bratva type groups . All the recent Russian OC busts in the States seem to involve small and relatively unsophisticated groups , as opposed to relatively large sophisticated ones that have important connections to the upperworld ( which is my personal definition of mafia style organized crime groups ) .

@ThePolakVet

Thanks for the intel. You're a lot more well versed in this subject than I am, seeing what I know is mostly based on the articles I can read.

If you would say that the Solntsevskaya is mostly a Russian gang, do you know how the current relations are with their Chechen, Georgian, Azeri and Armenian counterparts? I know they got some connections to the Georgians, but were feuding with the Chechens in the 90's. Probably that has cooled down nowadays.

Do you also happen to know what Ivankov's business in Brighton Beach was in the 90's? It's told he was sent by the Solntsevskaya and his activities mostly seemed to focus on the average rackets the Russian mob was pulling on the local Russian community back in the days - but were other local gangsters like Nayfeld and the like connected to Ivankov and the Solntsevskaya as well?

There's no doubt Russian OC is a powerhouse, but they seem to be much more low-key nowadays than they used to be.

Didn't know the Colombians had the numbers to attack the Georgians in NY prisons. Didn't even know there were still enough of them around down that neck of the woods. Dominicans and Puerto Ricans seem to dominate the Hispanic jail population in NYC.

They said it was a Latin-American prison gang.

The Vors who are in their 40s-50s are hardcore those guys came up in the 90´s right after the fall of communism.

Colombians stab thief-in-law and former boxer in American jail.

https://en.crimerussia.com/criminal...-lord-razhden-pitersky-in-american-jail/
https://en.crimerussia.com/criminal...n-brooklyn-jail-along-with-the-kingpin-/

Solntsevskaya is not composed of independently running brigades. The group itself was formed in late 1980's in Moscow neighborhood Solncevo. Popular for those times the group absorbed and recruited smaller brigades under them, by good will or force. Such as in Latvia Valeriy "Tsigan(Gipsy)" Berlin said to be connected with most biggest crime group in Latvia - Kharitonov's Brigade, was killed due to refusing paying tax to Solncevskaya while being acting boss of the group. In other regions they either recruited other groups under them or sent there their own brigades to look over business. There is nothing independent in these groups which are under Solncevskaya - they are a big criminal network which relies on each other in different ways.

Their power goes more far, having Vory V Zakone on their side and even government officials, including the president himself. Not even speaking about that they own large businesses and even banks and other financial structures.


There are brigades operating from Solncevskaya and Izmailovskaya in the US, which are kind of mafia style groups but still with different structures and organizing than LCN.

As mentioned before, there is not that much of information available on these groups. I know some information, because I have loose connections to people who are involved with some groups or illegal businesses in my country. The small groups get arrested and prosecuted, the ones which are not so organized. Big groups like Solncevskaya are more smart, better investing and more reasonable. It's not the 90's anymore, when they needed to run around with guns and extort farmers selling tomatoes on the local market - that business now goes to small crews which are not smart. The big groups like Solncevskaya are more involved in financial crimes, such as fraud or large scale scams, not the typical LCN crimes which they make money on.

Speaking about media, @TheKillingJoke - Media is a business that runs on peoples attention. So they will make a sensation over everything. There is no doubt, that Russian groups are one of the most powerful in the world when it comes to business or eliminating their enemies. But I doubt that in US they are there to make danger to the average American unless they get involved in a bad way themselves. It's pretty logic - you fuck with criminals, they'll fuck you up, doesn't matter what ethnic they are. They are just there to make business, and mostly it's not violent one.

Are there any recent articles about the activities of the Solntsevskaya and Izmailovskaya linked brigades that operate in the US ?

Mini Mike Tyson’ sentenced to 10 years in prison for work as mob enforcer

https://www.google.nl/amp/s/nypost....-in-prison-for-work-as-mob-enforcer/amp/

under what name razdhen shulaya or razdhen pitersky is he incarcerated he is not found in federal inmates if someone can help me thank you in advance.