The Russia Scandal Was Desperately Missing a Biker Gang Subplot. Well, Here It Is.

By Charles Pierce, Esquire

26 June 17

Paging Hunter S. Thompson.

he most amazing story ran in the Miami Herald last Thursday. It involves the Trump organization and a Russian official deep in the dark side of shady, because all of the amazing stories do these days. But it also involves a Russian motorcycle gang that has staked a claim in this country and that once had its gang colors hoisted in outer space.

But the tale of Igor Zorin offers a 21st-century twist with all the weirdness modern Miami has to offer: Russian cash, a motorcycle club named after Russia's powerful special forces and a condo tower branded by Donald Trump. Zorin is a Russian government official who has spent nearly $8 million on waterfront South Florida homes, hardly financially prudent given his bureaucrat's salary of $75,000 per year. He runs a state-owned broadcasting company that, among other duties, operates sound systems for the annual military parade that sends columns of soldiers and tanks rumbling through Moscow's Red Square.

So, on a salary of $75,000, Zorin somehow sunk $8 million into high-end Florida real-estate. He must have invested very wisely. Or he eats Ramen noodles all day and has a hell of a big mattress. Naturally, because he is a Russian official of the Putin era, Zorin has connections with former Russian intelligence officials who have hit it big in the new globalized capitalist economy, and Zorin picked a real doozy, too.

Zorin has other Miami connections, too: His local business associate, Svyatoslav Mangushev, a Russian intelligence officer turned Miami real-estate investor...

Let us pause right there and catch our breath. This cannot end well. Anyway:

[Mangushev] helped found a biker club called Spetsnaz M.C. Spetsnaz is a group of motorcycle-loving South Florida expatriates who named themselves after the Russian equivalent of Delta Force or Seal Team Six. Spetsnaz members once asked for official recognition from Russia's biggest biker gang, the Night Wolves, an infamous group that has strong ties to Russia's security services. The Night Wolves played a role in the Ukrainian uprising, once had their flag flown in outer space by Russian cosmonauts and are under U.S. sanctions.

So this Mangushev character starts a motorcycle gang among his fellow Russian expats that he names after the Russian equivalent of the special forces. This gang, named after the Russian special forces, seeks the imprimatur of an actual Russian biker gang that, unlike their American brethren, doesn't settle for tearing up small towns along the California coast. This bunch helps overthrow governments. This is not a guy I'd do business with but, then again, I'm not Igor Zorin, with his millions buried in coffee cans in his backyard.

Zorin and Mangushev have ties in both Russia and the United States: In Russia, security firms that have been linked to Mangushev have won $2.4 million worth of contracts from Zorin's agency since 2015. In Miami, Mangushev once transferred a Florida company that owned a $1.5 million condo out of his name and into Zorin's. No deed of sale was recorded, meaning the price paid — if any — is unknown. The condo is one of three units Zorin owned at Trump Palace, a ritzy tower in Sunny Isles Beach built by a local developer and branded by the Trump Organization. Their total value? $5.4 million. Zorin still owns two condos there, plus a $3.3 million home in Bal Harbour… Zorin was not an original buyer at Trump Palace, meaning his funds would not have gone to the Trump Organization, which signed lucrative deals to brand several condo towers in South Florida in the early 2000s. The Trump name is attractive to Russian buyers and helped turn Sunny Isles Beach into a high-rise condo haven sometimes called "Little Moscow."

The whole thing reads like Tolstoy rewritten by Hunter Thompson. The biker gang in Florida, founded by Zorin, writes a letter to a Russian gang called The Night Wolves, asking to be affiliated with them. The Florida biker who writes the letter is a Russian expat who is also a Broward County sheriff's deputy. Meanwhile, the Night Wolves are wired into the highest levels of the Russian government and they also operate as a kind of paramilitary outfit. This is like finding out that the Hells Angels roared into Baghdad ahead of the U.S. Army and Marines.

During the invasion of Crimea and uprising in Ukraine, the Night Wolves took their hogs to the road to join Russian-backed separatist fighters. Their leader, Alexander Zaldostanov, a plastic surgery specialist nicknamed "the Surgeon," has been decorated by Putin. He is considered a close ally of the Kremlin. In 2015, Russian cosmonauts flew the Night Wolves' flag above the International Space Station. The United States has a less charitable view: In 2014, the Treasury Department put Zaldostanov and the Night Wolves under sanction for their role in the Ukrainian conflict. U.S. officials said the Night Wolves had abducted a Ukrainian border guard, stormed a Ukrainian naval base and smuggled a senior Ukrainian official out of the country. In addition, "the Night Wolves have been closely connected to the Russian special services [and] have helped to recruit separatist fighters," a Treasury news release said.

It was always going to be about the money. By sacrificing the credibility of his office to his dread of transparency as regards his business dealings, perhaps because there's a shady Russian winking at you at every turn, the president* practically begged someone to rip his entire organization apart in a hail of writs. Robert Mueller seems only happy to oblige. Even this story, which touches the president*'s business interests only tangentially, nonetheless reeks of money laundering.

U.S. law enforcement is taking note of Miami's reputation as a lock box for suspect money. Among the highest-profile incidents that have left the local real-estate industry feeling under siege: unprecedented federal monitoring of shell companies buying pricey homes in cash. A wave of disclosures from the release of the secret offshore files known as the Panama Papers. And now a special prosecutor-led investigation that could focus on potential links between Russian operatives and President Donald Trump's business empire, with its large South Florida footprint. None of Zorin's property purchases used bank financing, meaning he most likely paid cash. He made roughly $75,000 in 2015 and $159,000 in 2016, according to his latest disclosure forms. The Trump unit he got from Mangushev was later sold to a woman who appears to be Mangushev's relative for $1.5 million, Florida records show.

And speaking of such things, the Dauphin, Jared Kushner, having failed to achieve peace in the Middle East in three days, also was in the news as regards a transaction with Deutsche Bank that stretches the definition of coincidence halfway to Neptune. From the WaPo:

The loan came at a critical moment. Kushner was playing a key role in the presidential campaign of his father-in-law, Donald Trump. The lender, Deutsche Bank, was negotiating to settle a federal mortgage fraud case and charges from New York state regulators that it aided a possible Russian money-laundering scheme. The cases were settled in December and January. Now, Kushner's association with Deutsche Bank is among a number of financial matters that could come under focus as his business activities are reviewed by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who is examining Kushner as part of a broader investigation into possible Russian influence in the election.

A simple impulse toward public service could have saved America's current ruling family a lot of stress and billable hours. Their half-assed attempts at divestment and transparency—blind trusts that can see quite well; Kushner's apparent attempt to be Talleyrand and J.P. Morgan at the same time—only make them look worse, not better. If they'd stayed within accepted political norms—if, for example, the president* just had released his damn tax returns—all of this could have been avoided. That kind of sacrifice is not in them, however, not in any of them. So we get the office of the presidency dragged by proxy into stories that contain references to biker gangs that topple governments, and passages like this one.

Although Kushner divested some properties in an effort to address potential conflicts, he retains an interest in nearly 90 percent of his real estate properties, including the retail portion of the former New York Times headquarters, and holds personal debts and loan guarantees. The deal that led to the Deutsche Bank loan is rooted in a holiday party held in late 2014 at the Bowlmor bowling alley, which is located in the retail portion.

A bowling alley.

None of this is normal.