Fur mafia of the USSR

The fur mafia of the USSR is the largest organized criminal formation of the USSR , discovered by the KGB of the USSR in the 1970s .

They went on the trail of the “fur mafia ” by accident: during the investigation of one of the robberies , several robes of unknown origin are found at the robber, with no GOST and no state price . An investigation into this case leads to the Kazakh SSR , to the city of Karaganda . The investigation of this case was personally supervised by the chairman of the KGB, Yuri Andropov .

Content

Investigation

The director of Karagandinsky was the first in the attention of the investigationCity Industrial Complex Lev Dunaev, former employee of the city college of lawyers . Feeling something was amiss, Dunaev quit his job and went to Moscow , but they continued to follow him.

The new director was Rudolph Jaton, a descendant of the Russified French who settled in Russia after the Patriotic War of 1812 . According to operational data, he was also involved in the fur mafia. Previously, he was the director of the Saransk city industrial complex.

The leader and organizer of the fur mafia was Peter Snobkov, director of the Abay City Industrial Complex.

This trinity was able to establish the production of fur coats, hats and other products from fur .

The militia cover for the fur mafia was carried out by the head of the department of the Karaganda Higher School of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, Joseph Epelbeim.

Arrest

The operation was top secret, but the conspiracy was suddenly violated by Andropov’s deputy, Brezhnev’s brother-in-law Semyon Tsvigun . In a conversation with the Minister of the Interior Nikolai Shchelokov, he accidentally mentioned an operation. Since officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR appeared in it, and Shchelokov did not tolerate interference in the work of his department (and especially from the KGB ), representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the USSR Prosecutor's Office were sent to Kazakhstan. This made the investigation very difficult.

On January 7, 1974, Dunaev, Zhaton, Snobkov, Epelheim and about 500 people involved in the fur mafia were arrested. But the matter was rapidly falling apart. The leaders of the “ Cartel ”, as investigators christened the fur mafia, had connections at the top, but Andropov managed to defend the criminal case .

Mass searches were conducted in apartments, dachas, and places of work of the accused. Millions of rubles were found in three-liter jars, hundreds of kilograms of precious stones , precious metals . 24 kilograms of gold rings, more than 5 million rubles in cash, and about a hundred passwords for bearer were seized from Snobkov alone.

Leo Dunaev
Peter Snobkov
Rudolph Jaton
Joseph Epelheim

Sentence

In those years, the theft of state property on an especially large scale was a firing squad , so at the trial Snobkov, Epelheim and Dunaev were sentenced to death . Rudolf Jaton received 15 years in prison , as it turned out that he invested almost all the money stolen from the state in production .

All cassation appeals of Snobkov, Epelheim and Dunaev were rejected and the sentence was carried out.

Fur business became the largest case of theft in the industry of the USSR .

Links

D / f “Operation“ Cartel ”” from the cycle “ The investigation was conducted ... ” ( NTV )
Fur hunting
Cartel - Fur Mafia of Kazakhstan