‘Russian Mafia’ Label Denounced

Local Russian American leaders lambasted the media and law enforcement officials Thursday, accusing them of perpetuating the myth that immigrants from the former Soviet Union are involved in a “Russian Mafia,” and arguing that there is no evidence of such a group.

Heads of emigre groups criticized media outlets for stereotyping Russians as members of organized crime in the coverage of last week’s arrest of Ukrainian-born Mikail Markhasev in the slaying of Ennis Cosby.

“If the alleged assailant was Belgian or Norwegian, I doubt very much we’d be hearing about the Belgian or Norwegian mafia,” said Si Frumkin, chairman of the Southern California Council for Soviet Jews.

Though many news organizations speculated that Markhasev may have been part of a Russian Mafia gang, Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams said last week that there was no evidence Markhasev was linked to organized crime.

“The media should examine its own face,” said Boris Gorbis, a Russian American attorney who spoke at the Thursday afternoon news conference. “We resent that when the media uses shortcuts, it does not care about the visceral effects it will have. There is not one single ounce of evidence--not one shred--that there is a single organized, planned, coordinated [criminal] effort on the part of Russian immigrants.”

However, federal, state and local law enforcement officials have reported that Russian organized crime has gained a foothold in this region. A year ago, state Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren called mobsters from the former Soviet Union “a real threat” in California. Law enforcement officials--including the FBI’s Los Angeles field office and the West Hollywood sheriff’s station--have units focused on investigating Russian organized crime.

“Is there a Russian Mafia? I think that’s been well-documented,” said Lt. Robert Cook, commander of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s organized crime unit. “There is organized crime being perpetrated by immigrants from the former Soviet bloc. How persistent is it? That’s hard to say. We know we have a number of crooks that conspire together.”

Cook added that the danger of stereotyping arises when any ethnic group is linked to organized crime.

“99.9% of Russian immigrants are not unlike any other immigrants,” he said. “Clearly, there are some people who come with the group . . . that tend to taint the rest.”

On Thursday, Russian American leaders said the stereotype was unfair to the majority of Los Angeles’ Russian immigrant residents who came to the United States seeking religious freedom.

They appealed to the media and entertainment industry to refrain from portraying Russians as criminals or gangsters--a caricature they said is fast supplanting other images of villains in popular culture.

When Markhasev was identified as an immigrant from the former Soviet Union last Thursday, Frumkin said, many elderly Russian American residents stayed home out of fear of retaliation from the rest of the community. West Hollywood’s Plummer Park, a popular Russian American gathering spot, was nearly empty, he said. Russian talk radio was jammed with calls from people fearful they would be targeted in the wake of Markhasev’s arrest.

“This stereotype scares them,” said Eugene Levin, president of the Assn. of Soviet Jewish Emigres.

Eugene Alper, a Russian outreach worker for the city of West Hollywood, said this reaction is natural for those who have lived through discrimination and persecution because of their ethnicity or religion. “For somebody who has gone through this kind of thing, it would be kind of like a red flag,” Alper said.

Russian American leaders said the casual use of the term “Russian Mafia” increases divisiveness between immigrants and the native-born.

“There was for four generations a collective enemy: Soviet Communism,” Gorbis said. “A society needs an image of collective evil . . . and now, it’s the Russian Mafia. It’s all part and parcel of immigrant-bashing.”

Gorbis said Russian American leaders are sending a letter to Bill Cosby asking him to denounce the stereotyping of Russian immigrants in the coverage of his son’s slaying.