Kidnap Ring Suspect Is at Siberia Home

A Russian businessman who is the target of a worldwide FBI manhunt--and a suspected member of a kidnapping ring responsible for the slaying of five Los Angeles County residents--is living openly and quietly in his hometown in Siberia.

“I am not hiding,” Alexandr Afonin said in a telephone interview from his home in Barnaul, where he runs a hodgepodge of businesses, including a film shop and a bodyguard service. “I can be found right here in Barnaul.... So far no one has approached me from any law enforcement agency.”

According to FBI affidavits, Afonin, 41, oversaw the transfer of $234,000 in ransom money, some of which went to bank accounts controlled by suspects in the slaying of the five victims, whose bodies were pulled from a Northern California reservoir in October and March. They are believed to be the victims of a brutal kidnapping ring that targeted wealthy businessmen in the Los Angeles area.

In a 45-minute interview, Afonin acknowledged arranging the money transfers but described his actions as a misguided effort to do a favor for an acquaintance. He also expressed remorse that two business associates who carried out the bank transfers on his behalf have spent six months in custody in Los Angeles on charges of conspiring in the case.

“They never committed any crime. They did what they did because I asked them to,” Afonin said. “I didn’t commit any crime, either. I just made a mistake, a terrible mistake. I trusted people I hardly knew and shouldn’t have trusted.”

Manhunt Still On

Afonin acknowledged that he has not sought contact with U.S. law enforcement officials to clear his name and those of his associates. He has simply kept his head down and has canceled trips outside Russia, which has no extradition treaty with the United States.

“If the U.S. authorities ask the Russian authorities to hand me over, I hope our authorities will be reasonable about it,” he said. “In any case, I am not hiding, I am not running away.”

In Los Angeles, FBI spokesman Matthew McLaughlin said Monday that Afonin was still the target of an international manhunt. A warrant for his arrest has been entered into the Interpol databank, McLaughlin said, adding that the FBI believes that Russian authorities have been cooperating in seeking his capture.

But Russian law enforcement officials said they were not seeking Afonin. “We have no information about this case here,” said Sergei Shtin, spokesman for the Interior Ministry in Siberia’s Altai Territory, of which Barnaul is the capital. “We have received no orders or instructions about it.”

Two suspects in the case--Iouri Mikhel, 37, and Jurijus Kadamovas, 35--are accused of running the kidnapping ring and have been charged with conspiracy and hostage-taking resulting in death. Facing similar charges are alleged accomplices Petro Krylov, 29; Natalya Solovyeva, 26; and Aleksejus Markovskis, 32.

All five suspects are in custody in Los Angeles and face the death penalty if convicted.

The victims whose bodies were found in the reservoir have been identified as Beverly Hills businessman and would-be film producer George Safiev, his associate Nick Kharabadze, their bookkeeper Rita Pekler, North Hollywood businessman Alexander Umansky and real estate developer Meyer Muscatel. All except Muscatel were emigrants from the former Soviet Union.

In federal court in Los Angeles on Monday, charges of receiving ransom money were dropped against Afonin’s associates, Andrei Liapine and Andrei Agueev, Russian nationals who had been living in the United Arab Emirates. The men have been named as material witnesses in the remaining criminal case, however, and will remain in custody until they give their depositions Aug. 1-2. The government may then move to deport the two men.

Agueev, 34, and Liapine, 41, were arrested by Emirates authorities in January and flown to the United States.

In a brief interview, a shackled Agueev said he wasn’t necessarily angry with the way he was treated.

“I was at the beginning,” he said. “But I’ve kind of gotten used to it.”

The FBI believes that the men are the only witnesses who can authenticate bank records that show the path of ransom payments made by Umansky’s family. It also believes that the pair will help link Afonin to defendants Mikhel and Kadamovas.

Agueev’s attorney, Victor Sherman, said he was able to show that there was insufficient evidence to charge them with any crime. He said that neither Liapine or Agueev profited from the money transfers and neither knew where the money came from.

It Started With Dinner

According to Afonin, his involvement with the alleged kidnappers began at a dinner party in a Moscow restaurant last summer, when he made the acquaintance of a former model named Marina Abramkina, who also uses the surname Karagodina.

Abramkina told Afonin that she was planning to marry a Russian immigrant in the United States named Mikhel, whom she described as being in “the gambling business.” She told Afonin that Mikhel needed to wire some money to China, the United Arab Emirates or Turkey and asked if he knew anyone who could help for a commission.

At the time, Afonin recounted, he was operating a tourism and cargo company in the Emirates called Saisan Cargo, and he agreed to help in return for a 10% commission.

A few months later, Afonin said, he again assisted Abramkina by enlisting the help of two old acquaintances from Barnaul: Agueev, owner of a building materials export company and a customer of his cargo company, and Liapine, former general manager of Saisan Cargo, which Afonin had closed down. Agueev agreed to let the money be transferred to his company’s business account, then pass it on to Liapine, who would wire it elsewhere.

According to court documents, Agueev received four wire transfers between Dec. 22, 2001, and Jan. 7 totaling about $234,000. He turned over the money in cash and personal checks to Liapine, who then used a Thomas Cook office to wire some of the money to accounts in Latvia and the United States.

On Jan. 15, Agueev and Liapine were arrested.

“To think what these people have gone through because of my mistake,” Afonin said. “They didn’t do anything bad.”

In addition to Agueev, Emirates police detained his wife, Irina Agueeva, and their three children. In an interview from her home in the Emirates, Agueeva said police also sent two of her sons, aged 13 and 8, to juvenile jail.

“They said they took my children to a ‘playroom.’ I didn’t understand right away that there was no playroom at a police station,” she said.

She and her third son, age 3, were transferred to an overcrowded female detention facility. They spent six nights sleeping on the floor of a corridor with about two dozen Russian prostitutes, she said.

They were released after a week because she argued that her youngest son suffers from phenylketonuria, a metabolic disease requiring strict diet control.

For his part, Afonin suggested that he was not culpable in the case because the transactions were made through banks. He said he spoke to Mikhel only three times, although he communicated frequently with Abramkina.

“I had every right to feel safe about this deal,” he said. “It was all about official bank transfers, no suitcases full of dirty money. How could I imagine that those immigrants were so stupid that they would wire the ransom money via a bank transfer? It is so easily traceable, isn’t it?”

Abramkina has been living in London, according to attorney Sherman, who briefly represented Mikhel until the court ruled he could not take him as a client along with Agueev.

In Barnaul, Afonin says he is spending his time running his company, Technics, which recently started a new publishing arm.

“You’ll laugh, but I’m now the publisher of Kriminfo [Criminal Information],” he said. “I know all the people from the regional law enforcement press offices.”

According to Kriminfo’s Web site, the editor in chief is a retired police colonel and the journal enjoys “permanent cooperation with ... former and active members of law enforcement agencies.”

Times staff writers Caitin Liu and Richard Fausset in Los Angeles and Yakov Ryzhak and Sergei Loiko of The Times’ Moscow Bureau contributed to this report.