Russian Oligarch’s Associate Accused of Evading Sanctions, Money Laundering
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An associate of sanctioned Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg has been charged with sanctions evasion and money laundering in connection with efforts to maintain the oligarch’s U.S. properties.
Prosecutors say Vladimir Voronchenko played a key role in a scheme to ensure the maintenance, property tax, insurance, and other payments were made on Vekselberg’s portfolio of U.S. real estate, which is valued at approximately $75 million.
Voronchenko, a Russian citizen with permanent legal U.S. residency, was served a Grand Jury subpoena in Fisher Island, Florida on May 13, 2022. Prosecutors say approximately nine days later he flew to Dubai then on to Moscow. He did not appear before the grand jury and has not returned to the U.S. since.
According to court documents, energy tycoon Vekselberg bought four properties— a Manhattan apartment, a Southampton, New York estate, a penthouse in Fisher Island, and a second apartment in Fisher Island— through shell companies before he was designated a Specially Designated National (SDN) by the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFTC).
Voronchenko retained a New York-based lawyer who helped buy the properties and made payments on them through his interest on lawyer’s trust (IOLTA) account. Approximately $18.5 million in payments were made before Vekselberg’s designation as an SDN.
After Vekselberg was designated an SDN in 2018, prosecutors say the source of funds to maintain the properties changed to a shell company in the Bahamas called Smile Holding Ltd. That was controlled by Voronchenko.
Approximately $4 million in maintenance payments were made through Smile Holding after the SDN designation.
The case was coordinated through the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Task Force KleptoCapture, which is an interagency unit dedicated to enforcing sanctions and other measures the U.S. imposed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Homeland Security Investigations (HIS) are investigating the case with assistance from DOJ’s National Security Division and Office of International Affairs, as well as OFAC.
This the third indictment of a Vekselberg associate in recent weeks. DOJ recently charged a British businessman and a Russian businessman in separate indictments in connection with managing the operations of Vekselberg’s $90 million yacht. The yacht was seized by Spanish authorities in April 2022, after a request from U.S. officials.