‘Putin’s Bankers’ Face the Music - As Cellist Hits Sour Note
Four bankers go on trial in Zurich on March 8 for helping Vlad’s ‘wallet’
I often reflect on these words from Russia’s War on Everybody author Keir Giles:
“Messianism in Russia’s view of itself in the world goes back a long way. It’s one of the compensation mechanisms for Russians who realize the deep and insoluble misery of their own existence and so look for something which is beyond the physical and look for spiritual means of compensation for that. So this idea that in some way Russia must be better than the rest of the world because in all the physically palpable ways it is worse is something that drives a lot of these ideas of Russia as the third Rome - as Russia as a center of post-Western liberal philosophy about the world.”
As a student of history, those words made me sad - that in order to cope with the misery of one’s own existence - a misery created by dictator-thieves who sell themselves as nationalist-saviors - a people turn to messianism for compensation.
In RadPod’s latest interview, with academic Alexandar Mihailovic - author of Illiberal Vanguard - Populist Elitism in the United States and Russia - he spoke about how men in Russia are hiding in their homes, afraid to leave to go to the market, for fear of being snatched off the street and sent to the front to fight Putin’s war in Ukraine.
‘Corruptocrat’
When I watched Alexei Navalny’s exposé on ‘Putin’s Palace’ - and how it revealed Putin’s endless gluttony - I thought if only the people of Russia knew about all the excess, maybe they’d revolt.
I have often thought that if the Russian people who have been hermetically sealed off from reality for decades learned that Putin was the world’s richest man, having thieved their wealth for decades, having been stealing from the very beginning - stealing money meant to aid starving citizens in St. Petersburg - they might actually do something. They might do something collectively about their lot in life rather than sending their sons and husbands off to die as their gluttonous leader continues to steal other people’s lives, wealth, countries.
As I wrote yesterday, quoting Canadian academic Michael MacKay, hostilities in Ukraine were enormously enabled by the ‘elite capture of Western political forces.’
“Russia’s been quite open about it. There’s no secret in this, it’s not like in a spy movie. It stated: ‘We will buy off journalists, we will buy newspapers and media empires, we will buy the press in Britain to ensure the Brexit campaign will be successful’.
“Then in the US, it waged its most successful operation: the elite capture of the Republican Party… and large segments of the press. He just needs Tucker Carlson. And he’s got ’em.”
‘Bankers Charged’
So as news breaks that Swiss prosecutors charged four bankers for offering a safe harbor for Putin’s millions we see a break in the tradition of covert offshoring.
This is excellent news, following on the heels of a week where I reported on how ‘elite defection’ has begun, which is a sign of the end of Putin. That this is all occurring on the eighth anniversary of the murder of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov has a kind of poetic justice to it.
It’s always been about the money. As Ruth Ben-Ghiat has taught us, authoritarians come to power to hide their corruption, so to have a major component of his game exposed while his war is going very badly spells further doom.
This is why I wrote that Christopher Wray going on Fox News to sell Trump and Kremlin propaganda was a sign of weakness.
The real news is that Switzerland is not remaining neutral as prosecutors take on the first court case ever to directly go after Putin’s millions - a very first in the West.
The four bankers who were charged worked for a subsidiary of Gazprombank in Switzerland - which is currently shuttering its business there due to Western sanctions. According to the indictment, the bankers were charged with being ‘criminally negligent’ in allowing accounts to be opened in Switzerland for cellist Sergei Roldugin, who is also the godfather to Putin’s daughter. Roldugin is colloquially called ‘Putin’s wallet.’
According to the indictment, “It is notorious that Russian President Putin officially has an income of just over 100,000 (Swiss francs) and is not wealthy, but in fact has enormous assets managed by people close to him.”
“Roldugin (was) a straw man,” the indictment stated.
It should be noted, the CIA once reported that Putin’s is likely the world’s wealthiest man, while many Russians live below the poverty line.
The cellist story was first reported by Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger, and it included the complexities of shell companies and accounts, all attempting to obfuscate the beneficial owner.
Prosecutors allege the bankers failed in their due diligence. As anybody who knows a cellist will tell you, they aren’t earning tens of millions of dollars unless they are a Bratva stooge. That he is a conductor in the gangster capital of Russia - St. Petersburg, where Putin got his start - hearkens back to what Toomas Ilves said is the best book about Russia, “The Godfather.”
“The declared assets were in general in no way plausible as Roldugin’s own assets,” prosecutors stated in the indictment.
The tentacles of this indictment go deep - exposing how shell companies set up in the cellist’s name were created by executives at Bank Rossiya, which according to the indictment tried to hide their involvement with anonymous email addresses.
“Bank Rossiya is the bank of Russia’s leading politicians and its majority shareholder and chair of the board is considered Putin’s treasurer,” according to court documents.
It is very important to note that this indictment is a direct result of the Panama Papers - which revealed the vast offshoring world, exposing networks of criminality.
In a Bette Dangerous exclusive, retired IRS criminal investigator Martin Sheil said the four bankers will likely be facing the music - expect violins, not cellos, he said.
Sheil did a deep dive on the back story, and noted that…
“It seems a certain cello player and close confidant to Vladimir Putin by the name Sergei Roldugin was the beneficial owner of Swiss bank accounts with Gazprombank which held millions if not billions of dollars that four Swiss bankers failed to conduct due diligence on and pretended to be sourced from cello concerts in Russia and not Roldugin's rich friend and wannabe Russian Czar.”
Sheil noted that “it looks like they have to face the music from Swiss prosecutors for not following anti-money laundering regulations in Switzerland as trial begins next week.”
He said the bankers should be grateful that all they are likely facing is prison time.
“These bankers could face prison time if they lose in court, but that is likely a more pleasant fate then the alternative,” he said.
Together, Marty and I have spent many hours documenting the fates of the defenestrated, poisoned, and suicided - among them, bankers.
“It is apparent that the voluminous funds in question that are safely ensconced in Swiss vaults belong to members of a Putin controlled ‘obshchak’ called the Ozero Cooperative,” said Sheil. “Obshchak is an old Estonian term referencing a common treasury or collective fund run by prisoners in a Russian gulag and used to pay for lawyers or caught members of an organized crime group to cover their expenses.
“Putin would be the chief of the Ozero Cooperative or Obshchak since he is the ultimate Godfather or Vor of the Russian mafia known as the Russian state,” said Sheil. “Putin gets a piece of the action of every major Russian earner or as the West has come to call them - oligarchs. The earnings are thought to be vast and since Russian banks and/or their legal system cannot be trusted, the purloined profits of the Russian state must be hidden offshore under the guise of shell companies with accounts in places like Switzerland held in the names of trusted associates such as boyhood friends like the cello player Sergei Roldugin.”
Sheil said Roldugin is among the members of the Obshchak.
“Other members of Putin's Obshchak are thought to be Putin favorites from St. Petersburg - the Rotenbergs, Timchenko and Kovalchuk - all of whom have benefited handsomely over the years from their friendship with the novo Russian emperor and his draining of Russian petro and mineral resources for his own benefit and the detriment of the Russian citizenry,” said Sheil.
“The use of shell companies located in Cyprus or the British Virgin Islands to disguise the ownership and control of vast stolen and laundered Russian funds and their concomitant Swiss bank accounts are almost as cliche these days as Russian yacht and London mega mansion ownership by members of the Obshchak. But laundered funds cannot happen without the resourceful and effective assistance of well paid financial facilitators such as Swiss bankers, UK barristers, and American accounting firms to name a few.
“Next week some Swiss bankers face the music and it will likely be accompanied by violins not cellos,” Sheil said.
The bigger question for Sheil is how long before the barristers and accounting firms are also held accountable?
He cynically answers his own question.
“No one should hold their breath,” he said. “Somebody has to come to the aide of whatever gangsters replace Putin and his Obshchak. There is money to be made and moved which means there are money laundering and tax laws to circumvent. Taxes are for the ‘little people’ and not oligarchs and their handlers.”
But even Sheil is feeling a possible sea change - shifting in the right direction.
“Hey Swiss Prosecutors,” he said, “how about breaking the pattern and proving the rule of law can prevail?”
In this indictment, Sheil said he does see a rather promising glimmer of hope.
“Let the rule of law prevail for once when it comes to gangsters and their ill-gotten gains. Let the term Obshchak go to a dictionary cemetery and die a well deserved death and be buried under a Swiss mountain.”
Taking down the transnational mob has to start somewhere.
Exposing Putin’s hidden millions in Zurich - and criminally charging his bankers - feels like a pretty good beginning to the end of this mob story.
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More info about Bette Dangerous - This magazine is written by Heidi Siegmund Cuda, an Emmy-award winning investigative reporter, author, and veteran music and nightlife columnist. She is the cohost of RADICALIZED Truth Survives, an investigative show about disinformation and is part of the Byline Media team. Thank you for your support of independent investigative journalism.
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(Image: ‘Follow the Leaders’ by Spanish artist Isaac Cordal; for my interview with Isaac Cordal, go here).
Figured you’d write about the ignominious 4’s trial, couple that,with the other oligarchs that have Putin’s cash stashed. It’s compelling news from a place that seldom offers anything of substance! Excellent article Heidi! Hopefully a modicum of justice will be served, with further fracturing to the house of Putin!