// Press Releases

Son of Senior Russian Government Official to Pay US$5.9 Million to the US Treasury in the First Money Laundering Action Linked to Magnitsky Case

May 13, 2017

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Son of Senior Russ­ian Gov­ern­ment Offi­cial to Pay US$5.9 Mil­lion to the US Trea­sury in the First Mon­ey Laun­der­ing Action Linked to Mag­nit­sky Case

 

13 May 2017 – Denis Kat­syv, the son of a senior Russ­ian gov­ern­ment offi­cial, will pay US$5.9 mil­lion to the US Trea­sury in the first case in the West linked to the $230m pro­ceeds from the Russ­ian fraud that Sergei Mag­nit­sky exposed and was even­tu­al­ly killed over.

 

“This is a huge vic­to­ry in our cam­paign for jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky. The amount to be paid is more than triple the amount of mon­ey laun­der­ing pro­ceeds that was thus far iden­ti­fied by the US gov­ern­ment in New York con­nect­ed to Pre­ve­zon,” said William Brow­der, leader of the glob­al Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice campaign.

“This sends a clear mes­sage to the peo­ple who received that mon­ey that it’s not safe in the West and will be seized. I believe that this case will give the green light to oth­er coun­tries to fol­low suit,” said William Brow­der, who described the Mag­nit­sky jus­tice cam­paign in a New York Times best-sell­er, “Red Notice: A True Sto­ry of High Finance, Mur­der, and One Man’s Fight for Jus­tice.”

 

The stip­u­la­tion to pay US$5.9 mil­lion to the US Trea­sury has been signed on 12 May 2017 by Russ­ian nation­al Denis Kat­syv, in his capac­i­ty as own­er of Cyprus-based Pre­ve­zon Hold­ings and a web of oth­er off­shore com­pa­nies, includ­ing IKR, Mar­tash Hold­ings, Fer­en­coi Invest­ments Ltd and as “legal rep­re­sen­ta­tive” of Kolevins Ltd. The stip­u­la­tion will have to be approved by the US court to go into effect.

 

After US$230 mil­lion had been stolen by a group of Russ­ian offi­cials and orga­nized crim­i­nals, a wide “Byzan­tine” net­work of shell com­pa­nies and con­duit accounts was used to laun­der the stolen  pro­ceeds, some of which have been traced by the US Depart­ment of Jus­tice to the real estate prop­er­ties in New York pur­chased by the Kat­syv-owned Cypri­ot com­pa­ny, Pre­ve­zon Holdings.

 

In 2013, the US Depart­ment of Jus­tice froze Prevezon’s assets, and the case was sched­uled to go to tri­al on Mon­day, 15 May 2017. Denis Kat­syv tried to dis­miss the US Jus­tice Department’s action on the eve of the tri­al, chal­leng­ing the basis for the mon­ey laun­der­ing alle­ga­tions against him.

 

In an opin­ion issued five days before the tri­al, on 10 May 2017, Unit­ed States Dis­trict Judge William Pauley III dis­missed Prevezon’s motion.

 

The court found suf­fi­cient basis to try the case on four dif­fer­ent wrong-doings iden­ti­fied by the US Depart­ment of Jus­tice, includ­ing (1) fraud against HSBC, (2) trans­porta­tion of stolen prop­er­ty, (3) bribery of a Russ­ian offi­cial, and (4) mon­ey laundering.
In its 10 May 2017 opin­ion, the US court also upheld the US Jus­tice Department’s mon­ey trac­ing analy­sis in rela­tion to the US$230 mil­lion fraud pro­ceeds. The court found that the US Gov­ern­ment pre­sent­ed evi­dence that “the mon­ey laun­der­ing scheme was designed to con­ceal the ille­gal nature and source of the $1.9 mil­lion [traced to Pre­ve­zon] at issue,” includ­ing that “some of the accounts of the con­duit enti­ties were opened a few months before the trans­fers at issue, at the same bank on the same day;” two inter­me­di­ary accounts had “strik­ing­ly sim­i­lar pattern[s] of activ­i­ty in their bank accounts;” “the major­i­ty of their incom­ing trans­fers came from three senders, one of whom rout­ed mon­ey from an account at a bank des­ig­nat­ed by the U.S. Trea­sury as mon­ey laun­der­ing con­cern;” “a total of five accounts reflect­ing sim­i­lar pat­terns of activ­i­ty were repeat­ed­ly accessed from the same IP address,” and  that “divid­ing pro­ceeds to avoid detec­tion is a hall­mark of mon­ey laundering.”

 

Two days lat­er Pre­ve­zon signed the stip­u­la­tion to pay US$5.9 mil­lion to set­tle the US Jus­tice Department’s mon­ey laun­der­ing action and avoid going to trial.

 

Sergei Mag­nit­sky, a Russ­ian lawyer who uncov­ered the mas­sive cor­rup­tion per­pe­trat­ed sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly by Russ­ian offi­cials and orga­nized crim­i­nals, includ­ing the theft of US$230 mil­lion in 2007, was tor­tured and killed in Russ­ian police cus­tody after expos­ing it. The Russ­ian gov­ern­ment pros­e­cut­ed Sergei Mag­nit­sky posthu­mous­ly and exon­er­at­ed all offi­cials involved in the US$230 mil­lion fraud.

 

Sergei Mag­nit­sky’s col­leagues have been able to con­tin­ue his inves­ti­ga­tion, and uncov­ered the vast mon­ey laun­der­ing net­work span­ning mul­ti­ple juris­dic­tions and hun­dreds of con­duit accounts.

 

Denis Katsyv’s and Prevezon’s accounts remain sub­ject to a crim­i­nal mon­ey laun­der­ing inves­ti­ga­tion in Switzer­land con­duct­ed by the Swiss Attor­ney Gen­er­al. Switzer­land was the first coun­try to act in rela­tion to the US$230 mil­lion fraud pro­ceeds going to Pre­ve­zon accounts impos­ing account freeze in 2012.

 

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

 

Jus­tice for Sergei Magnitsky

+44 207 440 1777

e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org

www.lawandorderinrussia.org

billbrowder.com

twitter.com/Bill­brow­der

The Queen of England Gives Final Approval to the Magnitsky Sanctions Law in the UK

April 28, 2017

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The Queen of Eng­land Gives Final Approval to the Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions Law in the UK

 

28 April 2017 –  The Queen of Eng­land has giv­en the roy­al assent to the UK Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions pro­vi­sion con­tained in the Crim­i­nal Finances Bill passed in the UK par­lia­ment. The UK Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions pro­vi­sion has now become law. It gives the British gov­ern­ment the pow­er to seize assets of gross human rights violators.

 

“The roy­al approval of the UK Mag­nit­sky act rep­re­sents a sig­nif­i­cant progress in the glob­al­iza­tion of the Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions regime against klep­to­crats and human rights abusers,” said William Brow­der, leader of the glob­al Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice Cam­paign and author of “Red Notice: How I Became Putin’s No 1 Enemy.”

 

“This effort is the result of sev­en years of advo­ca­cy in the name of Sergei Mag­nit­sky who uncov­ered and tes­ti­fied about the US$230 mil­lion cor­rup­tion scheme per­pe­trat­ed by Russ­ian offi­cials and was killed for his whis­tle-blow­ing,” said William Browder.

 

The Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions pro­vi­sion has pre­vi­ous­ly received approval from both hous­es of the UK parliament.

 

The UK Mag­nit­sky leg­is­la­tion pro­tects those who “have sought to expose the ille­gal activ­i­ty car­ried out by a pub­lic offi­cial or a per­son act­ing in an offi­cial capac­i­ty, or to obtain, exer­cise, defend or pro­mote human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms.” (full text here).

 

The UK Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions leg­is­la­tion stip­u­lates gross human rights abuse as unlaw­ful conduct.

 

Sergei Mag­nit­sky was a Russ­ian lawyer who uncov­ered the mas­sive cor­rup­tion per­pe­trat­ed sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly by Russ­ian offi­cials and orga­nized crim­i­nals, which includ­ed thefts from the Russ­ian trea­sury, includ­ing the theft of US$230 mil­lion in 2007. Instead of pur­su­ing the offi­cials who approved the thefts, the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment arrest­ed Sergei Mag­nit­sky and put him in pre-tri­al deten­tion, where he was tor­tured for 358 days and killed at the age of 37. All offi­cials impli­cat­ed in his tor­ture and the mul­ti-mil­lion dol­lar thefts have been exonerated.

 

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

 

Jus­tice for Sergei Magnitsky

+44 207 440 1777

e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org

www.lawandorderinrussia.org

billbrowder.com

twitter.com/Bill­brow­der

 

 

Magnitsky Sanctions Legislation Introduced in the Lithuanian Parliament

April 20, 2017

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Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions Leg­is­la­tion Intro­duced in the Lithuan­ian Parliament

20 April 2017 – Today, Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions leg­is­la­tion has been intro­duced in the Lithuan­ian Parliament.

The Lithuania’s Mag­nit­sky bill refus­es entry to Lithua­nia to per­sons who have been involved in human rights abus­es, mon­ey laun­der­ing and corruption.

The bill is the ini­tia­tive of Gabrielius Lands­ber­gis, MP, Chair­man of the Home­land Union-Lithuan­ian Chris­t­ian Democ­rats, and is co-spon­sored by twen­ty oth­er mem­bers of the Lithuan­ian Par­lia­ment from all major polit­i­cal groups, includ­ing Farm­ers and Greens, Social Democ­rats, Home­land Union ‑Chris­t­ian Democ­rats, and the Liberals.

Mr Lands­ber­gis said of the Mag­nit­sky initiative:

“The impuni­ty of for­eign per­sons who per­pe­trate gross human rights vio­la­tions, par­tic­i­pate in mon­ey laun­der­ing or cor­rup­tion should not be tol­er­at­ed just because the jus­tice sys­tem and the rule of law is cor­rupt­ed in an unde­mo­c­ra­t­ic coun­try, as the Mag­nit­sky case has shown. It is impor­tant to let per­pe­tra­tors know in advance that such crimes are not tol­er­at­ed in Lithua­nia and that such peo­ple will not be allowed to enter our coun­try. Our Mag­nit­sky law is uni­ver­sal, just as human rights themselves.”

“I hope that more demo­c­ra­t­ic coun­tries in Europe will fol­low suit, and that final­ly we will have EU-lev­el sanc­tions in this regard, just as the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment has called for,” said Mr Landsbergis.

The pro­posed Mag­nit­sky leg­is­la­tion seeks to amend Arti­cle 133 of the Lithuan­ian Law on the Legal Sta­tus of Aliens.

It would ban an alien from enter­ing the Repub­lic of Lithua­nia if there is infor­ma­tion or good rea­son to believe that the per­son par­tic­i­pat­ed in or con­tributed to large-scale cor­rup­tion or mon­ey laun­der­ing, or to vio­la­tions of human rights, which result­ed in the death or seri­ous injury of a per­son, the unfound­ed con­vic­tion of a per­son based on polit­i­cal motives, or oth­er seri­ous neg­a­tive consequences.

The Mag­nit­sky leg­is­la­tion is pro­posed as a result of the case of Sergei Mag­nit­sky in Rus­sia which has become emblem­at­ic of the human rights abuse for the finan­cial ben­e­fit of cor­rupt gov­ern­ment officials.

In 2008, Sergei Mag­nit­sky uncov­ered a $230 mil­lion tax theft com­mit­ted by Russ­ian state offi­cials, but when he impli­cat­ed the offi­cials involved, he him­self was arrest­ed, unjust­ly impris­oned for 358 days, tor­tured and beat­en to death in deten­tion cen­ter on Novem­ber 16^th, 2009 at the age of 37, leav­ing a wife and two children.

The Cam­paign for Jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky has been vig­or­ous­ly pur­sued by his for­mer col­leagues, which has led to the US Con­gress pass­ing the Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Account­abil­i­ty Act in 2012, and the Glob­al Mag­nit­sky Human Rights Account­abil­i­ty Act in 2016.

In Decem­ber 2016, the Eston­ian Par­lia­ment unan­i­mous­ly passed its own Mag­nit­sky Law deny­ing entry to Esto­nia to human rights abusers.

This year, the UK Par­lia­ment has begun con­sid­er­a­tion of the Mag­nit­sky leg­is­la­tion impos­ing the finan­cial sanc­tion on human rights abusers in the form of assets for­fei­ture. The UK’s Mag­nit­sky assets sanc­tions leg­is­la­tion has been passed by the House of Com­mons and is being cur­rent­ly con­sid­ered in the House of Lords.

Main spon­sor of the Lithuan­ian Mag­nit­sky bill:

-       Gabrielius Lands­ber­gis, Leader of TS-LKD Group in Seimas, Chair­man of TS-LKD, he also served as Mem­ber of the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment in the Euro­pean People’s Party.

Among oth­er co-spon­sors of the Lithuan­ian Mag­nit­sky bill:

-       Mr Vytau­tas Bakas, Lithuania’s Farm­ers and Greens Union, Chair of the Nation­al Secu­ri­ty and Defence Com­mit­tee, mem­ber of the Anti-Cor­rup­tion Commission.

-       Mr  Juozas Berna­to­nis, Social Democ­rats par­ty, Chair of the of For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee, he also served as chief advis­er under Prime Min­is­ter Kirk­i­las and as a Min­istry of Extra­or­di­nary and Plenipo­ten­tiary Ambas­sador to the Repub­lic of Estonia.

-       Ms Aušrinė Armon­aitė, Lib­er­als Move­ment par­ty, mem­ber of the For­eign Affairs Committee.

The events of the Mag­nit­sky case are described in the inter­na­tion­al best-sell­er “Red Notice” by William Brow­der and in a series of Mag­nit­sky jus­tice cam­paign videos on the YouTube chan­nel, “Russ­ian Untouch­ables.”

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

Jus­tice for Sergei Magnitsky

44 207 440 1777

info@lawandorderinrussia.org

www.lawandorderinrussia.org

billbrowder.com

twitter.com/Billbrowder

 

 

 

Canadian Parliament Formally Recommends the Canadian Government Adopt Magnitsky Sanctions Against Human Rights Violators

April 7, 2017

Press Release
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Cana­di­an Par­lia­ment For­mal­ly Rec­om­mends the Cana­di­an Gov­ern­ment Adopt Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions Against Human Rights Violators

6 April 2017 – Today, the Cana­di­an Parliament’s Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on For­eign Affairs has issued a for­mal rec­om­men­da­tion to the Cana­di­an gov­ern­ment to update the exist­ing sanc­tions leg­is­la­tion with the Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions against human rights violators.
In their rec­om­men­da­tion, the Com­mit­tee said: “In hon­our of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, the Gov­ern­ment of Cana­da should amend the Spe­cial Eco­nom­ic Mea­sures Act to expand the scope under which sanc­tions mea­sures can be enact­ed, includ­ing in cas­es of gross human rights violations.”

The Mag­nit­sky rec­om­men­da­tions include:

1) Freez­ing assets of human rights violators,

2) Ban­ning their entry to Canada,

3) Pub­lish­ing a list of peo­ple and enti­ties sub­ject to these sanc­tions, and

4) Con­duct­ing an annu­al review of the Cana­di­an gov­ern­men­t’s enforce­ment of the legislation.

The rec­om­men­da­tion was inspired by the case of Sergei Mag­nit­sky in Rus­sia, but has been expand­ed to apply to human rights vio­la­tors globally.
The Com­mit­tee concluded:

“While orig­i­nal­ly focused on address­ing the human rights sit­u­a­tion in Rus­sia, catal­ysed by the trag­ic case of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, this move­ment now calls for the appli­ca­tion of sanc­tions against human rights vio­la­tors glob­al­ly, and was instru­men­tal in the pass­ing of the Glob­al Mag­nit­sky Human Rights Account­abil­i­ty Act in the U.S.”

The report by Canada’s For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee cites William Brow­der, leader of the glob­al Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice Campaign:
“Effec­tive­ly, with a Mag­nit­sky act, whether it be a Russ­ian act specif­i­cal­ly or a glob­al act, it would give peo­ple some hope that in Cana­da, the Unit­ed States, and oth­er places, peo­ple do care.”

The Cana­di­an Mag­nit­sky Rec­om­men­da­tion is a result of a five-month review of the sanc­tions regime con­duct­ed in the Canada’s House of Commons.
“The Com­mit­tee heard com­pelling tes­ti­mo­ny from a num­ber of high­ly-respect­ed human rights activists regard­ing how sanc­tions can be a poten­tial­ly valu­able tool in the pro­mo­tion and pro­tec­tion of human rights. They rec­om­mend­ed that Cana­da expand the leg­isla­tive author­i­ty under which the gov­ern­ment can impose sanc­tions against human rights vio­la­tors,” says the For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee report.

The report by the For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee quotes Zhan­na Nemtso­va, founder of the Boris Nemtsov Foun­da­tion for Free­dom, named after her father, a Russ­ian pro-democ­ra­cy advo­cate who was mur­dered in 2015, saying:

“These are not sanc­tions against a coun­try or even a gov­ern­ment. These are sanc­tions against spe­cif­ic indi­vid­u­als respon­si­ble for cor­rup­tion and for abus­ing human rights.”

The Stand­ing Com­mit­tee on For­eign Affairs was tasked with the review of the sanc­tions regime on 14 April 2016 by the Canada’s House of Commons.
The Com­mit­tee held the review from Octo­ber 2016, by con­duct­ing 13 hear­ings where dif­fer­ent experts tes­ti­fied on the leg­is­la­tion. The com­mit­tee assessed relat­ed pol­i­cy issues from gov­ern­ment offi­cials, aca­d­e­mics, researchers, stake­hold­ers and practitioners.

Today, the Com­mit­tee pub­lished its final report rec­om­mend­ing the Gov­ern­ment adopts the Mag­nit­sky sanctions.
As part of its rec­om­men­da­tions, the For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee called for the Gov­ern­ment to pub­lish a list of sanc­tioned persons:

“The Gov­ern­ment of Cana­da should pro­duce and main­tain a com­pre­hen­sive, pub­lic and eas­i­ly acces­si­ble list of all indi­vid­u­als and enti­ties tar­get­ed by Cana­di­an sanc­tions con­tain­ing all infor­ma­tion nec­es­sary to assist with the prop­er iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of those listed.”

The For­eign Affairs Com­mit­tee also rec­om­mend­ed that the Gov­ern­ment pub­lish­es an annu­al report on the imple­men­ta­tion of the sanc­tions regime.

“The Gov­ern­ment of Cana­da should amend the Spe­cial Eco­nom­ic Mea­sures Act to require the pro­duc­tion of an annu­al report by the Min­is­ter of For­eign Affairs, to be tabled in each House of Par­lia­ment with­in six months of the fis­cal year-end, which would detail the objec­tives of all orders and reg­u­la­tions made pur­suant to that Act and actions tak­en for their implementation.”

The next step is for the Cana­di­an gov­ern­ment to con­sid­er the parliament’s rec­om­men­da­tion and draft legislation.

 

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

Jus­tice for Sergei Magnitsky

+44 207 440 1777
e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org
www.lawandorderinrussia.org
billbrowder.com
Twitter.com/Billbrowder
 

Magnitsky Family Lawyer Remains in Intensive Care Unit, But no Longer in Critical Condition

March 22, 2017

Press Release

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Mag­nit­sky Fam­i­ly Lawyer Remains in Inten­sive Care Unit, But no Longer in Crit­i­cal Condition

 22 March 2017 – Russ­ian lawyer Niko­lai Gorokhov, who rep­re­sents Sergei Magnitsky’s fam­i­ly, remains in the inten­sive care unit at Moscow Botkin hos­pi­tal. His con­di­tion is present­ly assessed as seri­ous, but not crit­i­cal. He is con­scious and respon­sive and this morn­ing Niko­lai was able to speak to doctors.

“Our thoughts and prayers are now with Niko­lai and his fam­i­ly at this dif­fi­cult time,” said William Brow­der, leader of the glob­al Mag­nit­sky jus­tice campaign.

Since last night, Russ­ian state media car­ried state­ments from Russ­ian law enforce­ment sources dis­miss­ing foul play.

Details about the inci­dent with Niko­lai Gorokhov were first pub­li­cised soon after the inci­dent by life.ru, a Russ­ian media orga­ni­za­tion report­ed­ly con­nect­ed to Russ­ian state secu­ri­ty services.

The details pre­sent­ed by life.ru and oth­er Russ­ian state-con­trolled media con­tra­dict the infor­ma­tion avail­able from eye­wit­ness­es. The notable dif­fer­ences con­cern the num­ber of work­ers at the scene who were deliv­er­ing a bath­tub to the upper floor of the apart­ment build­ing where the lawyer lives, and the where­abouts of the peo­ple at the scene dur­ing the incident.

Niko­lai Gorokhov was sched­uled to appear this morn­ing, at 10:50 am, in front of the Moscow City Appeals Court to argue the new “Pavlov Leaks” case expos­ing orga­nized crime and cor­rup­tion in the US$230 mil­lion fraud inves­ti­ga­tion in which all Russ­ian offi­cials were exon­er­at­ed and Sergei Mag­nit­sky was accused posthumously.

The new evi­dence sub­mit­ted by Niko­lai Gorokhov in par­tic­u­lar shows reg­u­lar com­mu­ni­ca­tions between Andrei Pavlov, lawyer for the Klyuev orga­nized crime group who was involved in the US$230 mln fraud, and Oleg Urzhumt­sev, ex Inte­ri­or Min­istry inves­ti­ga­tor (sanc­tioned under the US Mag­nit­sky Act), who helped Pavlov and oth­ers evade respon­si­bil­i­ty for their role in the crime that Sergei Mag­nit­sky exposed. Cer­tain Klyuev gang mem­bers are iden­ti­fied in the com­mu­ni­ca­tions by their crim­i­nal alias­es such as: “The Bold” and “The Great.”

The out­come of the hear­ing at the Moscow City Court today is not known.

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

 

Jus­tice for Sergei Magnitsky

+44 207 440 1777

e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org

www.lawandorderinrussia.org

billbrowder.com

twitter.com/Bill­brow­der

 

 

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