Sohlberg and the White Death

by Jens Amundsen

  Timchenko’s jaw dropped.

  How was he to ship the equivalent of $ 27 billion U.S. dollars in cash to Moscow?

  “Do you hear me?”

  “Yes,” said Timchenko. “But it’s going to take time.”

  Timchenko thought about the nightmare logistics of shipping a cargo of 20 billion euros. That meant 200 wooden pallets. Each pallet would carry 100 million shrink-wrapped euros. Nikolai Bashilova had made this fortune by turning over state-owned companies to grateful friends. The deputy prime minister received his friends’ appreciation in the form of “commissions” on billions of dollars of export sales of oil, natural gas, chemicals, diamonds, minerals, and metals.

  “We’re running out of time,” said Nikolai Bashilova. “You yourself told me someone’s been snooping around.”

  “It’s someone from FINMA. . . . That’s all that the secretary at U.B.S. would say.”

  “You told me that we’d be left in peace after the Italians killed the Interpol translator.”

  Timchencko shook his head and said:

  “It’s complicated. . . .”

  “No,” said Nikolai Bashilova. “It’s insane. . . . Who would’ve thought that those crazy Italians would go after our plant? . . . They must’ve put two and two together and figured out that she knew too much about them. Obviously they’re not that stupid.”

  “But they are . . . because she worked with these two cops at Interpol. The two cops are far smarter than the idiot Italians. One cop is from Norway. The other is French. These guys are very very clever . . . sneaky is the word. And they’re either very lucky or well-connected with some intelligence service . . . or both.”

  “Why do you say that?” said Nikolai Bashilova.

  “Because they have a knack for knowing the unknowable.”

  After a long pause Nikolai Bashilova said:

  “I don’t want anyone getting near my money. I want it up here at Sheremetyevo Airport no later than two days from now. Arkady will pick it up on August the seventh.”

  “Sir. If I may . . . it would be madness to ship the cash directly from Switzerland to Moscow. A cargo flight from Zurich is always bound to attract attention. You never know if there’s another crooked Colonel Zubkov ready to pilfer your money.”

  “What do you suggest?”

  “I have someone at Deutsche Bank who’s willing to help me take it out of the vaults at U.B.S. and Credit Suisse . . . they can load it on four trucks tomorrow. . . . I’m sure that Arkady can put together a heavily-armed team that will escort the trucks to Frankfurt Airport.

  “Germany has a lot of people who can help us. I know this guy from Iran . . . Farzin Koroorian Motlagh. He’s got French and American citizenship. He can help us ship the cash with all of the right paperwork.”

  “Who is this guy . . . how can he help?”

  “Farzin is a customs broker and a freight forwarder . . . the airlines trust him . . . he’s paid people off. Farzin specializes in helping people who need to ship a lot of cash around the world. He’s always willing . . . for a fee . . . to put his name as the shipper on any document for customs. Shall I put Arkady as the recipient and owner?”

  “No. Put no one. Arkady will pick it up. I know the director of customs at the airport. One phone call and everything will be taken care of at our end.”

  “Okay. I’ll start the arrangements. Eh . . . one more thing . . . can I take my share out? . . . I’d like to keep it here in Switzerland.”

  “No. We’ll divide the money up here when you drop by in a few months.”

  “But—”

  “But no. Yuri . . . I’ve noticed that our colleagues do not return to Mother Russia after they deposit their first hundred million dollars or euros in some Swiss bank. . . . You now have one hundred million more reasons to come visit me at the Kremlin.”

  Yuri Timchenko wiped the sweat from his brow. He did not foresee a happy ending for his pallet.

  ~ ~ ~

  Fabrizio Morabito pulled out his cell phone as soon as the three mobsters were safely inside their limousine on the way to back to Lucerne with their bodyguards. In broken German he said:

  “Make sure that Timchenko’s Gulfstream does not take off. Under no circumstances is the Russian national Arkady Kovalchuk to leave in that airplane or any other private jet. Yes. That’s right. First name is A-r-k-a-d-y. Last name is K-o-v-a-l-c-h-u-k.

  “Tell this Arkady Kovalchuk that Timchenko’s jet needs repairs and that his friend Timchenko will fly him in First Class to Moscow on Aeroflot because he has a stand-by arrangement for Aeroflot flights out of Zurich.”

  Morabito hanged up.

  The three men smiled with great satisfaction at each other. Fabrizio Morabito dialed a new number and said:

  “The passenger will be on the evening flight. Correct. Make sure the package gets on board.”

  Pasquale De Stefano beamed. “This will teach them a lesson.”

  The consigliere handed out to each of his co-passengers a list of banks assigned to groups of allied families. “Here’s the latest list. Please make sure that each family stays with whatever bank they pick from the list. They must not use other banks outside of the list.” Domenico Pelle stared intently at Morabito. “We do it this way because everything has to be compartmentalized in case the law goes after any family. That way one family might go down but not the rest.”

  “I understand.”

  ~ ~ ~

  The caravan dropped each man off with his bodyguards at their assigned banks to check up on the state of their fortunes.

  De Stefano was dropped off at Credit Suisse.

  Pelle set off to UBS.

  Morabito headed to Schwyzer Kantonalbank—a very accommodating savings bank owned by the Cantonal government of Schwyz with a convenient branch in Meggen.

  The three men were about to implement the “Butterfly” or “Farfalla” plan that Domenico Pelle had drawn up for his and other branches of 'Ndrangheta families that had chosen to fly away from a life of crime. They were going to immigrate to the legit world where they would live off their investments.

  Francesco Zappia and other branches of the Barbaro Family were among those who were morphing into the legit world. So was Pasquale De Stefano and his branch of the De Stefano. Fabrizio Morabito and his branch of the Morabito clan were also there for the same metamorphosis. Of course those going legit had to transfer their criminal activities to 'Ndrangheta relatives who wanted to remain in that line of business. Entire families—like the Nirta and Striango clans—rejected Pelle’s proposals. Some had zero confidence in their ability to survive outside a life of crime and violence. Others enjoyed it.

  ~ ~ ~

  A watery-eyed white-haired mouse bowed to Domenico Pelle. The extremely myopic bank manager wore thick eyeglasses that allowed him to clearly see everything as long as it was three inches from the tip of his nose. He stood with Swiss reverence before the sacristy of the UBS bank vault. The mouse and his young ghostly assistant escorted Pelle past the 5-foot-thick steel door and the first gate of steel bars. The gate could only be opened if the armed guard inside and the manager outside inserted and turned their keys at the same time in the lock.

  “This way please,” whispered the mouse.

  Pelle followed the two bank employees into the main vault. Hundreds of rows of small- and medium-size safe-deposit boxes lined the walls. Padded doors on both sides of the room led to private viewing cubicles where customers could receive unction from their valuables in complete solitude.

  “Please. This way.”

  A second gate and guard protected the next chamber which gave sanctuary to large safe-deposit boxes as big as a kitchen dishwasher or stove. A row of padded doors led to spacious private viewing rooms.

  The third and final gate and guard defended the next chamber where Pelle rented four safe-deposit boxes as big as kitchen refrigerators. The box on the far right was his own personal box for himself, his wife and children, and close relatives. The other thr
ee boxes held stocks, bonds, gold bars, and other loot of the extended Pelle, Vottari, and Romeo Families from the poverty-stricken village of San Luca.

  “Your key please,” said the murine manager to Pelle.

  The mouse’s tiny pale claws turned both keys to open the mechanical lock. But they were not done. The rodent in a dark suit discretely walked away to provide Pelle the needed privacy to dial in the code for the electronic lock. The two-inch steel door snapped open.

  “Excellent,” said the manager.

  The doe-eyed assistant pulled a steel safe on wheels out of the safe and he pushed it to a row of windowless sanctuaries where the ultra-wealthy enter into communion with their treasures. With hushed reverence the two men retreated from the room after the steel tabernacle was perfectly positioned next to a long cherry wood table.

  “We will wait for you at the gate. Please let me know if you need anything.”

  Domenico Pelle closed and locked the door of the enormous viewing room inside the UBS bank vault. He took off his coat, shirt, belt, shoes, and pants. He set the clothes on a chair and pulled the velcro straps of the narrow cloth belt that was strapped around his torso just above the hip. Pelle put the belt and its pouch on top of the table. He opened the pouch that held the Pelle-Vottari-Romeo clan’s share of monthly profits. His hands lovingly caressed the half-pound of 3- and 4- and 5-carat flawless-rated diamonds as he placed them in a steel drawer inside the family’s safe deposit box.

  The diamonds formed a key component of Domenico Pelle’s plan to go legit. Money from the piggy banks bought top-quality diamonds in Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Sao Paulo, Sydney, Tokyo, Bombay, and Bahrain. The diamonds could never be traced when sold off.

  The convenience of carrying 1,134 carats—or the equivalent of $ 45,360,000—in the small of his back pleased him to no end. The soothing impact of earning $ 544,320,000 tax-free dollars a year—or $ 11,340,000 a week—left him in worshipful contemplation. A warm climactic ecstasy washed over him.

  Life was good because business was good.

  What more could a man ask for?

  ~ ~ ~

  As soon as the three men fulfilled their deposit obligations to their respective clan, each man pinched a few diamonds for personal spending money. That was their right as the top men of their clan. The trio left the vaults and beelined with their bodyguards to the nearby offices of their own personal bankers. These Swiss bankers were the cream of Switzerland’s banks—private banks which only hold client money for investing.

  De Stefano set off for Julius Baer Bank.

  Morabito to Pictet Bank.

  And Pelle to Bank Jacob Safra.

  Diamond brokers from Antwerp and Tel Aviv waited for them inside private suites that the banks provide for special clients. A quick round of negotiations yielded the desired prices and electronic transfers from the diamond buyers’ accounts to the Italians’ accounts with the private banks. Half of the proceeds stayed with the private bank’s money managers who invested the loot in stocks and bonds. The men then wired the other half of the fruits of their labors to shell companies that they controlled in London and Hong Kong. The shells wired the money to wealth managers at Goldman Sachs, Citibank, HSBC, Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, and JPMorganChase. The remaining personal funds would be wired from London to Milan within 24 hours.

  Tomorrow the three men would go back for more diamonds and repeat the process with other diamond buyers. Then they would disburse all of the proceeds for investments at hedge funds and private equity firms such as the Carlyle Group in New York and Bain Capital in Boston. Wall Street’s men of honor—giovane d’onore—would toil day and night to make crime pay.

  ~ ~ ~

  The consigliere from San Luca and the investment banker from Goldman Sachs met for dinner at Jasper—the Michelin star-rated restaurant of the grand Palace Luzern Hotel. The restaurant manager had reserved $ 800 bottles of wine and a private table for the two men to discuss the finer points of money laundering over culinary masterpieces.

  “Sorry old boy . . . I can’t stay long,” said James H. Winchester. “Got to get back to the office.”

  Pelle detested the head of the Zurich office of Goldman Sachs. His private investigators from the corporate spy group Kroll had discovered that James Winchester had been born in Nebraska as Delbert Chidester to poor schoolteacher parents. The facade of a Ralph Lauren Polo lifestyle and the affected accent grated on the Italian. He hated the American fraud with a passion after their first meeting five years ago when the banker had dared to lecture Pelle about “The absolute need for your money to come into our bank with no crime or scandal attached.”

  The Italian hated all bankers. But future profits required Pelle and the 'Ndrangheta to do business with Goldman Sachs—the world’s most powerful bank. He picked Goldman Sachs because the firm manipulated governments and politicians and economies as superbly as the puppet masters of the Guignol theater of Lyon.

  Pelle stared hard at the banker. “How much did they want . . . how much are they willing to pay?”

  A thin smile spread over the bloodless lips of James Winchester. “They want everything you’re selling. I’ve never seen so many venture capital firms in San Francisco and New York falling over themselves for such a small piece of Ultra Laboratories.”

  “How much?” said Pelle who hated the clever and slow conversation that the American always used to point out the grand favors that he was doing the dirty Italian peasants by handling their investments.

  “Actually it was quite unexpected.”

  “How much?”

  “We decided to auction the shares after we saw so much interest. The venture capital firms paid a premium over what you asked for. I say . . . we got you a rather charming valuation for your company.”

  “How much?”

  “Let’s see . . . based on the last of the wire transfers that arrived for the purchase of the five percent that you Italians sold from your group’s shares . . . your people’s remaining ownership of Ultra Laboratories is now worth around twelve billion dollars.”

  Pelle savored the number and the 1937 Château d'Yquem. Rarely had any white wine and bread spread with seared Sousa foie gras from Spain tasted so good with $ 12 billion dollars. And that amount was just a small part of their assets.

  “You can go public . . . or . . . wait a little and sell out to Merck or Johnson and Johnson. . . . Who knows? Maybe even AstraZeneca or Roche. We can probably get you much more money if you hire us to sell your stake to private equity people . . . Apollo . . . Bain . . . Blackstone or T.P.G. Capital . . . Kohlberg Kravis. . . . The world is yours.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Later that night the Calabrians enjoyed a celebratory snack at Domenico Pelle’s chalet some 20 miles northeast of Meggen in nearby Zug. The cook—Pelle’s older sister—brought out two rectangular Italian sponge cakes soaked with fruit juices.

  “Excellent!” cried Pasquale De Stefano at the sight of his favorite comfort food.

  “It’s been ages since I had cassata siciliana.” Fabrizio Morabito laughed. “There’s nothing like Italian home cooking.”

  The traditional Italian cakes were layered with ricotta cheese and candied fruit peel and covered with a tasty decorated shell of marzipan and icing. One cake was decorated with green marzipan and icing to look like a $100 U.S. dollar bill. Purple marzipan and icing made the other cake look like a 500 euro banknote. The cakes served as fitting symbols for the paper currencies that fueled the 'Ndrangheta empire and the men’s greed.

  “Not bad,” said Domenico Pelle.

  Pelle and his two business partners devoured the cake and icing with relish. Meanwhile Aeroflot Flight # 117 from Zurich to Moscow exploded in midair with 145 passengers and 8 crew members on board. The bomb-maker Achilles Tsoukalas had been worth every penny of the $ 200,000 U.S. dollars.

  The men scooped heaping spoonfuls of cassata into their avaricious mouths as pieces of wreckage and humans rained down on the steppes of Russia.

&
nbsp; ~ ~ ~

  At midnight Semion Mogilevich received the call from Yuri Timchenko informing him that his ally—Arkady Kovalchuk—was no more. Mogilevich could also kiss goodbye to his finder’s fee for connecting the Italians with the very highest levels of Russian government.

  The former deputy Minister of Finance was diplomatic but firm:

  “The Italians have made it perfectly clear that they’re very angry with us.”

  “I had no part in the problem that your people created.”

  “Look. It’s take it or leave it. We give you a million euros.”

  “Not enough.”

  “Then don’t expect more help from us. . . .”

  “I can talk to the newspapers about the toilet of bribes in the Kremlin . . . the sewer pipe that spills out billionaire oligarchs. Do you want me to name names? . . . Anisimov . . . Berezovsky . . . Abramovich . . . Blavatnik . . . Khodorkovsky . . . Prokhorov . . . Nazarbayev . . . Nevzlin . . . Rybolovlev . . . and Rez—”

  “Enough. I get the idea. But you forget that no one cares about old news.”

  “We will see.”

  “My friend,” said Yuri Timchenko. “You forget that your name is on the F.B.I. Ten Most Wanted Fugitive list.”

  “Old news. No one cares.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Semion Mogilevich snorted. “If I have to . . . I can buy a presidential pardon like Marc Rich. I put fifty million dollars in a Swiss bank account and I buy whatever and whoever I want in any government.”

  “You need to add more to your budget. Much more. Marc Rich had to pay off a lot of people in the Justice Department and White House before he made the final big fat pay-off to the president.”

  “I can do it,” said Semion Mogilevich.

  “You’re not as big as Marc Rich. And you don’t have a seductive ex-wife to work her charms on anyone inside the Kremlin or the Oval Office.”