Source: United States Attorneys General 2
Miami real estate broker Roman Sinyavsky pleaded guilty today to engaging in a scheme to violate U.S. sanctions and commit money laundering by conducting transactions involving blocked properties owned by sanctioned Russian oligarchs Viktor Perevalov and Valeri Abramov.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Perevalov and Abramov for conduct including owning and operating VAD, AO, a Russia-based construction company responsible for constructing the Tavrida Highway in the Russian-occupied Crimea Region of Ukraine. Perevalov was designated again by OFAC in December 2024 for operating in the construction sector of the Russian economy.
As described in court documents, from in or around January 2018 through in or around March 2023, Sinyavsky conspired with others to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and commit money laundering by maintaining, transferring, selling, and leasing several luxury condominiums in the Miami area that Perevalov and Abramov owned and by collecting, sharing, and using the proceeds to maintain the properties.
Sinyavsky faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. As part of the plea agreement, Sinyavsky agreed to forfeit the proceeds he received from the scheme totaling $182,442.45.
On Feb. 22, 2024, the United States filed a civil forfeiture complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, alleging that two luxury condominiums owned by Perevalov are subject to forfeiture based on the unlawful transactions. On Jan. 6, the court ordered forfeiture of $1.8 million representing the proceeds from the sales of those properties. Abramov’s property was sold in June 2018.
Concurrent with today’s guilty plea, OFAC announced a separate settlement with Sinyavsky and his real estate company Family International Realty LLC in connection with a related, parallel proceeding. Under the terms of that resolution, Sinyavsky and his company have agreed to pay a civil penalty of approximately $1,076,923. In recognition of the amount Sinyavsky has agreed to forfeit in connection with today’s guilty plea, OFAC will credit the forfeiture against its civil penalty.
Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brent S. Wible, head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division; U.S. Attorney Markenzy Lapointe for the Southern District of Florida; and Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey B. Veltri of the FBI Miami Field Office made the announcement.
The FBI Miami Field Office is investigating the case with assistance from the Sunny Isles Beach Police Department. The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs also provided valuable assistance.
Trial Attorneys Sinan Kalayoglu and Lindsay Gorman of the Criminal Division’s Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Section, Trial Attorney Joshua E. Kurland of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Eli Rubin for the Southern District of Florida are prosecuting the case.
The investigation was coordinated through the Justice Department’s Task Force KleptoCapture, an interagency law enforcement task force dedicated to enforcing the sweeping sanctions, export controls and economic countermeasures that, beginning in 2014, the United States, along with its foreign allies and partners, has imposed in response to Russia’s unprovoked military invasion of Ukraine. Announced by the Attorney General on March 2, 2022, and under the leadership of the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, the task force will continue to leverage all of the department’s tools and authorities to combat efforts to evade or undermine the collective actions taken by the U.S. government in response to Russian military aggression.