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33 â€˜thieves in lawâ€™ from post-Soviet countries detained in US

08 June 2017 09:41 (UTC +04:00)

15 criminals (so-called “thieves in law” or “Vor v zakone”) of Georgian nationality have been detained by the US authorities in New York on charges of involvement in organized crime, APA reported citing News Georgia.

In total, the police detained 33 immigrants from post-Soviet countries. The operations to detain them involved the New York State police, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the US immigration and customs services.

All the detainees, according to the investigation, were involved in extortion, fraud, crimes related to drugs and firearms, and some of them were actors of contract killings. They had operated in several American states, including New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Florida and Nevada.

The prosecutor's office did not specify the citizenships of the detainees but stated that 27 of them were affiliated with a group led by Shulaya and Zurab Janashvili.

18 of them have already been brought to trial. The others will stand trial in the next few days