Estonian organized crime / mafia

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As there isn't any discussion about the Estonian organized crime (or mafia), I though I'd start one. Estonia is a small Baltic nation with about 1,4 million people. It has the highest homicide rate in Europe after Russia (Estonia has 12 homicides per 100,000 people according to Nationmaster stats) and lot of criminal activities.

I'll just post up some articles first and then with a better time write something else, too.

Here's what Wikipedia says about Estonian mafia:

"Estonian organised crime is described as Estonian mafia, which is a loose alliance of Estonian mobster groups, with a wide range of different rackets, from drug trafficking to motorvehicle theft. The Estonian-speakers meet as Nõukogu. The groups do not fight with each other, as this would decrease the profits. The Kemerovo group is the most powerful, led by a man known as "V.G." or "Slava Kemerovsk". Another leader was believed to be Kalev Kurg, who was killed in November, 2005.

The rackets are prostitution, motorvehicle theft, drug trafficking, and previously also "providing" workers to building contracts in Finland, when the mafia was taking its share of the workers' salaries. Particularly important are the operations in Finland, since Finland is a Western country and thus is much more lucrative than Estonia. Cannabis is trafficked from North Africa via Costa del Sol in Spain. Amphetamine has a high demand in Finland, and the Estonian mafia manufactures it in Estonia.

The Estonian mafia is known to hold meetings with the Russian mafia to maintain a cartel in prostitution in Finland.[citation needed] This cartel is known as Obtshak "Joint fund" (and as Ühiskassa by the Finnish police).[citation needed] It has gotten rid of native Finnish pimps and has a virtual monopoly. Obtshak collects membership fees and provides arbitration.[citation needed]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_mafia

.....I'd say that that article is pretty much on point. But the Obtshak didn't actually "get rid of native Finnish pimps", because pimpin hasn't never been something that Finns would have done. So Obtshak basically just came here and filled the empty slot. Before them, the prostitutes where basically self-employed and worked without pimps. Even today a lot of prostitutes do it that way.

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Here's an article from a Finnish newspaper about the Obtshak:

"Estonia's Obtshak crime organisation a major supplier of Finnish illegal drug market

Syndicate divides territory and arbitrates in disputes - international criminal cooperation established in prison in 1990s

By Jukka Harju in Tallinn

The Tallinn criminal organisation known as the "common treasury", or Obtshak is responsible for a good deal of the trade and smuggling of illegal drugs in Finland. Estonia is known to be the source of most of the amphetamine available on the Finnish market.

The operation is one example of how international organised crime - in this case, the Eastern Mafia - operates and extends its influence into Finland.

Obtshak is the highest level of the Eastern Mafia - an umbrella organisation of a number of different criminal groups. One of the goals of Obtshak is to make money; some of its activities are legitimate.

There are just under ten groups in Estonia which belong to Obtshak. Each of them pays part of the ill-gotten gains to a central organisation, which maps out the geographical areas and the fields of operations of the affiliate members. The common treasury also mediates in disputes between member groups, provides financial aid to those in prison and their families, and covers expenses such as lawyers' fees.

The Estonian media has often identified
a certain Russian-born man as the head of Obtshak. Most of the groups are Russian, and many are named after their cities of origin. For instance there is talk of the Novosibirsk and Kemerovov Mafias. More recently, new groups have been named after the bosses of the gangs.

Risto Pullat of the Estonian police is specialised in organised crime. He says that some of the groups are of Estonian origin, and they have their own representatives in Obtshak. However, purely Estonian gangs also have an umbrella organisation, known as the Nõukogu, or "council".

The Estonian groups are more international
in their operations than their Russian counterparts. For example, some Estonian criminals who have settled in Spain's Costa del Sol organise the smuggling of cannabis from North Africa to Finland.

Few can say how much of the Finnish amphetamine trade is in the hands of the Obtshak, but it is safe to say that the organisation would not just watch this lucrative trade across the Gulf of Finland from the sidelines. It is believed that it also has its hands in the smuggling of alcohol and tobacco into Finland.

There is considerable demand in Finland for amphetamine. The drug is manufactured in clandestine laboratories in Estonia. Since the late 1990s Estonian police have shut down such laboratories at the rate of about one each year. The latest was found in a rural house in the Western Estonia about two weeks ago.

The term "laboratory" is perhaps somewhat misleading in this respect, as the equipment required for the manufacture of amphetamine is not much more elaborate than a moonshine still.

The equipment is quite easy to assemble: the kettles and pipes of the laboratory that was most recently discovered fit into two cardboard boxes. This makes the laboratories easily portable, and more difficult for the police to track down.

According to Pullat
, the current situation on the Finnish amphetamine market emerged in the 1990s after the first Estonian criminals were caught in Finland. While in a Finnish prison they managed to establish contacts with Finnish professional criminals, and the business has flourished ever since.

"The criminals are more experienced and more crafty than before", says Martin Ilumets of Estonia's central criminal police.

The reason why so much Estonian amphetamine is smuggled across the Gulf of Finland from Estonia to Finland is simple: the same drug brings in at least three times as much money in Finland as it does in Estonia."

http://www2.hs.fi/english/archive/news. ... 020423IE11


......also this article is pretty much on point. But you have to keep in mind that this article was written 8 years ago, so it doesn't match with the current reality 100%. Nowadays a lot of the Finnish organizations work together with the Estonians, while in the past the Estonians had Finnish criminals working for them. It started to go that way after there were enough connections between the Finns and the Estonians, and those connections were made during the time the Estonian criminals were serving time in Finnish prisons. Russian organized crime isn't anymore such a factor in Finland as it maybe used to be (even though even in the past the Russian mafia presens in Finland had always been exaggerated). Nowadays it's the Estonian-Finnish groups that are the most notable ones in Finland.

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One more article:



"Estonian Minister of Justice Rein Lang says that more and more criminals are investing their ill-gotten funds in real estate development in Estonia.

In an interview to Aripaev- Lang said that illegal money usually goes to where it is easiest to be legalized. "In today's Estonia- the real estate development has become the most profitable business for them."

Lang was referring to the recent case where family members and close business partners of Hans H. Luik- a media and real estate owner- were attacked by criminals- allegedly over real estate disputes.

Lang said that in his opinion all larger real estate transactions in Tallinn can be made only with the approval of the leaders of criminal underworld and referred to Kalev Kurg who was gunned down some time ago and was believed to have been the key person in the Tallinn property business.

Lang says that Estonian businessmen should never cooperate with criminals and promises that the Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Interior Affairs will help them not to.

Lang wrote in Postimees daily yesterday that he was putting his hopes on the central criminal police and its new head Elmar Vaher."

http://www.balticbusinessnews.com/?Publ ... 8816abe765