Posted on 02/14/2007 11:15:35 AM PST by A. Pole
A federal jury on Tuesday ordered that two men be put to death for abducting and killing five Russian immigrants, including four from the San Fernando Valley, before dumping them into a cold mountain reservoir.
The jury deliberated less than two hours before deciding that Iouri Mikhel and Jurijus Kadamovas, both of the former Soviet Union, should die. It marked the first death sentence to be issued from a federal court in Los Angeles in more than 50 years.
[...]
"They got what they deserved," said Ruven Umansky, whose son Alexander, of Sherman Oaks, was among those killed. "It's a relief."
As the death verdicts were read, the families of the victims clasped their hands and cried.
Mikhel, 41, of Encino shook his head and smirked at the jury. Kadamovas, 40, of Sherman Oaks showed no reaction as an interpreter translated the verdict for him.
Prosecutors said both men were ringleaders of a group that sought to amass a fortune by kidnapping affluent Russian immigrants from Los Angeles in late 2001 and early 2002 and extorting money from their families and friends.
They collected more than $1.2 million in ransom after promising family members their loved ones would go free.
The bodies were tied with weights and thrown from a bridge 187 feet into the frigid New Melones Reservoir near Yosemite National Park.
`Unmitigated greed'
Prosecutors said the two men showed "unmitigated greed and almost boundless viciousness" in a quest to get the trappings of wealth, including expensive homes and luxury cars.
[...]
Nancy Shapiro, whose husband, Sherman Oaks developer Meyer Muscatel, was the first to be killed, said she felt "just like we finally got some justice."
Her husband was abducted in October 2001 and his body was found floating in the reservoir. He was not identified until months later.
During the two-week penalty phase of the trial, the jury heard from the victims' relatives.
"I prayed that he would come home," Muscatel's daughter, Rachel Hoisman, told the jurors tearfully. "And the way he came home was in a box."
The bodies of the other four victims - three men and one woman killed by early 2002 - were pulled from the bottom of the deep body of water by law enforcement divers.
Those killed were Muscatel, 58, a philanthropist; Russian banking mogul George Safiev, 37, of Beverly Hills; Safiev's accountant, Rita Pekler, 39, of Encino; Safiev's business partner, Nick Kharabadze, 29, of Woodland Hills; and Umansky, 35, owner of a Sherman Oaks car-stereo store.
[...]
Lawyers for Mikhel, a native of St. Petersburg, Russia, and Kadamovas, a Lithuanian, argued unsuccessfully that their clients should have received life in prison rather than death. They said the two were affected by having grown up under a communist government, contending that they learned they had to be criminals to survive.
[...]
Well, at least it's Federal, so if they are put down it'll be a lot sooner than if it were a California DP sentence.
Well, at least it's Federal, so if they are put down it'll be a lot sooner than if it were a California DP sentence.
Ping.
"Court papers said one of the kidnappers boasted that the group would continue its money-making plan until the bodies they dropped in the reservoir near Yosemite National Park were “stacked on top of each other.”
"said the two were affected by having grown up under a communist government, "
Yah but they didn't grow up in CA they grew up in the Soviet Union so that argument fell flat .....
;-)
So many murderers who seem to be Mideastern Moslems or Mexicans or Central Americans are held up to great scrutiny on these threads while others are given short shrift.
Actually it doesn't seem to matter a whole lot whether they came here legally or illegally as evidenced by some of the ugly crimes committed by both types. Maybe we need to look at ourselves and what qualities our citizens possess or lack that might make us vulnerable to violent crimes. I can't remember who said "an unexamined life is not worth living" but I think I agree with him.
You could guess it by their names. Most of the victims were Jewish, some where Christians from Caucasus (Georgia) one perp was Lithuanian the other Jewish. They were all or almost all legal.
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