McGonigal was arrested at JFK airport in New York on Saturday, when he returned home from a trip to the Middle East. The alleged sanctions violations will include money laundering. Prosecutors believe McGonigal was paid by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska to investigate a rival Russian oligarch, according to NBC News. McGonigal denies any wrongdoing. The billionaire and Putin friend Deripaska is the man whom news has previously mentioned in connection with fishing trips with the yacht Elden in the Moldefjorden. Supposed to have collaborated with Putin friend McGonigal worked in the FBI from 1996 to 2018, and had counterespionage against Russia and organized crime as a field of work. The illegality is said to have occurred three years after he left the FBI. Deripaska founded the aluminum giant Rusal and is among those affected by the Western sanctions against Russia. CONTACTS: Vladimir Putin and Oleg Deripaska at a meeting in Vietnam in 2017. Photo: Mikhail Klimentyev / AP McGonigal allegedly tried to hide Deripaska’s involvement through shell companies, forged signatures and other means. Two other people are also involved, according to the prosecution. McGonigal is also charged with having received over NOK 2 million in cash from an agent in another case. – Should have known better – The charges are that Charles McGonigal, who was formerly a high-ranking official in the FBI, and Sergei Shestakov, who is an interpreter in the judicial system, violated US sanctions by providing services to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch on the sanctions list. – Both have previously worked with Deripaska to try to get the sanctions against him removed. As public officials, they should have known better, prosecutors’ representative Damian Williams told NBC News. Assistant FBI Director Michael Driscoll says the sanctions rules must be complied with by everyone for them to have any effect. – There are no exceptions for anyone, not even a former FBI director like Mr. McGonigal, says Driscoll, according to Reuters. Sanctions The USA introduced sanctions against Deripaska in 2018. The Ministry of Finance then stated that Deripaska had been investigated for money laundering, extortion and organized crime, and that he was also accused of bribing an official, ordering the murder of a businessman and having ties to a criminal Russian group, according to NTB. Deripaska sued the Treasury Department in 2019, claiming he had lost billions due to the sanctions, but the lawsuit was dismissed by a federal court. Deripaska is also said to have had close ties to Paul Manafort, the head of Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign, who, according to court documents, provided Deripaska with information and polling data from the campaign. Manafort was sentenced to seven years in prison for financial crimes, but was pardoned by Trump.
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Former FBI chief arrested for ties to Russian oligarch – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
