Monday, December 27, 2021

With money believed stolen from Ukraine's largest bank, "Ukraine oligarch became Cleveland's biggest landlord"

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

The hotel is part of a portfolio — including iconic skyscrapers in Cleveland — that collapsed amid a series of stunning failures and a federal investigation of allegations that the oligarch and others stole hundreds of millions of dollars from Ukraine’s largest bank and then secretly plowed the money into U.S. real estate, including the four-star hotel.

...

The 58-year-old billionaire and others bought the towers through companies set up in Delaware — one of the nation’s foremost havens for corporate secrecy — through a litany of offshore shell companies in amounts that forced taxpayers in Ukraine to turn over billions to save the bank.

Far from the usual havens for shadowy money, Cleveland has become the center of an international money laundering probe