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Agents Raid Gallery at Manhattan Hotel in Gambling Inquiry Agents Raid Gallery at Manhattan Hotel in Gambling Inquiry
(about 4 hours later)
A scion of one of the world’s most influential and wealthiest art-dealing families was charged on Tuesday with playing a leading role in a gambling and money laundering scheme that was carried out under the direction of a Russian organized crime group and included high-stakes poker games involving Wall Street financiers, Hollywood celebrities and professional athletes, according to an indictment unsealed in the case and people familiar with the prosecution. Outside the rarefied world of art dealers and collectors, where discretion is often prized nearly as much as the art itself, the Nahmad family does not attract the same recognition as some of their fellow billionaires.
The investigation, which led to charges against more than 30 people, including a Russian man who was previously wanted in connection for his role in a bid to rig Winter Olympic skating competitions, found ties that stretched from a Bronx plumbing business and a Brooklyn car-repair shop to Cypriot banks and Russian oligarchs. But for those who trade in multimillion-dollar paintings, they have long been a major presence at the premier auctions held every spring and fall at Sotheby’s and Christie’s, where they often descend, wives and children included, and have been known to argue loudly with one another, even while others around them engaged in more genteel bidding.
During an early morning raid on Tuesday, agents executed a search warrant at the Helly Nahmad gallery, which is inside the Carlyle Hotel on Madison Avenue in New York. The owner of the gallery, Hillel Nahmad, known as Helly, was one of those charged. Despite sneers from some of their more staid peers who have accused them of unfairly negotiating special terms with auction houses, they are among the most powerful, wealthy and colorful members of the elite global club of fine art dealers.
The Nahmad family members, Lebanese art dealers with galleries in New York and London, are well-known and powerful players in the art world. In recent years, they have been among some of the most prolific buyers at high-end auctions around the globe, buying and selling millions of dollars of art. “They have sold more works of art than anybody alive,” Christopher Burge, the chairman of Christie’s New York, once said.
According to Forbes magazine’s annual compilation of the world’s wealthiest people, the family’s fortune has been valued at $3 billion. But on Tuesday, the family’s New York flagship gallery, the Helly Nahmad Gallery, at the opulent Carlyle Hotel in Manhattan, was filled with agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation conducting a raid. An indictment unsealed on Tuesday charged its owner, Hillel Nahmad, 34, with playing a leading role in a far-flung gambling and money-laundering operation that stretched from Kiev and Moscow to Los Angeles and New York.
In addition to charges that he helped finance a multimillion-dollar gambling ring in the United States, Mr. Nahmad is accused of defrauding an unnamed individual by selling him a painting for $300,000 when it was worth only $50,000, according to the indictment. The case features a wide cast of characters, including a man described as a Russian gangster accused of trying to rig Winter Olympic skating competitions in Salt Lake City and a woman who once organized high-stakes poker games for some of Hollywood’s most famous faces. In all, 34 people were charged on Tuesday with playing a part in what federal prosecutors described as two separate but interconnected criminal groups — one operating overseas and the other in the United States. Together, they are accused of laundering more than $100 million in gambling money.
Mr. Nahmad, according to the indictment, also wired money — once for $500,000 and another time for $850,000 — from his father’s bank account in Switzerland to a bank account in America to help fund the gambling operation. In addition to charges that Mr. Nahmad helped finance a multimillion-dollar gambling ring in the United States, the art dealer is accused of defrauding an unnamed person by selling him a painting for $300,000 when it was worth only $50,000, according to the indictment.
The charges lay out activities of what prosecutors describe as two separate but interconnected criminal groups — one operating overseas and the other in the United States. Mr. Nahmad, the indictment said, also wired money — once for $500,000 and another time for $850,000 — from his father’s bank account in Switzerland to a bank account in America to help finance the gambling operation.
At the center of the overseas operation detailed in the indictment was Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov, whom prosecutors describe as a made member of a Russian organized-crime gang — referred to as the “Taiwanchik-Trincher Organization.” The Nahmad family’s rise to prominence dates back to its roots in Aleppo, Syria, where the family’s patriarch, also named Hillel, was a successful banker in the middle of the last century.
“The Taiwanchik-Trincher Organization was an international organized-crime group with leadership based in New York City, Kiev and Moscow, and that operated throughout the United States,” according to the indictment. He had three sons, David, Ezra and Giuseppe; Giuseppe died last year in London.
Mr. Tokhtakhounov was a “Vory V Zakone,” sometimes known as a Vor or a “thief in law,” according to the indictment, the highest level of Russian gangsters. As a Vor, he had substantial influence in the criminal underworld and offered assistance and protection to the group. David Nahmad, whose son Hillel ran the New York gallery, has been described as a risk-taker in both business and life. In Monte Carlo, he won the World Championship of Backgammon in 1996.
Over the years the family has amassed an estimated 300 Picassos worth $900 million, and about 4,500 other works by artists including Monet and Miró, many secreted in a duty-free warehouse near the Geneva airport. It is a treasure that Forbes estimated to be worth over $3 billion. Before this week, Hillel Nahmad’s gallery was a cynosure of refinement and wealth, with masters like Wassily Kandinsky and Francis Bacon on the walls.
With an entrance at Madison Avenue and 76th Street, the gallery’s connection with the Carlyle, itself synonymous with privilege, added to its prestige. The gallery has been at the Carlyle since at least the late 1990s.
However, even before the F.B.I. raid at 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday, the gallery’s windows were covered with brown paper, which is unusual since the spring art season is just kicking into high gear.
A sign on the door said, “We are closed for renovation, please ring the bell or call.”
A man who answered the phone at that number declined to speak to a reporter.
According to the indictment, Hillel Nahmad was one of the leaders of a “high-stakes illegal gambling business run out of New York City and Los Angeles that catered primarily to multimillionaire and billionaire clients.”
He was expected to surrender to the authorities in Los Angeles on Tuesday. His lawyer could not be immediately reached for comment.
The indictment also named Molly Bloom, who made headlines in 2011 for her role in arranging clandestine games for high-rollers, including Tobey Maguire, Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck.
Federal law enforcement officials would not say whether the poker games Ms. Bloom ran in Los Angeles in 2011 came under scrutiny during the course of the investigation. But the charges in the indictment relate to her conduct between 2010 and the present. The indictment did not name any of the high-profile players who investigators said were involved in the poker games held in New York and Los Angeles.
According to the indictment, the organization would enforce payment of gambling debts through coercion. One client surrendered a 50 percent interest in his business, Titan P&H plumbing company in the Bronx, to repay a $2 million gambling debt. Some of the money generated by the scheme was also used to buy expensive property, including an apartment at Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue.
One of the defendants, Vadim Trincher, helped run the scheme from the $5 million apartment, according to prosecutors, who said that $75,000 in cash and $2 million in chips from the Bellagio casino in Las Vegas were seized from the apartment.
At the center of the overseas operation detailed in the indictment was Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov, 64, whom prosecutors describe as the leader of a Russian organized-crime gang.
Mr. Tokhtakhounov, according to the indictment, was a “Vory V Zakone,” sometimes known as a Vor or a “thief in law,” the highest level of Russian gangsters.
Between December 2011 and January 2012, Mr. Tokhtakhounov was paid $10 million for his leadership role in the organization, according to the indictment.Between December 2011 and January 2012, Mr. Tokhtakhounov was paid $10 million for his leadership role in the organization, according to the indictment.
Mr. Tokhtakhounov, according to the indictment, oversaw the laundering of money generated by a huge sports-betting operation in Ukraine and the former Soviet Union that served Russian oligarchs. Mr. Tokhtakhounov, the indictment said, oversaw the laundering of money generated by a huge sports-betting operation in the former Soviet Union that served Russian oligarchs.
Tens of millions of dollars were laundered from the operation through shell companies and bank accounts in Cyprus and sent to the United States, according to the indictment. Mr. Tokhtakhounov, who remains at large, was indicted in 2002 on charges that he was part of a scheme to rig the results of the Winter Olympic finals in Salt Lake City in pairs figure skating and ice dancing.
Many members of the organization were born in the former Soviet Union and many maintain ties to Ukraine and the Russian Federation, the indictment said. In July 2002, Italian tax authorities detained Mr. Tokhtakhounov at his villa in Tuscany at the request of federal prosecutors in New York.
In the United States, one of the principal directors of the group was Hillel Nahmad, who ran a high-stakes gambling operation. According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Manhattan in that case, he was accused of working with an unidentified member of a Russian crime gang and an unidentified Russian skating official to rig the competition. He helped secure a gold medal for Russia in the pairs event in exchange for a victory for the French ice dancing team, according to the complaint.
The organization operated a “high-stakes illegal gambling business run out of New York City and Los Angeles that catered primarily to multimillionaire and billionaire clients,” according to the indictment. However, Italy’s highest court overturned an extradition order, and he was never brought to the United States to stand trial.
In addition to online gambling and sports betting, the organization was behind poker games catering to Hollywood celebrities, Wall Street financiers and professional athletes. In 2008, Mr. Tokhtakhounov, who has been linked with powerful Russian politicians, including some close to President Vladimir V. Putin, was interviewed by ESPN and denied all the charges against him regarding the Olympics scandal.
According to the indictment, the organization would enforce payment of gambling debts through threat and force. For instance, the organization acquired a 50 percent interest in Titan P&H plumbing company in the Bronx as repayment for a $2 million gambling debt. “All that’s being written about me is completely untrue,” he said. Still, he seemed to revel in his lavish lifestyle.
The government is seeking the forfeiture of four luxury properties, including an apartment at Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue and two Miami estates, in connection with the case.
There are several money laundering schemes outlined in the indictment, including an attempt by a branch manager at a JPMorgan Chase bank in Manhattan, Ronald Uy, to structure transactions in a way that they would not prompt currency transaction reports.
In addition to the millions that flowed illegally between banks in the United States and Cyprus, the indictment charges that several co-conspirators laundered money through a car-repair shop in Brooklyn, a real estate company set up in New York and a company that sold used cars over the Internet.
Mr. Tokhtakhounov, the central player in the overseas arm of the organization who remains at-large, was indicted in 2002 by the United States attorney in Manhattan on charges that he was part of a scheme to rig the results of the Winter Olympic finals in Salt Lake City in pairs figure skating and ice dancing. He has been linked with powerful Russian politicians, including some close to President Vladimir V. Putin.
In July 2002, Italian tax authorities detained Mr. Tokhtakhounov at his opulent villa in Tuscany at the request of federal prosecutors in New York.
According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Manhattan in that case, he was accused of working with an unidentified member of a Russian crime gang and an unidentified Russian skating official to rig the skating competition. He helped secure a gold medal for Russia in the pairs competition at Salt Lake City in exchange for a victory for the French ice dancing team, according to the complaint.
Italy’s highest court overturned an extradition order, however, and he was never brought to the United States to stand trial.
Mr. Tokhtakhounov was born in 1949 in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, then a Soviet republic.
Before the collapse of the Soviet Union, Mr. Tokhtakhounov, a former athlete himself, ingratiated himself into the country’s elite circle of athletics — establishing a reputation as a prolific gambler.
In the Moscow underworld during the Soviet era, he was known by the nickname Taiwanchik, or the Little Taiwanese, because of his vaguely Asian appearance, though his friends knew him as Alik.
Vladimir B. Rushailo, a former Russian interior minister, described him in a television interview in 1999 as a petty crook and a card shark, known for bilking travelers and soldiers at Sochi, the Soviet Black Sea resort.
In 1989, around the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the tumultuous aftermath, he made his way to East Germany, where he sold cars and electronic equipment. He was also reported to have trafficked in arms left behind in Germany after the Soviet Army boarded troop trains back to Russia.
Later, in Italy, he was known for driving around in a Mercedes-Benz sedan, a gift from the Ukrainian tennis star Andrei Medvedev.
His activities in recent years remain shrouded in mystery.
In 2008, Mr. Tokhtakhounov was interviewed by ESPN at a dacha in Peredelkino, a village southwest of Moscow that has long been home to some of the country’s most privileged residents.
He denied all the charges that were leveled against him regarding the Olympics scandal.
“I would like the American audience to know the truth about me,” he said. “That all that’s being written about me is completely untrue.”
Still, he seemed to revel in his lavish lifestyle.
“I am not a poor man,” he said. “I am a wealthy man. I work a lot. I work hard.”“I am not a poor man,” he said. “I am a wealthy man. I work a lot. I work hard.”
Even as he lived a comfortable life, he remained a fugitive from American justice.

James Barron, Colin Moynihan and Carol Vogel contributed reporting.

Mr. Tokhtakhounov’s connection to the Nahmad gallery was not immediately clear.
At about 10:15 a.m. on Tuesday, F.B.I. agents and other investigators could be seen carrying computers from the gallery.
The gallery, which has traded in the works of postmodern masters like Wassily Kandinsky and Francis Bacon, according to its Web site, has an entrance at Madison Avenue and 76th Street. It has two storefront windows and a shiny brass door. On Tuesday morning, all of the windows were covered by brown paper. A sign on the door said, “We are closed for renovation, please ring the bell or call.”
A man who answered the phone at that number declined to speak to a reporter.

James Barron contributed reporting.