Agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided a condominium unit belonging to a Russian-owned company in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, in Miami-Dade County.
The search occurred Thursday at the Sunny Isles Beach Trump Towers, a group of three oceanfront 45-stories-high luxury apartment buildings, according to reporting from the Miami Herald.
The target of the search was condominium unit 4102 in Trump Tower III at 15811 Collins Avenue.
The unit is owned by MIC-USA LLC, according to reporting from The Detroit News.
MIC-USA LLC is owned by Russian businessmen Oleg Sergeyevich Patsulya and Agunda Konstantinovna Makeeva, according to records from the Florida Department of State, Division of Corporations.
Speaking to reporters on Friday, a representative from the FBI’s field office in Miami said that the agency “was conducting court-ordered law enforcement activity in the vicinity of that location,” according to reporting from The Detroit News and Miami Herald.
The spokesman did not provide further information on the raid.
Patsulya’s and Makeeva’s purchase of the $1.65 million three-bedroom, three-bathroom apartment was financed by BAC Florida Bank, Miami Herald reported.
The bank, in 2020, had filed a lawsuit against the duo for defaulting on their $975,000 mortgage.
The parties later resolved the legal dispute.
Since then, the shell company, MIC-USA, has continued to maintain ownership over the apartment, Detroit News reported.
Miami Herald was unable to reach Patsulya and Makeeva for comment.
Patsulya’s wife, Roza Pereira, who is also listed on state corporation records, told the outlet that while she was aware of the raid, “I can’t talk about it.”
“The lawyer [for my husband] said not to talk to anyone. … I have no idea what it’s about,” Pereira said.
Sunny Isles Beach has earned the moniker “Little Moscow” after being a popular destination for wealthy Russians seeking to buy up property in the United States, according to reporting from Insider.
As of 2020, according to data from the Census’ American Community Survey, Sunny Isles Beach had a Russian-born population of 1,079 people — the largest proportion of foreign-born residents from Europe and Central Asia, the Insider noted.
However, U.S. sanctions on Russian oligarchs following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have raised concerns among some in the affluent community that they might suffer “backlash,” according to Miami Herald.
The Trump Organization does not own the Sunny Isles Beach Trump Towers.
However, the property’s developers had obtained licensing to use the Trump brand to name the towers after former President Donald Trump.
via westernjournal