AFU eliminate 3 criminal kingpins who were recruited by Wagner private company to be sent to Ukraine

In the war in Ukraine, three Russian criminal kingpins were killed, who had previously been recruited by fighters of the Russian private military company Wagner in the colonies in the territory of Russia.

This follows from a statement from the data provided by the investigative group Bellingcat.

Bellingcat representatives managed to find out that during the recruitment campaign, the Wagner troopers were able to recruit 59-year-old Serhii ‘Olympian’ Maksymenko, 55-year-old Andrii ‘Avenger’ Berezhnykh, and 55-year-old Igor ‘Afghan’ Kusk.

It is noted that these people are notable not only for their age (Wagner troopers usually recruited prisoners under the age of 50), but also for their criminal past.

Bellingcat established that back in the 90s, these people led violent criminal gangs that operated in different parts of Russia.

Olympian - Serhii Maksymenko

59-year-old Maksymenko signed the contract with the private military company Wagner while serving a 25-year prison term in one of the two colonies in the territory of the Republic of Mordovia.

According to information from open sources, in the 90s, Maksymenko headed a criminal group called Olympia, which operated in Penza, Russia.

The Olympia group engaged in extortion, prostitution and contract killings. Members of this group also committed murders of several other local criminal groups.

In 2014, Maksymenko was sentenced to 25 years in prison. The contract with Wagner was concluded by a criminal kingpin.

It is known that he was killed during hostilities in Ukraine in December 2022.

Avenger - Andriy Berezhnykh

Andriy Berezhnykh was serving a 25-year term in one of the colonies of the Saratov region when he signed a contract with Wagner.

He was imprisoned in 2013 for murders and committing numerous other crimes while leading a small criminal group that operated in the Saratov Oblast from 1994 to 2011.

It is noted that Berezhnykh was previously sentenced to 10 years for attempted murder.

The gang, headed by Berezhnykh, was involved in the arms trade. Members of the group were involved in murders and an attack on the office of the Saratov TV channel STV.

According to the Telegram channel, which covers the events of the criminal world, Berezhnykh was killed in Ukraine in December 2022. He signed the contract with the Wagner troopers only a month before.

Afghan - Ihor Kusk

At the time of his recruitment into the Wagner company, Ihor Kusk was in the Syktyvkar colony, where he was serving a 23-year term. It is noted that he wanted to go to war in Ukraine even before the Wagner troopers started recruiting prisoners.

He got his nickname because he was a veteran of the war in Afghanistan. Since 1998, he led a criminal group known as the Kuksovskys.

The gang operated in Nizhnekamsk and Kazan, engaged in minor crimes and contract killings.

However, in 2004, the Kuks gang committed the murder of two general directors of the large construction company Tatsantekhmontazh, which at that time employed approximately one thousand people.

Kuks joined Wagner at the end of July 2022.

As the Ukrainian News agency earlier reported, on January 23, the head of the Russian foundation called Russia Behind Bars, Olga Romanova, said that of the approximately 50,000 prisoners recruited by the Wagner PMK, about 10,000 remained on the front line in Ukraine.

According to her, most of the prisoners either died or were injured. Some others deserted from the war zone or surrendered to the Ukrainian military.

And on February 6, the Russian mass media reported that Wagner tried to conduct a second campaign to recruit prisoners, but faced difficulties due to the low number of people willing to go to fight in Ukraine.

As earlier reported, on February 9, the owner of Wagner Yevgeny Prigozhin announced the termination of recruitment of prisoners from Russian prisons to be sent to Ukraine.