14) Kompromat
2024-07-02 00:37:37
<p>Imagine you were a fly on the wall at a dinner between the mafia, the CIA, and the KGB. That’s where this unprecedented story begins. A journey through the dark world of Russian intelligence where, for the first time, a professed “sex spy” tells her story. All of it. </p> <p>Host Neil Strauss (Rolling Stone, The New York Times) brings listeners into the dangerous world of sexpionage, where enemies of the State are not the only victims. So too are the spies themselves, brainwashed to believe that their bodies belong to Russia and meticulously trained to become “the perfect weapons.” Who is Aliia Roza? From the creators of the hit podcast series To Live and Die in LA, this is To Die For.</p>
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, the host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly, every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust and the trail of destruction left behind. Listen to Betrayal weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast Missing in Arizona, and I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI in 2001. Police say I killed my family and rigged my house to explode.
Before escaping into the wilderness, police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere. Join me. I'm going down in the cave as I track down clues. I'm going to call the police and have you removed.
Hunting one of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Robert Fisher, Do you recognize my voice? Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
All eight episodes of To Die For are available now to bid absolutely free. But for ad-free listening and exclusive bonuses, subscribe to Tenderfoot Plus at Tenderfootplus..com or on Apple Podcasts.
WaRnIng The following episode contains explicit language and sexual themes.
Listener discretion is advised.
Topping our world lead today is a tale that seems straight out of a spy novel, so audacious, so horrific. It would have to be a work of fiction, but it's all too true.
This is the tragic story of Alexander Litvinenko.
My name is Alexander Litvinenko. I am a former lieutenant colonel in Russian. I have a name, Alexander Litvinenko.
I am a former KGB FSB officer.
My rank lieutenant colonel.
My position Deputy Head of Section Top Secret Department of FSB.
Alexander Litvinenko was a former FSB officer who was fighting organized crime. He soon discovered a connection between high-ranking officers in the FSB and Russian criminal gangs. When he began investigating this FSB corruption, he was blocked by Putin. Frustrated, he soon became a whistleblower for the FSB's dirty tricks. Their organized crime activity, their secret assassinations, even their supposed involvement in the terrorist apartment bombing that was used to justify the second Chechen War.
The former Federal Security Service agent admits he's worried about coming forward with the allegations and says he fears for the life of his wife and child. But Litvinenko says he decided to come forward because, quote if these people are not stopped, this lawlessness will flood the country.
Litvinenko eventually fled Russia for England, where he shared his secrets, worked to try and bring down Putin and sought protection from the British government. While there, he connected with Russian historian Yuri Felshtinsky, and together they wrote the book, Blowing Up Russia Terror. From within, Felshtinsky recalls the last time he saw Litvinenko in person.
And I saw Litvinenko from a distance, he was running to me and yelling to me, Yuri, I just got British citizenship. Now they will not be able to touch me. And so this was on 13th of October and on the 1st of November, he was poisoned.
On the 1st of November, just after he'd become a British citizen, he met two former colleagues from Russia's intelligence world.
In the pine bar at the Millennium Hotel.
Two days later, he was admitted to his local hospital vomiting and in great pain.
Here's Yuri Felshtinsky, again with something I never knew about how these international poisoning missions work.
This is very important. You notice probably that every time somebody is poisoned, it's usually like two people or even more involved. And this has a reason. The FSB still does not trust those people whom they send to kill because the chance that they would defect is very high. Now. That's why you always send them in groups, at least two people.
And they have to be together all the time. They sleep in one room in the hotel, so they are really not allowed to be alone because one is controlling the other.
There's one other safeguard that helped keep Litvinenko's assassins from defecting and abandoning their mission. The fact that they used radioactive polonium-210, said to be one of the most toxic substances on Earth to do the job.
If they are operating with radioactive poisoning, then they actually are not able to defect because the FSB will find them very quickly because they are already marked with radiation.
A few days after Litvinenko, the FSB whistleblower entered the hospital for treatment, Felshtinsky spoke with him, and Litvinenko was feeling optimistic.
Now I talked to him by phone several days soon after the 1st of November, and he told me that, look, I was poisoned. But I survived and then after the first 10 days, his health deteriorated.
What Felshtinsky, Litvinenko's co-writer and friend, shares next explains something that few talk about when covering these poisonings in the news how unbelievably horrible they are.
He was telling me that, you know, this was so painful, that if I have a choice. And Litvinenko was at one point in Russia arrested by the government and put in prison for almost a year. And he said, You know, if you give me a choice to spend another year in prison or to go through this poisoning, I would rather spend another year in prison. That's how painful this was. And on 23rd of November, he died in the late afternoon of Thursday, 23rd of November.
The police confirmed with the Health Protection Agency that a significant quantity of the radioactive isotope.
Polonium-210-210 had been found in Mr Litvinenko's urine.
I asked Felshtinsky, after experiencing all this, what does he think people don't know about Russian intelligence that they need to know?
What people do not really understand that? We have the largest special services structure in the world, with the largest budget in the world, and enormous amount of people. And even now, we do not really know how many people work for the FSB.
And so we resume Ilya's story as she is unknowingly about to begin a similar journey with her colleague Sasha. Uncover corruption in the FSB from within. An investigation that, as history clearly shows, does not usually end well for the agents involved, and this investigation would be no exception.
I had to kill you.
I'm really sorry I had to do it, that I got on my own. You didn't guess the great harm I was loathing my gun.
I got you, I tear you apart.
I had to kill you, cause it's so much fun.
It was finally time.
Sasha brought me sleeping pills, which supposed to help me to put Vladimir into long sleep, deep, deep sleep.
Ilya's mission was to slip sleeping pills into the dinner of her target, Vladimir, leader of one of the most dangerous gangs in the city. While he was knocked out, she planned to photograph the documents in his office for her colleagues in the FSKN, the Federal Drug Control Service of Russia.
It was like a quiet evening. I cooked some dinner and I gave him the pill in the glass of water.
Then we went upstairs and I was massaging and rubbing his shoulders and he was like, just laying on the side. And I was telling him some kind of like, bullshit from the university about my teachers, so it was like, really slow. There is a technique about hypnosis when you want, like your target, to relax and fall asleep, you put your target into the trance. So I did that and Vladimir started to sleep. And I was laying, looking at the ceiling, looking at myself and thinking, How do I do it?
I was waiting till about like, 1 a.
M So it will be late, late night and very, very slowly, almost like a cat. And I walked out from the room into that office room. I took my camera and I took the small like flashlight, and I basically photographed all these papers.
And I just saw, like, many numbers and some places and many, many different names, and I opened also notebook. I did like all the photos over there with telephone numbers, so I photographed everything. And when I finished, I just returned to bed and I hid my bag with a camera like underneath of the clothes, which was on the armchair.
Early morning, we woke up, Vladimir felt good and he said, Oh, I had such a good sleep. Finally, yeah, thanks to me.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast Missing in Arizona, and I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI in 2001. Police say I killed my family.
First mom, then the kids, and rigged my house to explode. In a quiet suburb, this is the Beverly hills of the valley, before escaping into the wilderness.
There was sleet and hail and snow coming down.
They found my wife's SUV.
Right on the reservation boundary.
And my dog, blue.
All I could think of is him going to sniper me out of some tree.
But not me. Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere for two years.
They won't tell you anything.
I've traveled the nation, I'm going down in the cave, tracking down clues.
They were thinking that I picked him up and took him somewhere.
If you keep asking me this, I'm going to call the police and have you removed. Searching for Robert Fisher?
One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Do you recognize my voice? Join an exploding house to hunt family annihilation.
Today.
In a Disappearing Act, listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts.
Or wherever you get your favorite shows.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly every Thursday.
Each week, you'll hear brand new stories first hand. Accounts of shocking deception, broken trust and the trail of destruction left behind. Stories about regaining a sense of safety.
A handle on reality after your entire world is flipped upside down from unbelievable romantic betrayals.
The love that was so real for me was always just a game for him.
To betrayals in your own family. When I think about my dad, oh well.
He is a sociopath.
Financial Betrayal.
This is not even the part where he steals millions of dollars.
And life or death deceptions.
She's practicing how she's going to cry when the police calls her after they kill me.
Listen to Betrayal weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
The next morning, Aaliyah prepared to meet with her colleague Sasha and hand over the camera, making sure to download a copy of the files for herself. First, they were both new to intelligence work.
And given this mission by their commander to fail. But inexperience often comes with enthusiasm, and they were succeeding, perhaps too well for their own safety.
I was in rush, the only one thing which I did. I took the memory card, so I downloaded all the things in my computer and I installed it back to the camera.
And I passed the camera to Sasha.
Back at home, Aaliyah sat down at her computer to examine the photograph she'd taken of the documents in Vladimir's office.
And what I've seen there blew my mind. I texted Sasha and I said, I think I found out something important, which might be a big explanation in all this mess.
And maybe it gives us the light of what just happened with this case. Let's meet at the same place tomorrow, he said. Yeah, let's do it.
And he didn't come, he didn't show up, and I was really worried. I didn't know exactly what to do. I called him, he didn't pick up.
I texted, he didn't reply.
When Aaliyah saw Vladimir later that day, she tried to conceal her worries about Sasha and what may have happened to him.
So Vladimir, he asked me, like, is everything okay? and I said like, No, everything is okay. And I try not to be worried about Sasha.
And that day, I heard a conversation between Vladimir and his army friend, and it was a big argument.
And Army friend was saying to Vladimir, We've been losing many, many drugs recently and this is not good. I'm responsible in front of these people in Afghanistan and if something goes wrong, they will cut off my head, not yours, and Vladimir said It won't happen.
I will protect you, everything will be all right.
But the conversation finished on the note where I understood that the army friend wasn't really satisfied.
I reached out to Sasha again the next day and he came to the place where we usually met. And I was like, almost screaming at him. Like, I mean, like, what the hell you didn't pick up the phone you like? freaked me out.
I thought something happened to you. And he said, The reason why I couldn't contact you is because for the whole night and day I was spying on our commander.
And you'll be shocked what I will tell you right now.
So in these documents, which I photographed, there was a few times written the name of our commander and Sasha. When he was spying on our commander, our commander had a meeting with Vladimir's friend.
Then he said, Like, why? Our commander sent us to this drug operation and we arrested people and we confiscated drugs. And yet now he's speaking with this guy.
I asked Sasha if he's done any photos or anything like that, so apparently he did, which is good.
And also we had these documents stating that our commander was involved, so more or less I had some evidences, some compromise, let's say to our commander. And I started to dig in more.
And eventually, in my head, I created a plan how to save myself and Vladimir out of all this big mess.
Chapter 31 The Sting.
The next day, Ilya met with her friend Anna, who was part of the gang's entourage, to see if she knew anything more about what was going on.
She said the man with whom she was dating, he, said to her that the whole gang had started to be divided.
So slowly, the army friend were bringing his people together to create kind of a good confrontation towards Vladimir's people.
I felt sorrow because I started to realize that there is something going on behind his back and he doesn't even know.
You know, like, I wanted to, kind of, like, protect him.
This is probably not standard practice for an undercover agent, but this is what happens when you mix love and war. As much as the state would like to turn people into robots, or at least sociopaths without empathy. They're still human at the end of the day, and a human connection usually wins over a work order. When Ilya met with Vladimir next, she tried to find a way to hint to him that his army friend, his second in command, who had saved his life during the war, might be plotting to betray him.
I tried to start the conversation and I asked him like, Do you trust your friend? and he said, Yeah, I trust him. He saved my life, I owe him for that.
I understood that moment that it would be just almost impossible to tell him anything. I thought, like, you know that I will find a way how to make it right.
So next day we met with Sasha again and he gave me some photos. Like there were like a couple photos of our commander standing with this army friend. And he told me, I'm worried about my life. He said, I know too much now and you do, and he said, If something happens with me, promise that you will take care of this information and you will make sure that he will get what he deserves.
And that moment, I remembered about Cornell, because I remember that dinner when I first time met my future commander. And I remember them sitting and drinking vodka and just having this kind of look to each other. And something told me that all of them involved in this thing, something like, it's just like a gut feeling. But yet, without evidences, it's just it's just a thought.
Lia told Sasha about the colonel, her abuser at the military Academy, and the commander's close friend. And asked if it was possible to see if the colonel was involved with the gang at all. Sasha replied that they should just keep taking down the trafficking network and watching everyone closely, and eventually the truth would be revealed.
He said, Like, let's see, like, what would be their reaction. Once we know, we will understand who is really involved in there and who is not.
They decided to raid another one of the spots on Vladimir's map. They timed the operation to take place during a celebration that the gang was planning for a member's birthday. This way, Lia could watch everyone's responses.
Then Sasha can arrest them and we will see how, like other people in this chain, how will they respond. So that day, we organized everything I remember, even like what I was wearing that day.
That afternoon, Lia's colleague Sasha showed up with her team at the suspected drug-dealing operation and, as usual, sent in an informant to buy drugs with marked money. Meanwhile, Lia was with Vladimir at the gang member's birthday celebration.
So everybody was drinking for the health of the birthday person. And suddenly the army guy stands up and he leaves. Somebody called him. I opened my bag and I texted Sasha that the army guy just left. Vladimir is here.
I'm just like, I'm controlling the whole situation. I will text you, what's going on? He texted me. It's okay, we work on it.
I will text you later.
And I never heard from him since that moment.
This is the Beverly Hills of the Valley.
There was sleet and hail and snow coming down.
Right on the reservation boundary, all I could think of is.
He's going to sniper me out of some tree.
Police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere.
They won't tell you anything.
I'm going down in the cave.
They were thinking that I picked him up.
And took him somewhere if you keep asking me this.
I'm going to call the police and have you removed. Searching for Robert Fisher.
One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Do you recognize my voice? Join an exploding House the Hunt Family annihilation today.
And a Disappearing act. Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, first-hand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust and the trail of destruction left behind.
Stories about regaining a sense of safety, a handle on reality after your entire world is flipped upside down from unbelievable romantic betrayals....
The love that was so real for me was always just a game for him.
To betrayals in your own family when I think about my dad.
Oh well, he is a sociopath.
Financial Betrayal.
This is not even the part where he steals millions of dollars.
And life-or-death deceptions.
She's practicing how she's going to cry when the police calls her after they kill me.
Listen to Betrayal weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Text to Sasha Hey, what's up? text me. No answer came back again from the toilet, sitting again with Vladimir, everybody drinking and so on.
I couldn't eat or drink, I was just sitting there and pretending that I'm okay and I'm smiling. Go to the toilet, text Sasha, no messages back.
Coming back again, sitting, stressing again and again, and again and again. And I had like this kind of feeling inside of me, where, you know, something is like, not good. We were driving home and Vladimir was sitting with almost probably the same face, because, like, we didn't really talk.
I was just like opening my bag and trying to see the telephone, my small Motorola, if there's any message from Sasha, and it wasn't, it was empty.
We just drove back. When we came to the city. Vladimir was like, intense, and I said, you know, like, I don't feel good. I want to just like, Lay down, can you drop me home? And he's like, Yeah, of course, besides, I want to check something too.
So he dropped me home. And I didn't call to the commander, obviously, and I didn't call anyone apart from one person who was in our team. I texted him, he didn't reply, I called him, he picked up the call and I said, like, Hey, hey, it's me.
What's going on? And I heard his voice was almost like broken. His voice sounded like so far away. And I asked him, Do you know where is Sasha? He said, Yes, so I said, So what happened?
Can you tell me? he said.
So we sent our drug bait guy who does all this like transaction with the mark money? And when we entered the house, we entered the main door, he said. Like, there was like few Afghani men and they started to shoot.
And Sasha was the first who entered as the commander of the team, and he said he was the one who received the first bullet.
And I asked him, Sasha, always wearing the bullet protection jacket? He said Yes, he does, and I said, So, is he okay? He said No.
And I said, like, where was the bulletproof jacket? and he didn't reply to me and said, like, where was the bulletproof jacket? I was almost like screaming, and he said, he's in the morgue.
I said, What's going on with the commander? what did he say? He said, like, he was like, really pissed off. And he said that he's all going to put us to jail because they did the whole operation without his permission. I standed there at the room and I just couldn't, I couldn't do anything, and I.
You know, like this feeling where I I started to hate, like the strong, like anger, the anger that he's just not here anymore, and the guilt.
Ilya felt that the commander, or someone, must have told the drug dealers to expect a raid and to expect impunity. Otherwise, they wouldn't have had their guns out and started firing immediately.
And I just hated our commander so much. I felt like he betrayed Sasha, he betrayed his own people for his own good. It was a very dark, dark day.
I remember Sasha told me the last time I saw him. If something happened to me, promise me that you will get the justice and you will finish this case. And I gave him this word.
And I had almost like every single evidences towards my commander, I had photos, him and the criminal leader, this army friend of Vladimir. I had handwritten name on the papers and I was thinking, Okay, so if I will have all these documents and all this evidences, whom do I go to prove it that my commander is criminal?
And there was, like, one main commander who was the general of the whole state.
The next morning, on a Monday, I called to the receptionist of the general. I said to her like, I have some information about the case, I have some evidences. I need to speak with the commander. And she said to me, Oh, like, you can pass me information, I'll give it to him.
I said like, No, I need to meet him in person, I cannot give this information to anyone apart from him.
She said I will speak with him.
And just basically, like in a few minutes, she called me back. She said, When can you come in? I said, I can come in, like in 30 minutes, she said. He will be waiting for you.
I got dressed, I put the files into USB, I took the USB, I took these photos which Sasha gave me.
I was just thinking if I can really trust.
But I wanted just to understand if he knows anything or not and if he's really involved or not.
So I came into the main building, big, beautiful, with the big columns, and I walked through the security check. I said, I have an appointment with the general.
They let me in, I went upstairs to the second floor.
I came to the reception and there was a woman about 45 years old, and she was having this strict face like all the military people do. And she said, He's waiting for you.
He told me, This is the end, this is the last moment of your life. And when he told that, he punched me from this side so hard that it just crushed my bone.
To Die For is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with iHeart Podcasts. The show is hosted and written by me Neil Strauss, with additional writing assistance by Tristan Bangston. Executive producers are myself, Donald Albright and Payne Lindsey. for iHeart Podcasts. Executive producers are Matt Frederick and Alex Williams. lead producer and editor is Tristan Bangston.
Additional editing by Miles Clark and Christian Brown. Supervising producer Tracy Kaplan. Consultants include Nushin Velizadeh, Chelsea Gooden and Jamie Albright. Artwork by Byron McCoy, original music by Makeup and Vanity set.
Mixed and mastered by Dayton Cole, our theme song is Killer Shangri-la by Psychotic Beats, featuring Patty Amore. Special thanks to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at UTA Beck Media and Marketing, Oren Siegel, Becky Jensen, the Nord Group, Meredith Stedman, Rose Baruch and Alex Vest-Bested.
Hi, it's Andrea Gunning, the host of Betrayal. I'm excited to announce that the Betrayal podcast is expanding. We are going to be releasing episodes weekly, every Thursday. Each week, you'll hear brand new stories, firsthand accounts of shocking deception, broken trust and the trail of destruction left behind. Listen to Betrayal weekly on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm John Walczak, host of the new podcast Missing in Arizona, and I'm Robert Fisher, one of the most wanted men in the world. We cloned his voice using AI.
In 2001.
Police say I killed my family and rigged my house to explode ...before escaping into the wilderness, police believe he is alive and hiding somewhere. Join me....
I'm going down in the cave ....as I track down clues, I'm going to call the police and have you removed hunting....
One of the most dangerous fugitives in the world.
Robert Fisher.
Do you recognize My voice? Listen to Missing in Arizona every Wednesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.
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