Federal Bureau of Investigation agents conducted a raid on a condo unit owned by a Russian-owned business in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, in Miami-Dade County.
According to information from the Miami Herald, the search took place on Thursday at the Sunny Isles Beach Trump Towers, a collection of three luxury condominium complexes with an oceanfront height of 45 floors.
Condominium 4102 at Trump Tower III, located at 15811 Collins Avenue, was the subject of the search.
The Detroit News said that MIC-USA LLC is the owner of the property.
According to records from the Florida Department of State, Division of Corporations, Russian businessmen Oleg Sergeyevich Patsulya and Agunda Konstantinovna Makeeva are the owners of MIC-USA LLC.
According to reports from The Detroit News and Miami Herald, an FBI agent from the Miami field office told reporters on Friday that the organization “was conducting court-ordered law enforcement activity in the vicinity of that location.”
The official gave no other details regarding the raid.
The $1.65 million three-bedroom, three-bathroom apartment was purchased by Patsulya and Makeeva with help from BAC Florida Bank, according to the Miami Herald.
In 2020, the bank sued the couple for not making payments on their $975,000 mortgage.
The legal matter was later settled by the parties.
According to a report in the Detroit News, the fictitious business MIC-USA has kept possession of the apartment ever since.
Patsulya and Makeeva could not be reached by Miami Herald for comment.
Although she was aware of the raid, Patsulya’s wife Roza Pereira, who is also mentioned on state corporate records, told the outlet, “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.
According to Insider’s research, Sunny Isles Beach has acquired the nickname “Little Moscow” due to its popularity as a destination for affluent Russians looking to purchase real estate in the United States.
Sunny Isles Beach had 1,079 Russian-born residents as of 2020, according to statistics from the American Community Survey of the Census, making up the majority of foreign-born individuals from Europe and Central Asia, the Insider said.
However, Miami Herald reports that members in the wealthy community are worried they would see “backlash” as a result of U.S. sanctions on Russian oligarchs as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The Sunny Isles Beach Trump Towers are not owned by the Trump Organization.
The towers were named after the previous president Donald Trump by the building’s developers, who had received licensing to use the Trump name.
Rephrased from: The Republic Brief By: Trump Knows
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