18:28
Spain plans to extradite Russian national Dmitry Zavyalov, the alleged leader of a criminal gang whose members are accused of killing over 20 people, spokesperson for the Prosecutor General’s Office Marina Gridneva said on Thursday.
Zavyalov’s criminal group attacked and killed people and extorted protection money from businesses in Moscow and the Moscow Region from 1999 to 2009, according to Gridneva.
Gridneva claims gang members have killed 19 people and are guilty of attempted murder, of assaulting people, two of whom have died as a result of beatings, and of committing several other crimes.
Zavyalov, 28, was placed on the federal wanted list in August 2009 and on the international wanted list in December 2009. He eventually settled in Spain where he was living on a forged Belgian passport. Zavyalov was arrested in May 2014 during a routine border check in La Jonquera, a municipality in Catalonia on the border with France. He was taken to a police station where his true identity was established, along with an alert indicating that he was armed and dangerous.
In June and August 2014, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office sent a request to Spain for Zavyalov’s extradition. Spanish authorities granted the request in April 2015.
One of Zavyalov’s accomplices, Mikhail Prutov, was killed in Moscow in 2002 following a conflict with another organized crime group. That crime was followed by the murder of dozens of criminal leaders and businessmen. Zavyalov’s accomplice Dmitry Lesnyakov was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
