Ejaj Lakdawala gang

The Mumbai police have nabbed six armed men suspected to be contract killers planning to murder over a dozen businessmen in the city, including noted filmmaker Rajkumar Santoshi.
The gangsters, Roy Sequera (30), Sohail Irani (28), Amhjad Ali Shaikh (22), Anthony Lobo (32), Suraj Yadav (20) and Raju Mayaje (20), were about to loot a wine shop in Juhu area of north-west Mumbai on Friday night when the police caught them.
The police seized from them a pistol, three revolvers and seven bullets. They belonged to the Ejaj Lakdawala gang notorious for extortion rackets, police sources said. Lakdawala was once a member of the Dawood gang.

Unsolved contract killings

David Roads, an underworld armourer, was shot twice in the head in an alley in Kingston-upon-Thames, south-west London,
Alan Decabral, the key prosecution witness in the Kenneth Noye murder trial, was killed six months later with a single shot to the head as he parked outside a Halfords store at Ashford, Kent.
two Turkish men were murdered as they drove through east London. Hasan Mamali, 23, was shot in the back of the head and Sama Mustafa, 26, was hit in the back, chest and skull as he tried to run away.
Leonard Naylor, 46, a convicted drug dealer, was shot dead by a hit man wearing a balaclava on the drive of his home in the village of Istead Rise, near Gravesend,
The badly burnt bodies of George Price, 34, and his friend, Mark Thompson, 30, were found face down in a field in Ince Blundell, near Crosby, Merseyside. Both men had been stabbed and slashed with a knife and shot through the head.
Jonny Bristow, a 39-year- old builder from Chatham, Kent, was killed by a shot to the head . His body was dumped in the Medway near the north Kent coast.
Solly Nahome, 48, a Hatton Garden jeweller and a money launderer for the notorious Adams family, was shot dead outside his home in Finchley, north London by a gunman who fled on a motorcycle.

£20,000 a job

The professional contact killers used by big-league criminals charge about £20,000 a job. Their ranks are supplemented by part-time killers whose main source of income is from violent crimes such as robbery. These part-timers would get about £10,000 for a killing. At the bottom end of the scale are the murderers who work for drug gangs, often selling crack cocaine. They can be paid as little as £200 to shoot a rival.

Mad Georgie

"Mad Georgie," is said to be behind 23 murders. He is credited with thinking up the "motorbike hit" in which two men, whose crash helmets cover their faces, use a powerful off-road scrambler motorcycle. The killers will speed up to their target, and the pillion rider will jump off, shooting his victim with a handgun or sawn-off shotgun. The two men then flee on the motorcycle, taking a predetermined route.

20 professional hitmen are operating from the south-east of England

The Metropolitan Police has estimated that up to 20 professional hitmen are operating from the south-east of England, charging between £1,000 and £20,000 for each murder. Concern is growing at the growing number of contract killings and the use of hitmen to commit professional murders throughout the country, and at the sophisticated techniques being used by the killers.
growing number of contract killings in Britain, estimated to be up to 30 a year.
A register of convicted and suspected hitmen and the techniques used by contract killers is being compiled to help police catch professional murderers. The initiative follows concern at the growing number of contract killings in Britain, estimated to be up to 30 a year.
Police experts have drawn up four main categories of "hits" - disputes over the payments of debts or financial dealings; disputes over drugs; domestic arguments between former lovers; and fighting between rival organised crime groups.
Investigators are to be urged to concentrate attention on the person who wanted the contract killing carried out, the person who organised the hit, the killer, and who supplied the firearm if one was used.

Mexican Mafia implicated in Contract Killings

The Mexican Mafia operate on a paramilitary structure, complete with a president, vice president, and numerous generals, captains, lieutenants and sergeants. Below these high-ranking members are soldiers, also known as "carnales," as well as suppliers and associates, all of whose activities are overseen by the generals. Only one general operates in the federal prison system, while another one operates in the state prison system. The state general appoints a committee of lieutenants and captains who command prison units across the entire state.

"The criminals virtually riddled the car with bullets," the source said.

Unknown assailants sprayed a Mercedes car with automatic gunfire late on Sunday killing two men in southwestern Moscow, local police said on Monday.
The attackers pumped at least 40 bullets into the vehicle killing the driver and his passenger instantly. The victims aged 42 and 37, were from Vladikavkaz in Russia's North Caucasus Republic of North Ossetia and were involved in the wholesale alcohol trade.
According to preliminary reports, the murders are thought to be linked with their business activities.

Russia Contracts

May 14: Mikhail Sinelnikov, captain of St Petersburg Sea Port, shot outside his home in the city

May 25: Kostya Mogila (Kostya the Grave), head of St Petersburg Mafia, machine-gunned with two companions in his car in central Moscow

May 27: Sergei Pereverzev, furniture import boss, shot in Moscow hospital bed

May 28: Viktor Tarabanovsky, security chief at Reemtsma Russo-German tobacco factory, stabbed in the back outside his home in Volgograd

May 28: Farit Gazimov, Yukos oil terminal general director, shot outside his home in the Irkutsk region

June 3: Alfred Lerner, theatre and business centre director, shot outside his home in Moscow

June 6: Igor Trunov, head of Almaz Antey, shot outside his home in Moscow

Alexander Samoylenko

Alexander Samoylenko, chief of the Itera-Samara oil company and a former executive for Russian carmaker AvtoVAZ was murdered in an apparent contract killing. Mr. Samoylenko was shot dead Monday evening while leaving work in his Lexus. The vehicle was riddled with bullets from a Kalashnikov assault rifle, and seven bullets struck the businessman, killing him instantly. A friend who was in the car with him suffered multiple gunshot wounds.
The killer escaped in a Russian-made Zhiguli, which was found a few minutes later on a residential street. The killer set the getaway car on fire to cover his tracks, and no one has been arrested in connection with this murder. Police suspect that Samoylenko was killed due to his present and past business affiliations. Samara’s local government has just changed leadership, and there have been several attacks on regional businessmen. These attacks may be part of an attempt to re-distribute financial power in the city. Itera is a prominent Russian oil company, and there are many potential enemies in Samara who could have wanted Samoylenko dead. Another possible reason for this murder could have been Samoylenko’s previous position with AvtoVAZ - the largest car manufacturer in Russia. Over 500 people affiliated with AvtoVAZ have been murdered in contract killings since 1992.
Exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky has been charged with multiple crimes dating from the time he acquired AvtoVAZ (the Franco-Russian film Oligarkh, a thinly veiled biography of Berezovsky, portrays this part of his career). Many criminal organizations are involved in stealing and re-selling AvtoVAZ vehicles. In the last few years, the Russian government has exerted a tighter grip on the situation around AvtoVAZ, and this combined with new management has resulted in more transparent business practices. Although AvtoVAZ has been forced to pay back taxes, the recent reforms have actually led to higher profits for the company due to reduced fraud and theft committed by employees.
However, many criminal gangs lost money as a result of this new transparency. Now anyone involved with AvtoVAZ faces the threat of being “punished” for their previous “misdeeds” by these criminals.
In June 2006, Vice-President of AvtoVAZagregat, Boris Selivanov was killed in Tolyatti, the company’s hometown. In October 2006, Igor Lisyutin, CEO of AvotVAZ daughter-company Eleks-Polyus, survived an attempt on his life in Moscow.

The confessed killer of a 73-year-old American nun who defended the poor in Brazil's Amazon rain forest told a court on Friday he shot her in self-def

The confessed killer of a 73-year-old American nun who defended the poor in Brazil's Amazon rain forest told a court on Friday he shot her in self-defense, not in a contract killing.


Rayfran das Neves Sales, is seen in a video which shows how he killed nun Dorothy Stang during a trial at Justice Tribunal in Belem, Brazil, on Friday, Dec 9, 2005. Rayfran das Neves Sales and Cloadoaldo Carlos Batista will be the first of five men accused in the killing to stand trial for the Feb. 12 killing of 73-year-old nun gunned down in the remote corner of the Amazon rainforest in a dispute over land. Dorothy Stang spent the last 30 years of her life defending poor settlers in the Amazon rain forest. She was shot near the remote jungle town of Anapu in a dispute over a patch of forest that a local rancher wanted to cut down.(AP Photo/Silvia Izquierdo)
Raifran das Neves Sales told the court in the Amazon city of Belem that he killed the rain forest activist after mistaking her Bible for a gun, not in a contract killing as he had previously stated.

The ranch hand shot Dorothy Stang six times with a revolver on a jungle track in February. He and his employers had clashed with the activist as she set up a government reserve for peasants on land they claimed was theirs.

Stang worked for 30 years fighting for land rights for poor settlers in the Amazon.

Brazilian police claim to have broken up a huge crime ring responsible for carrying out thousands of contract killings over the past half decade

.

More than 20 suspects - from businessmen, through police officers to hired assassins - have been arrested in the north-east of the country this week.

The state of Pernambuco, where the majority of the arrests are believed to have taken place, has the highest murder rate in Brazil and was the home of the gang, branded Murder Incorporated.

The local police chief Jorge Pontes claims the crime ring operated like a professional business, prepared to take on absolutely any job and charging between $500 and $2,500 per hit.

"This group practices what we in the police call 'general hospital'," he explained to the BBC.

"We were suddenly faced with this homicide company. Many times the victims were killed because of loan sharks, they owed money."

Russia Contract Killings

Dmitry Shvets, the 37-year-old deputy director-general of the TV-21 Northwestern Broadcasting independent television in the city of Murmansk. He was killed April 18, 2003, when he was shot several times outside the TV-21 office building. TV-21 journalists had reported receiving threats in connection with critical reporting on several influential politicians, including those involved in local mayoral elections.

Paul Klebnikov, the editor of the Russian edition of "Forbes" magazine, was killed July 9, 2004 outside his Moscow office, after being struck by shots fired from a passing car. Klebnikov, a 41-year-old American of Russian descent, had reported extensively on Russia's billionaire oligarchs, including Boris Berezovsky. His family has dismissed attempts to attribute the killing to Chechens acting on the orders of a separatist fighter whom Klebnikov had profiled.

Magomedzagid Varisov, a prominent journalist and political analyst with the "Novoye delo" weekly, was killed June 28, 2005 in Makhachkala, the capital of Daghestan. Assailants carrying automatic rifles opened fire on his car as he was returning home with his wife and driver; Varisov was killed immediately. Varisov had often used his publication to criticize the Daghestani opposition. "Novoye delo" had reportedly received repeated phone call threats against him.

Contracted Killings in Russia

Igor Domnikov, 42, died in a Moscow hospital on 16 July, 2000, two months after being bludgeoned with a hammer in the entryway of his apartment building in Moscow. Domnikov covered culture and education issues for the biweekly newspaper "Novaya gazeta." Domnikov's colleagues say his killer may have mistaken him for another "Novaya gazeta" reporter who had been threatened after investigating corruption in the oil industry. The two reporters lived in the same building.

Sergei Novikov, the owner of the independent Vesna radio station in Smolensk, was shot dead as he entered his apartment building on July 26, 2000. Investigators describe his murder as a contract-style killing. Vesna had broadcast claims of corruption in the regional administration on several occasions. Novikov was 36 years old.

Iskandar Khatloni, the Moscow correspondent for RFE/RL's Tajik Service, was attacked in his apartment on September 21, 2000, by unidentified assailants who hit him in the head with an axe. Khatloni, 46, died later that night a Moscow hospital. He was writing a report on human rights abuses by Russian forces in Chechnya when he was killed.

On October 3, 2000, unknown gunmen killed Sergei Ivanov, the 30-year-old director of the television company Lada-TV, in a courtyard outside his apartment building in the Volga River city Tolyatti, an industrial center that is home to one of Russia's largest automaker, AvtoVAZ. Lada-TV was the largest independent television company in Tolyatti and was influential on the local political scene.

Adam Tepsurgayev, 24, bled to death after Chechen-speaking gunmen shot him in the thigh and groin on November 21, 2000. He had been watching television at a neighbor's house in Alkhan-Kala, a village close to Grozny. Tepsurgayev had worked as a fixer and driver for foreign journalists during the first Chechen war. Later, he had worked as a freelancer for the Reuters news agency.

Eduard Markevich, the editor and publisher of "Novyy reft," a local newspaper in the town of Reftinskiy, in Sverdlovsk Oblast, was found dead on September 18, 2001. He had been shot in the back. "Novyy reft" was often critical of local officials and Markevich, 29, had reported receiving threatening telephone calls. In 1998, two unknown assailants had broken into his apartment and beaten him up in front of his pregnant wife.

Natalya Skryl is currently the only woman on the list. A business reporter with "Nashe vremya" in the southwestern city of Rostov-na-Donu, the 29-year-old Skryl was investigating a power struggle over a metallurgical plant when she was attacked and struck multiple times with a heavy object. She died the following day, on March 9, 2002.

Two journalists from a single newspaper in the industrial city of Tolyatti were killed over the course of 18 months. On April 29, 2002, 32-year-old Valery Ivanov, the editor in chief of "Tolyattinskoye obozreniye" and a deputy in the local legislative assembly, was shot eight times in the head at point-blank range. According to a witness, his killer used a pistol with a silencer and fled the scene on foot. His close friend and successor, 31-year-old Aleksei Sidorov, was killed on October 9, 2003, after being stabbed in the chest with an ice pick. Both men were killed just outside their homes.

13 contract-style killings since Vladimir Putin took office

"The deadliest country for journalists that we've documented in the last 15 years is Iraq," Wright said. "Algeria is the second. But again, these are countries that were experiencing war, major conflicts. What's different about Russia is that there is no declaration of war in Russia itself, it is nominally at peace, and yet we've documented these 13 contract-style killings since Vladimir Putin took office. So that is a major indicator of the kind of press freedom climate that you find today in Russia."

Contracts Completed

October 2006 - campaigning Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya shot dead in Moscow
Sept 2006 - first deputy chairman of Russia's central bank Andrei Kozlov shot dead in Moscow
Oct 2005 - former bank head Alexander Slesarev gunned down near Moscow
July 2004 - US editor of Forbes' Russian edition Paul Klebnikov shot dead in Moscow
Oct 2002 - Magadan governor Valentin Tsvetkov killed in Moscow
Nov 1998 - liberal MP Galina Starovoitova killed in St Petersburg
March 1995 - leading journalist Vladislav Listyev shot dead in Moscow

bloody and lucrative world of caviar smuggling, has been run over and killed in a suspected contract killing.

Russia’s only “sniffer cat”, hailed for its successes in the campaign against the bloody and lucrative world of caviar smuggling, has been run over and killed in a suspected contract killing.

After wandering in to a customs checkpoint as a stray kitten last year, Rusik soon became the scourge of the Stavropol region’s mafia by hunting out caviar being smuggled from the Caspian Sea to Moscow, and on towards the lucrative Western market.

Rusik’s prowess was made public last week. It proved to be a fatal error. Now Rusik is dead, mown down by a car in which he had once discovered smuggled sturgeon.

Rusik’s demise was just the latest blow to Stavropol’s crime-fighters. Another cat, Barsik, succumbed a few weeks ago after eating a poisoned mouse.

The gangland murder of Jordanka Zapryanova

The gangland murder of Jordanka Zapryanova shocked police hardened to underworld violence and showed the mountain that Bulgaria still has to climb to combat the mafia and purge its judicial system of corruption.

Mrs Zapryanova, the mother of a murdered mobster, was shot dead the day before she was due to give evidence in court against one of her son’s former associates.

Details of her whereabouts had been leaked to the mob in a sign of worsening corruption and in spite of Bulgaria’s promise when it joined the European Union to clean up its police and prosecution services.

Mr Hyland was killed by six shots fired from weapons fitted with silencers as he lay in bed in his niece's house

Mr Hyland was killed by six shots fired from weapons fitted with silencers as he lay in bed in his niece's house. The killers also shot dead Anthony Campbell, a young apprentice plumber who had been working in the house at the time and who may have been a potential witness. Mr Campbell, 20, was described as an innocent young man who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Few are shedding tears over the killing of Hyland, as he was known as a killer who had chosen his violent criminal lifestyle. The same applies to most of those who have been killed this year, since the majority of them were regarded as underworld figures.

But there has been an outpouring of emotion about Mr Campbell's murder, because the young man was not involved in the criminal world. And only last week, a Kilkenny postmaster was shot dead while pursuing a gunman who had robbed his post office.

With 21 people killed in gun crimes last year, the authorities have already assigned more police officers and resources to tackle violent organised crime. But the drugs world is awash with money - stashes totalling more than €23m (£15.5m) have been seized recently.

The RUC (Royal Ulster Constabulary) were directly involved in the

The RUC (Royal Ulster Constabulary) were directly involved in the
London plot by South African state agents to assassinate former security police
officer and political dissident, Dirk Coetzee, it was revealed this week.
According to a secret South African government document, the RUC team
not only provided surveillance and intelligence on the intended target, but also
offered to "take him out" if required.
The document also reveals that South African agent, Leon Flores, paid
2,000 pounds sterling to a Northern Ireland contact, Charles Simpson "for
services rendered by his RUC friends in monitoring the activities of Dirk
Coetzee."

San Francisco Police Department's Intelligence Unit

Irish political activists have expressed concern over revelations that information
gathered by members of the San Francisco Police Department's Intelligence Unit
may have been sold to representatives of the South African and Israeli
governments. At present, it appears that an officer, Tim Gerard, is the main
suspect. Gerard, who recently resigned from the department, is believed to be
in the Philippines. The Philippines and the United States do not have an
extradition treaty.

no traces of radiation in Russian ex-prime minister's system

Irish medical experts have found no traces of radiation in Russian ex-prime minister's system, a RIA Novosti correspondent reported Saturday.

Following Scotland Yard's probe into the radioactive killing of a former Russian spy, Irish police said Friday they launched an investigation into the mysterious poisoning of a former Russian premier.

more than 155 contract killings in public

Bulgaria is the shocker: more than 155 contract killings in public since 2000, according to interior ministry figures. To be rich, to be in politics, to be president of the Lokomotiv Plovdiv football club – all these have been repeatedly shown to be lethal. The Commission expresses “great concern” over the killing of local politicians this year, and the lack of prosecution or conviction.

1994 contract killing of her brother-in-law.

Still adamant that she was framed by a vindictive ex-lover, attorney Beth Carpenter was sentenced Friday to life in prison without parole for her role in the 1994 contract killing of her brother-in-law.

Carpenter, 38, sobbed quietly but said nothing during a 90-minute hearing that ended with Judge Robert Devlin Jr. imposing the only sentence allowed by state law. Devlin called the March 10, 1994, shooting death of 28-year-old Anson "Buzz" Clinton of East Lyme "insane" and something that Carpenter could have prevented.

A man found with serious stab wounds

A man found with serious stab wounds to his leg in Swords, Co Dublin, in the early hours of yesterday morning has died from his injuries in the city's Mater Hospital

One of the most powerful drug dealers in the Ireland

One of the most powerful drug dealers in the Ireland and an apprentice plumber were shot dead in a north Dublin house, today.


Forensic officers
at the scene of a double fatal shooting in Scribblestown Park in Finglas

The bodies of the men were discovered at Scribblestown Park, Finglas, at around 10am today by gardaí who had been called to the scene.

Martin "Marlo" Hyland (39) from Cabra, was one of the biggest sellers of cocaine and heroin in Ireland. He was asleep asleep in an upstairs bedroom when the attack happened.

He was also suspected of being involved in a number of recent contract killings in and around the Dublin area and had been under GArda surveillance.

Gardaí believe the shooting dead of a 28-year-old woman in north Co Dublin last night was carried out by a professional killer

.

Baiba Saulite, a Latvian and a mother of two, was shot by a lone man as she stood in the hallway of her home at Holywell Square, Feltrim Road, Swords.


Her sons aged three and five were asleep upstairs when the shooting occurred at around 9.45pm last night.

Contract killings in Russia have hit record levels

Contract killings in Russia have hit record levels, puncturing
the hope that the country has left the era of "gangster capitalism"
behind, according to a senior crime official here.

Between 500 and 700 Russians a year are killed by business rivals,
according to crime official Mr Leonid Kondratyuk, a top Interior
Ministry official.

The news comes a month after American journalist Paul Klebnikov,
editor of Forbes Russia, died in a hail of bullets fired by an
assassin in Moscow. Mr Kondratyuk told the Moscow Times that even his
estimate of 500 to 700 was conservative because it counted only those
murders definitely linked to organised crime, and that the true figure
could be "two to three times higher".

His statement follows similar claims earlier this year by a former
prosecutor, Mr Valentin Stepankov, who said total crimes attributable
to mafia groups had passed the 25,000 mark in four years.

Russia attracted the nickname the "Wild East" in the 1990s, when
gangsters fought turf wars in the free-for-all that followed the end
of Communism.

The government hoped the arrival of tough central control from
President Vladimir Putin, coupled with rising prosperity, had put an
end to these murders, but this prosperity may actually be encouraging
a new wave of blood-letting.

Klebnikov was one of two journalists murdered in Moscow last month -
also killed was Paila Peloya, editor of an Armenian-language
newspaper, who, like Klebnikov, was shot dead in broad daylight. Since
Mr Putin took office in 2000, 15 journalists have been murdered, along
with six MPs and dozens of suspected gangster bosses.

Prominent killings include the shooting last summer of Igor Klimov,
chief of defence giant Almaz-Antei. The option of contract killing is
sometimes used as a last resort in business disputes. Typically, if a
firm refuses to honour its end of a contract, remedies such as going
to court may be useless, with judges sometimes bribed or the state law
simply unable to get back money owed.

The rise in contract killings comes despite a fall overall in recorded
crime. The number of murders in Russia fell 8 per cent last year,
though remained high at 16,240. Some doubt the official claims. Andrei
Konstantinov, a crime journalist with the Agency of Journalistic
Investigations in St Petersburg, said his interpretation of official
figures is that there are fewer contract killings, not more.

Konstantinov said police often know the identity of contract killers,
but lack evidence, and in particular witnesses, to bring the guilty to
court. He blames a collapse in moral values for the high level of gun
crime.

keeler

The hitman or killer (pronounced "keeler" in Russian) is a phenomenon of the country's shock transition from communism to a market economy.

You would use the Russian verb zakazat' to order a pizza or a plane ticket but when you "order someone", in the popular parlance, it means you want them killed by one of these hired hitmen.

If Russian media accounts are to be believed, his wages can range from a modest $100 to sums running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on the target.

When Ms Politkovskaya was shot at her home, there did not appear to be any attempt at robbery and the presumed weapon, a Makarov pistol, was left at the scene together with its used cartridges.

murdered Russian journalist Anna Politovskaya.

Russia's chief prosecutor, Yuri Chaika, announced yesterday that 10 people had been arrested in connection with the murder of Anna Politkovskaya which he blamed on a Chechen mafia boss and rogue elements in Russia's security services.
But he hinted that the real mastermind behind the plot to kill the campaigning journalist was a Russian citizen living abroad who had arranged the murder to discredit the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. Asked whether he meant the exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky, Mr Chaika refused to answer but smiled.

HUNT FOR BRITONS

A Londoner has been shot dead by five bullets in a late night slaying close to The Point cafeteria in the Avenida del Prado in Nueva Andalucía, Marbella. According to police sources the 43-year-old had a police record in Spain. Officers are investigating his death and are keeping an open mind on the motive and who carried out the slaying.
The Briton, named as William Moy, is said to have been accompanied by a group of three people before his death. The emergency services received a 091 call to say a man had been hurt in a shooting but when medical teams arrived he was already dead.
The Point is in the Aloha urbanisation and the area was soon sealed off by police scientific officers. The investigations are being carried out by the National Police drug and organised crime squad, the Greco unit against organised crime plus the specialised and violent crime detachment.
HUNT FOR BRITONS
National police searching for the two gunmen, believed to be British, who shot the local police officer in an incident that occurred last week, have found the weapons involved in the shooting. They discovered a pistol and a revolver with a silencer inside a rubbish container near the Clínica Buchinguer. They also found nearby the burnt out Opel Astra used by the duo.
In another linked operation 200 officers from the Costa del Sol Drugs and Organised Crime squad poured into the Monte Biarritz, Diana and Golf Park urbanisations in Estepona. They acted after two police officers manning a control to search for the two gunmen were run down by a car that they had ordered to stop. No arrests were made but police believe the gunmen may be hiding out in the zone.
As the Costa del Sol News went to press the shot local police officer was still in a very serious condition at the Costa del Sol Hospital in Marbella. Married with two sons, the officer was on a breathing support machine and under sedation but was said to be making a slow improvement.