By Alison Boshoff
That’s what ex-wife claims she was threatened by owner of house Harry’s bought... but tycoon says it’s all a lie and that SHE is trying to defraud HIM
THE proud owner of a Kalashnikov rifle which he boasts has been signed by its inventor, Sergey Grishin enjoys minor notoriety in his native Russia.
Unabashed, he has claimed that he ‘practically brought the Russian banking system to collapse’ in the 1990s by committing ‘the largest bank fraud scheme ever’, worth up to $60billion (£46billion).
So today he is likely to be revelling in his new-found fame in the West as the man who sold the Duke and Duchess of Sussex their first California home.
Records show that Grishin, a heavy-set, greying figure who has lived in Santa Barbara for ten years, sold the Montecito property at an estimated $10million loss, which may have something to do with the legal action he faces from his former wife.
The billionaire oligarch, 54, who is notorious for admitting money laundering, faces allegations that he held a gun to his estranged wife’s head and knocked out her teeth in a ‘violent rampage of domestic violence’.
His ex-wife Anna Fedoseeva and her friend and business partner Jennifer Sulkess are seeking $125million in damages, accusing him of assault, battery, extortion, domestic violence, invasion of privacy and cyberstalking. Grishin, who has shared a mystery photo online of his own bloodied face, is scheduled to go on trial in October.
From Moscow, Miss Fedoseeva said last night: ‘I am in fear of my life and the safety of my loved ones. He is 100 per cent still very dangerous and is on a road of war with me.’
Both women have successfully sought restraining orders against him, amid claims of death threats and the hiring of hitmen.
In one text message, he allegedly told his wife that he would cut her up ‘piece by piece from the tail until I reach your head’, adding: ‘THAT’S WHAT WILL HAPPEN.’
Grishin and his wife lived in the Santa Barbara house until the middle of 2017 when they relocated to central Los Angeles. Their marriage fell apart in January 2018 and the threats soon began.
The oligarch is notorious for his part in the so-called ‘Russian Laundromat’ which may have netted him up to $60billion. He has an apartment at the Century Tower in Los Angeles, where Steve Bing, Liz Hurley’s former boyfriend, killed himself in June.
Grishin’s ex-wife said last night of the news that Harry and Meghan had bought their former marital home: ‘It was a crazy shock to hear that they have bought the house.
‘It’s a lot of money to give to someone, not like buying a car, and I would have thought they would look at who was involved. I could hardly believe it.’
Miss Sulkess told the Mail: ‘I really cannot believe that of all the people in the world they could have bought a house from, they bought it from him. He is a monster.
‘It is astonishing to me that nobody would have checked his name out – even just for five minutes on the internet. A simple search on Google will throw up our case against him and the horrific abuse. He is in every sense a man who abuses women, and Meghan is someone who advocates for women.’
Grishin, who began his career selling cookies and hot dogs that he baked, was the chairman of Rosevrobank when it was at the centre of the Russian Laundromat scandal.
The International Centre for the Study of Corruption and Organised Crime, a consortium of international journalists, alleges that Rosevrobank laundered Russian money through Moldova and Latvia using fictitious loan agreements between shell companies. Up to $20billion is said to have been laundered in this way.
Grishin sold his stake in Rosevrobank in November 2018, years after the scandal. It was at about this time that he uploaded now notorious videos to YouTube. In them he claimed further larceny. He said: ‘I’m going to tell you how one person – that is, I – practically brought the Russian banking system to a collapse in the 1990s.’
In the since-deleted video he says: ‘I invented it. I stole a lot in Estonia and Russia. It was the largest fraud scheme, because no one knew exactly how much money was stolen.’
The scheme worked via fake advice notes, telling banks ‘officially’ that money had been transferred. It would take up to a month for the bank to discover that the note was a fake, by which time the funds had been moved elsewhere. Estimates suggest that four trillion rubles (£42billion) was lost in this way.
In a second video he boasted that he ‘robbed the banking system of Russia for the second time’ by using disappearing ink to write cheques.
He also appealed to President Don‘Are ald Trump to grant him US citizenship. He owned two Santa Barbara houses, one known as the ‘Scarface estate’ as it was used to shoot some scenes for the 1983 Al Pacino film.
Grishin married Miss Fedoseeva in 2017. The couple were introduced by mutual friends in 2015.
She said: ‘We had friends in common. He asked them if I wanted to date him as he was single. My relationship had ended and I thought why not have a dinner.’
At first the romance was ‘good’. But the marriage crashed in January 2018 after he accessed her password-protected computer. Here he found ‘innocent selfies’ of Anna with Miss Sulkess.
Miss Sulkess, a former PA to the actress Kate Bosworth, had set up a film company, 12 Productions Limited, with Miss Fedoseeva and they were making a film together.
According to court documents, Sergey became ‘insane with jealousy over the friendship’ and filed for divorce the following month.
Court documents allege that he started to threaten both women and demand that Miss Sulkess leave the film company. One text to his wife, sent on February 27 that year, ran:
you familiar with the concept of operation without a budget? This is the worst that can happen to a person opposed by a clever, inventive, insidious enemy. It’s not my choice, you got me there. Enjoy it.’
The following day he told her: ‘All your life and the lives of all your loved ones are at stake now.’
The following week he referred to himself as a ‘killing machine.’
He added that his first wife had been admitted to an ‘insane asylum’ four times.
Both women were afraid, and Miss Sulkess said she was told he would seek to bankrupt her if she didn’t leave the film company. Miss Fedoseeva released her from her position.
Sergey next asked Anna to pay him back all the money he had given her, and return all watches and jewellery. In a court filing, she said he texted her a picture of a Glock gun and said he had a 15-round clip of bullets: ‘13 for you and two in any case for me.’
Another long text allegedly talked about using special bullets so she would have to be buried in a closed casket, and suggested that he would film her murder and stream it live on Instagram and YouTube.
‘Imagine how beautiful it would be,’ he allegedly taunted.
The court papers also state that on June 3, 2018, he invited Miss Fedoseeva to meet him at their Moscow apartment, saying that a third party would be present and promising he meant her no harm.
According to her court filing, once inside he pulled out a gun with a silencer, told her he was going to kill her, and ordered her to strip naked.
There was then allegedly a fight in which she grabbed the silencer and he punched her in the face before head butting her, cracking her teeth. She fled to a neighbouring apartment and raised the alarm, filing a report with police and being treated in hospital.
A text the following day from Sergey told her that a doctor would
‘He said he would film her murder and stream it live’
be able to fix her with a ‘new Hollywood smile’.
On June 19, Anna and Jennifer took out temporary restraining orders against him, and Sergey was ordered to surrender his weapons.
The claimed harassment continued, with him allegedly sending pornographic and violent videos and setting up fake websites and social media accounts for the women.
Perhaps the most chilling evidence presented by the two women is the alleged ‘hitman’ audio where he records himself saying that he wants to ‘get rid of some people’ at a cost of 1million euros (£900,000) per head.
The alleged hour and a half audio, in Russian, was sent to Miss Fedoseeva’s mother.
In November 2018, Anna was arrested in Moscow and jailed after Sergey told authorities that she had defrauded him of 80million rubles (£840,000). After ten days, the charges were dropped and she was released.
Anna is seeking punitive damages of up to $75million (£57million) and Jennifer up to $50million. Both accuse him of malicious and oppressive conduct and say that thy are greatly traumatised. Miss Fedoseeva says: ‘It is not about the money. I have no need of money.
‘We have a trial in October. I also have a court date against him in Russia to settle the divorce.’
She received compensation from the Russian government over being falsely accused and imprisoned a year ago.
Sergey has hit back, suing the two women for $564,000 (£430,000), money he says he spent funding their film company and production. Anna says the money was a gift during the marriage and cited a text from Sergey saying: ‘There will be counterfeit lawsuits, under other clauses. Don’t forget that. Are you going to fight with me?’
He has also sued Miss Sulkess for defamation after she reposted the YouTube videos in which he boasted of banking fraud. That action has been dismissed.
A further legal action involves his former fiancee Catherine Loginova. He has accused her of fraud. She says that he has issued death threats and is mentally ill, claiming that he has ‘three people’ inside him.
Miss Sulkess said yesterday: ‘It is a fight for survival. I have never experienced anything like this, this has been a surreal couple of years.’
A spokesman for Mr Grishin said last night: ‘Mr Grishin is the unfortunate victim of a fraud perpetrated by his former wife Anna Fedoseeva in respect of which he has been obliged to file legal proceedings against her.
‘His legal claim sets out that fewer than two months after their marriage, Miss Fedoseeva became romantically involved with another woman and thereafter entered into a scheme to defraud him out of millions of dollars to finance her and her lover’s lifestyles.
‘When that fraudulent scheme failed, Miss Fedoseeva made a series of false and highly defamatory allegations about Mr Grishin – including of physical threats and violence – which are utterly fanciful, hotly denied and have no basis in truth whatever, and which Mr Grishin trusts will be proven to be entirely false when the matter comes before the court.’
‘He pulled a gun, punched her and butted her’