Ayrat Kabiryanof (seated,
front right wearing handcuffs) has been arrested for loan sharking and human
trafficking.
Boonlua Chatree
Department of Special Investigations officers arrested a Russian man
for allegedly running a loan-sharking operation in which at least one
customer was forced into prostitution when she couldn’t pay.
Ayrat Kabiryanof, 25, was captured following a July 2 pursuit by DSI agents
and Chonburi police through central Pattaya. Officers found 10 photocopied
foreign passports and two bank books. Kabiryanof led police to his
Banglamung house - which openly displayed Russian-language outdoor posters
advertising his illegal money lending business - where officers recovered
another 12 passports, two ledgers listing 285 Russian customers, credit
cards and bank account books with more than a million baht in balance.
The arrest came following a complaint from 22-year-old Ievgeniia Shevchenko,
22, who claimed Kabiryanof had taken her passport and forced her to work as
a prostitute after she couldn’t pay off the 2 percent daily-compounded
interest on her 10-day loan. DSI officials said they’ve received complaints
from 10 other Russians. They alleged Kabiryanof had not only advertised
outside his house, but in telephone booths and utility poles in heavily
Russian neighborhoods in Jomtien and Najomtien.
Lt. Gen. Chat Kuldilok of the Interior Ministry said the loan-shark
operation is believed to be funded by both Russian and Thai backers and that
nearly a half dozen Russians are employed in it.
Customers, he said, would borrow 5,000-30,000 baht and charged as much as 60
percent interest. Passports were confiscated as collateral. Non-paying
victims told police that Russians assaulted them while threatening to turn
them into police for not having a passport.
Kabiryanof was charged with loan sharking offenses as well as being in the
kingdom on an expired visa.
