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Russian in hacking probe linked to alt-right stock fraud
Pavel ‘Red Eye’ Vrublevsky, a Russian businessman under investigation in the FBI’s probe of Russian hacking in the 2016 Presidential election, shared a business address in John Gotti’s former stronghold of Howard Beach, Queens with a company led by a Tampa Mobster convicted in the “alt-right” stock fraud ring run by Sarasota’s own Andrew Badolato, business partner and Breitbart collaborator…
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Trump campaign chief’s hidden ties to Sarasota grifter
When Donald Trump’s campaign manager Steve Bannon hastily changed his voter registration residence from an empty house in Miami to a beach house on Casey Key in Sarasota, it made news. The man he moved in with was described as one of Bannon’s Breitbart writers. But Andrew M. Badolato the owner of Bannon’s new ‘registered to vote here’ digs…
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Frank Sinatra, Pablo Escobar… and Meyer Lansky
“Two kilos of heroin for a little walking around money” A ‘friend’ on Facebook found a link I posted there to a DailyMail story about Frank Sinatra’s purported ties to Pablo Escobar, (Frank Sinatra was ‘a better cocaine dealer than singer), based on interviews with dead Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar’s son where he claims singer Frank…
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Free press in U.S. vs Mexico: Que es mas macho?
Three Mexican journalists—each a woman who has spent years living with the real possibility that the death threats she regularly receives will one day result in a slow, gruesome death—heroically continue to report the truth about the drug war in their country that no mainstream American journalist has the balls to report about the drug war in ours:…
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Donald Sterling’s New York "Slip & Fall"
Beleaguered LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling numbers among his associates at least three figures who were involved in a troubled “rogue” drug operation run by Tampa ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) that consigned America’s reputation into the hands of people that other branches of the U.S. Government—even casino regulators in Nevada—wouldn’t trust not to cheat…
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Tampa ‘Black Ice” drug operation tied to organized crime
Doug McClain learned the ins and outs of financial fraud while working for Robert Colgin Wilson, who—far more than “The Wolf of Wall Street”—exemplified the role of American organized crime in financial fraud during the last quarter of the 20th Century. Wilson was no fly by night. His roots ran deep. When he was convicted…
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The Enterprise & Southern-style organized crime
The man who facilitated the purchase of several DC-9’s for SkyWay Aircraft in St. Petersburg Florida was the company’s largest shareholder, Doug McClain Sr.’s Argyll Equities. So how did he get such an important job in such a thriving Enterprise? During the 90’s, Doug McClain Sr. belonged to an organized crime ring run by Robert…
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Con man for Christ Floated ‘Cocaine One’ Drug Plane
Doug McClain Sr’s financial fraud career as a grifter, racketeer, and flimflam man can be traced back more than two decades, and likely extends much further into his past. The so-far unanswered question about him has been where he first acquired powerful patrons whose clout could—and did—keep him out of jail despite his record for flagrant…
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The NSA, Drug Trafficking, & the Crash of Cocaine2
This will someday be remembered as the year when shocking new discoveries about the National Security Agency became an almost daily occurrence. But amid the steady drumbeat of revelations, the one I’ve been waiting for hasn’t yet surfaced: The NSA’s involvement in the global drug trade.