From a violent criminal organization to the assassination of Yevgeny Prigozhin: the story of how Aslan Gagiev’s close associate took control of the private jet industry using a false identity

15 июля 2026 г., 23:03

666     0

From a violent criminal organization to the assassination of Yevgeny Prigozhin: the story of how Aslan Gagiev’s close associate took control of the private jet industry using a false identity

Once the "right hand" of Aslan Gagiev (Dzhako), the leader of the bloodiest organized criminal group, Arkady Berkovich (aka Arthur Khabibullin).

Despite facing charges for three murders of prominent bankers, he ended up free and then simply disappeared. As *Dossier* has found out, Berkovich now lives in Moscow under the name Andrei Nikolaevich Petrov (with a corresponding passport, apparently a cover document) and manages the largest business-jet owner, JSC Rusjet.

When the "storm clouds" began to gather over the Dzhako OPG in 2005, Berkovich left Russia and even staged his own death in Dagestan.

However, he later flew to Moscow on a private jet using a Bulgarian passport under a different surname to meet with his then-common-law wife, Svetlana Radionova (now the head of Rosprirodnadzor). He was detained at Vnukovo Airport and subsequently sent to a pretrial detention center in Vladikavkaz. To the surprise of the investigative team, Radionova personally arrived and tried to negotiate his release. At the same time, calls were coming "from above," arranged by her brother Grigory (now deputy head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service). At the time, they failed to secure the release of Dzhako’s "right hand." But after a year and a half, Berkovich was set free. He lived on Rublyovka for some time and then simply vanished. According to some sources, he left Russia.

But as it turned out, he later returned and is now living quietly in Moscow.

Radionova’s personal assistant for special assignments is Maria Makarchuk, who is employed at SOGAZ, a company headed by Radionova’s current common-law husband, Anton Ustinov.

Her husband, Ruslan Makarchuk, was formerly a founder of... Rusjet Service.

And one more interesting detail. Today we reported that the bomb that detonated aboard Yevgeny Prigozhin’s aircraft was most likely placed in a turbo cooler installed the day before. The turbo cooler of unknown origin was installed by the Protector Group of Pavel Provotorov, which had come under the influence of individuals closely linked to the Russian FSB. One of those individuals is Berkovich (aka Khabibullin, aka Petrov). And a few hours before Prigozhin’s flight took off, his aircraft was visited by two representatives of Petrov’s JSC Rusjet (the moment of inspection is captured on video). They did so under the pretext of wanting to purchase the jet. A few hours after their visit, the plane carrying Prigozhin took off and exploded mid-flight...