The Justice Department is accusing several members of Russia's intelligence services of running a "global assassination network" that targeted Kremlin critics — including one alleged murder plot on U.S. soil over the summer. Federal prosecutors in New York unsealed an indictment Tuesday against five people who belonged to what they called the "RIS Network," including a 63-year-old former Russian intelligence colonel named Yuri Khrameev, his son Kirill, two Cubans and one Venezuelan. All five defendants are believed to live in Russia and remain at large, the Justice Department said.
It marks the latest alleged attempt by a U.S. adversary to crack down on dissidents abroad, including in the United States and NATO-allied countries. One of the murder-for-hire plots took place in July and August of this year, the indictment says. The Venezuelan operative and one of the Cuban operatives allegedly recruited a Brooklyn resident to take photos and videos of two locations associated with an unnamed Russian dissident, promising him $1,000 to $1,500 to carry out the "gravely serious work." Another $40,000 was offered to "eliminate" or "disappear" the target of the surveillance.
The operatives believed the Russian dissident lived in the Washington, D.C., area, Attorney General Todd Blanche told reporters at a briefing Tuesday. The Brooklyn resident was willing to take photos, the indictment said, but expressed unwillingness to "do the other stuff" — as in, kill the dissident. The operatives then allegedly asked the Brooklyn resident if he knew of anybody else who was interested.
"Let me know as soon as possible because I have a chain and my boss has questions," one of the Cuban recruiters wrote, according to the indictment. "I have people in Mexico right now and theyre delayed. I only need a response to know if someone can do the work.
It doesn't have to be today or tomorrow just need to know if the[y] can." The indictment also accuses Yuri Khrameev (or "Colonel Yuri") and his son of trying to recruit a U.S. citizen in Lithuania to kill somebody who was ostensibly "telling lies about Russia" last year. The unnamed U.S. citizen met the younger Khrameev at the Estonia-Russia border, where he was asked to take photos of the target's address, court papers say. He was paid $200 for the surveillance.
Then, Yuri Khrameev allegedly offered him $25,000 to kill the person because he was "spreading dirt about my country" and "telling the media and the common people that the Russians are the aggressors." When the U.S. citizen declined to kill the person, Yuri Khrameev allegedly suggested he could instead get paid to set a warehouse or electrical substation on fire. The Russian intelligence officer said he was interested in targeting pro-Ukrainian countries and was offering "serious money for serious work," according to the indictment. Members of the RIS Network were also accused of helping facilitate a pair of failed arson attacks in Europe in 2024, including an attempt to set fire to buses in the Czech Republic and a plot against a Lithuanian facility that supplies radio equipment to Ukraine.
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