The criminal leader who served several terms in his homeland was accused of occupying the highest position in the criminal hierarchy. The “thief in law”, who fled from criminal prosecution in Germany, apparently did not leave criminal activities there either, since after a while he was forced to move to Portugal, already fleeing from the German prosecutor’s office.
“At the request of the General Prosecutor’s Office of Russia, the competent authorities of Portugal are extraditing Russian citizen Stepan Furman to Russia,” the supervisory authority said today. “He is accused of committing a crime under Art. 210.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (occupation of the highest position in the criminal hierarchy). According to investigators, since 1994, Furman, having received the criminal status of a thief in law, occupied the highest position in the criminal hierarchy and headed a criminal organization. In its composition, the members of the group committed grave and especially grave crimes in the territory of the Murmansk region. The prosecutor’s office did not specify the acts imputed to Stepan Furman – according to some reports, among other things, he allegedly controlled the colonies located in the region.
In turn, the press service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation reported that Stepan Furman was sent to Russia, accompanied by employees of the NCB Interpol of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia and the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia from Portugal.
“For the first time in history, a European country has extradited to Russia a person accused of occupying the highest position in the criminal hierarchy,” the department added.
A criminal case on the grounds of a crime under Art. 210.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, noted in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, was initiated in 2019. “Stepan Furman, previously repeatedly convicted of various crimes, on the basis of a request from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Murmansk Region, was put on the international wanted list through Interpol channels,” the department said. “The Oktyabrsky District Court of the city of Murmansk chose in absentia a measure of restraint in relation to him in the form of detention” .
58-year-old Stepan Furman, nicknamed Stepa Murmansky in the criminal world, after his birthplace, is considered one of the prominent thieves in law. In his youth, he regularly fell into the sphere of attention of law enforcement agencies. Back in Soviet times, he received his first conviction for theft committed on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR, then moved to Russia.
In the mid-1990s, as Kommersant’s sources in law enforcement agencies reported at the time, Styopa Murmansky allegedly worked closely with the Kuntsevo organized criminal group in the capital. Around the same time, as the media said, he was crowned by several thieves in law at once, and the legendary crime boss Revaz Tsitsishvili (Tsitska) and another Georgian “authority” Ramaz Dzneladze (Ramaz) allegedly contributed to his promotion in the criminal environment.
Stepan Furman was detained by law enforcement officers many times, mainly under articles traditional for thieves in law on drug trafficking or weapons, as well as hooliganism: according to rumors, Stepan Murmansky allegedly had a very violent temper in his youth. Sometimes the case ended with new lawsuits. If we add up all the punishments imposed on the thief by the courts, we get about a quarter of a century, although he was not in prison for such a time: in some cases, the terms were suspended, in others Styopa Murmansky fell under an amnesty or was released on parole.
After the introduction of Article 210.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, Stepan Furman went abroad and first settled in Germany. However, judging by media reports, after some time in this country he was put on the wanted list by the Munich prosecutor’s office – allegedly as part of an investigation into the activities of some organized criminal community. Stepan Furman moved to Portugal, where he was detained, but in connection with an Interpol wanted list initiated by the Russian side.