An affair, a murder plot and a bribe: Russian millionaire to plead Friday in NC case
Leonid Teyf was upset after he learned his ex-wife had been banging on another man’s door.
That man was the son of a former housekeeper who had lived with Teyf, a wealthy Russian national, according to federal court documents and testimony. Raleigh police had arrested his former wife, Tatyana, at the man’s home after she refused to leave.
“Teyf was very upset, believed this conduct signaled that the two had had an affair, and he began planning the (man’s) murder,” assistant U.S. attorney Barbara Kocher said in a 2019 hearing, describing a February 2018 recorded conversation Teyf had with a confidential informant.
Teyf would swing from a plan to immediately kill the former housekeeper’s son in the United States to having him deported to Russia and taken care of there, Kocher said.
About nine months after Teyf’s conversation with the informant, federal officials raided the couple’s $5 million North Raleigh mansion next to the North Ridge Country Club golf course.
Court documents that followed the Dec. 5, 2018, raid read like an international crime thriller.
Teyf, his now ex-wife and four others faced federal charges that among the defendants included laundering nearly $40 million in Russian money, bribing a Homeland Security official, and plotting to have Tatyana Teyf’s alleged lover murdered.
But the drama could be coming to an end Friday, when the the Teyfs appear in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina in New Bern for new plea hearings. The couple previously pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Leonid Teyf faces up to 20 years in prison. Tatyana Teyf, Alexsy Timofeev, Olesya Timofeeva, and Alexei Polyakov faced up to 10 years in prison.
All but the Teyfs have pleaded guilty to some or all of their charges under plea deals. The government is also seeking to seize $39 million in assets from the defendants, who will likely face removal after serving any time they are sentenced to.
John Patrick Cotter, of Apex, also faced related federal bribery charges, and Stephen Edward Myers Jr., of Raleigh, faced Wake County charges of cyberstalking after Teyf hired him to track the housekeeper’s son, according to court documents. Both have also pleaded guilty to charges.
Court documents filed in late 2020 argue that evidence disclosed at a 2019 hearing shifts the weight of evidence in Teyf’s favor and that other testimony exposes weaknesses in the government’s money-laundering case, which relies on a paid informant’s statements.
Attorneys representing Teyf and others declined to comment or couldn’t be reached.
FBI investigation
Leonid Teyf was already on federal officials’ radar as they learned about the murder-for-hire plot, court documents indicate.
In May of 2014, a local service company reported suspicious activity at a Raleigh address associated with Teyf.
Within months, a second source contacted FBI agents with concerns about Teyf and dangerous, criminal activity, according to court documents.
Teyf was born in Belarus, then a Slavic republic in the former Soviet Union, according to court documents.
Sometime between 2010 and 2012, records show, Teyf was deputy director of Voentorg, a Russian company that provided the Russian military with goods and services such as food, laundry and equipment, according to court records.
At Voentorg, Teyf and others developed a kickback scheme involving subcontractors that netted $150 million over two years, U.S. investigators allege in 2018 federal court records.
Teyf and others have at least 70 financial accounts at four financial institutions. Teyf’s U.S. businesses included trucking companies in Illinois and Utah and urgent-care services, including the Doctors Express in Cary, according to court documents and testimony.
Teyf also had ties to Yevgeny Prigozhin, one of 13 Russians indicted last February as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into interference with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, The News & Observer reported.
The Teyfs came to the United States from Russia in 2010, court documents state. They have three children. Wake County court records indicate the couple separated in 2015 and divorced in 2017.
Teyf’s housekeeper
Court documents don’t give specific dates, but at some point a live-in housekeeper, her husband and her son moved from Russia into the Teyf’s New Market Way home, court documents state. At some point the couple stopped working for the family, and the son, then an adult, moved out.
On Nov. 3, 2017, Raleigh police were called to the son’s home, said Kocher at Cotter’s July 2019 plea hearing, according to the transcript.
Taytana Teyf was banging on the door, refusing to leave and was eventually arrested for damage of property.
Teyf was upset, Kocher said in court, and turned to two former law enforcement officers. One worked as a landscaper and the other, Myers, offered private investigation services, Kocher said.
On Feb. 17, 2018, Teyf told the men he wanted the son deported, the prosecutor said.
Three days later Teyf told a confidential source he needed someone to kidnap the son, “take him into the woods and get him to admit that he had had sex with Tatyana, and then kill and bury” him, Kocher said.
Bribery charges
On May 9, 2018, a confidential source introduced Cotter and Teyf to a Homeland Security agent, who was undercover, Kocher said.
Two weeks later they paid the special agent $10,000, a down payment on the total $25,000 bribe, to find and deport the housekeeper’s son.
After the meeting, Kocher said, the confidential source asked Cotter “If, when (the man) lands there, could they...”
Cotter interjected, “oh,yeah, you know, yeah, we can do whatever we want.”
Teyf wanted the housekeeper’s son to be killed after the Christmas holiday, FBI special agent Dennis Kinney said at a Dec. 18, 2018 court hearing.
Meanwhile, Teyf had booked a Dec. 15 flight back to Russia with Tatyana and his three children, Kinney said.
Teyf planned to have his ex-wife arrested when they arrived in Russia, Kinney testified.
If anyone asked about the death of the housekeeper’s son, Leonid Teyf said, Tatyana should be named as the person responsible, Kinney said.
Guns and ammo found in condo
Investigators found guns and “hundreds of rounds of ammunition” at 510 Glenwood, a condo owned by Teyf, Kinney testified. They also found a safe in that at one time contained thousands of dollars used to carry out the murder-for-hire scheme, federal officials said in court.
“Glenwood was literally a safe house, solely to keep a safe of guns and cash,” Kocher said.
But in court documents, Teyf’s attorneys argued he bought the condo after he and his wife separated but that the couple then decided to live in the same house so he could see the children. Teyf was going to give the condo to his kids, the documents state.
He kept the guns in the safe there because he had concerns about his wife drinking too much, Teyf’s attorneys argued in court documents.
New Market Way
The Teyfs’ nearly 16,000 square foot home on nearly two acres stands out among the stately homes that line New Market Way. Its sits on a cul-de-sac behind tall fences and gates for an entrance and an exit. On Wednesday those gates were padlocked.
Neighbors interviewed this week said they don’t see anybody there, except for people taking care of the yard.
But there are still lots of lookie-lous driving by to see the Teyf property, they said.
Just then, a black SUV pulled in front of the home, circled in the cul-de-sac, paused and left.
This story was originally published March 18, 2021 at 1:05 PM.
