The owner of an Orlando steel company has pled guilty to purchasing $150 million worth of steelmaking materials from a sanctioned Russian oligarch at the “expense of national security.”
John Can Unsalan pled guilty to engaging in a conspiracy to commit money laundering on Tuesday, October 3. Unsalan admitted that his company, Metalhouse, acquired over $150 million in metal products from companies owned by Sergey Kurchenko, a Russian oligarch who had been sanctioned by the United States.
Kurchenko was sanctioned by the Department of the Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control in 2015 for his role in misappropriating state assets of Ukraine.
Kurchenko’s two sanctioned companies – Kompaniya Gaz-Alyans, OOO, which is based in Russia, and ZAO Vneshotorgservis, which is based in the Russian-occupied Georgian region of South Ossetia – were sanctioned 2018 for acting on behalf of and providing material support to the “so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic in the separatist-controlled regions of eastern Ukraine,” according to the indictment.
According to court records, between July 2018 and October 2021, Unsalan and his company, which is located at 4705 S Apopka Vineland Road, transferred over $150 million to Kurchenko and his companies in return for metal products that were used in steelmaking.
In April, a grand jury indicted Unsalan on one co
unt of conspiring to violate and evade U.S. sanctions, 10 counts of violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, and 10 counts of international money laundering, among other charges.
As part of his plea, Unsalan agreed to forfeit $160,416,948.56 in proceeds that he obtained a result of the conspiracy. As a result, the government agreed to dismiss the remaining counts of the indictment.
Unsalan now faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. No sentencing date has been set.
According to court records, Sergey Karpushkin, a co-conspirator in the case, also pled guilty and agreed to forfeit over $4.7 million in criminal proceeds.