Aarni Neuvonen, properly Vadim Rozenberg, also known under the aliases of Aarni Rozenberg and Vadim Petrov, is the largest ever perpetrator of

employment fraud Employment fraud is the attempt to defraud people seeking employment by giving them false hope of better employment, offering better working hours, more respectable tasks, future opportunities, or higher wages. They often advertise at the same locat ...

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

. He is known for having collected money with promise of overseas jobs from thousands of people and disappearing after having caused over (estimated) 10 million of EEK of damages in 1993.

Scheme

Neuvonen published in newspapers (mostly Russian) large and eye-catching ads on behalf of Inter Work Corporation, supposedly established in 1930s headquartered in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

and

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estim ...

, offering jobs in

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a re ...

pub A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the late 17th century, to differentiate private ho ...

s and

factories A factory, manufacturing plant or production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. Th ...

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

Arabia The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

and

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

. Job-seekers were charged 2335 EEK in advance; the fee was supposed to cover costs of "foreign passport" (note that this

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

-era relic had long before disappeared from Estonian jurisprudence), visa, airline tickets and Estonian

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

. At that time, the average salary in Estonia was about 1070 EEK, and due to the aftermath of the crash of the GOSPLAN-governed Soviet economy,

joblessness Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is the proportion of people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work dur ...

was around 17%. (Due to GOSPLAN's main interest being in the military-industrial plants in Northern Estonia, which had been manned primarily by

Russophone This article details the geographical distribution of Russian-speakers. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the status of the Russian language often became a matter of controversy. Some Post-Soviet states adopted policies of Derus ...

migrants from

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

transferred to

specifically to work there, the high joblessness affected particularly Russophone people.) Neuvonen also spread rumours that the first batch of jobs, supposedly scheduled to start working in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, at industrial plants of

Kodak The Eastman Kodak Company, referred to simply as Kodak (), is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in film photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorporated i ...

, had already been fulfilled — thus implying that the number of jobs was limited, and enticing victims to

bribe Bribery is the corrupt solicitation, payment, or acceptance of a private favor (a bribe) in exchange for official action. The purpose of a bribe is to influence the actions of the recipient, a person in charge of an official duty, to act contrar ...

Neuvonen with US$100 (about 1200 EEK at the then-current rates) fee for their positions in the queue to be lifted higher. After enjoying long queues of jobseekers wanting to pay the fee, Neuvonen announced that the visas, air tickets and job permits would be handed over to everybody on 23 March 1993 in the

banquette A banquette (), rampart walk or parapet walk is a small footpath or elevated step along the inside of a rampart or parapet of a fortification. Musketeers atop it were able to view the counterscarp, or fire on enemies in the moat. Typical they ...

hall of the Viru Hotel. However, Neuvonen's office, opened on 10 January 1993, was closed already on 9 February 1993, and documents presented by the jobseekers were found in a garbage bin next to the office's door.

Irregularities in licensing

In the investigation, it was discovered that one of the company's supposed office addresses was on wasteland, and the other only held an electricity transmission substation — both places unsuitable for offices. Furthermore, three of the people supposedly investing in the company through its incorporation agreement did not exist.

Damages

Police estimated that at least 3000 people paid Neuvonen the 2335 EEK of advance fee; some analysts have speculated there were up to 5000 victims. After closure of the office, only 32 000 EEK were recovered from one of the company's banking accounts.

Later sightings

In 1993, Neuvonen, then using the alias of Daniil Rosenberg was reported to be advertising little-used American and Japanese cars for 1000 USD on Ukrainian TV, defrauding hundreds of people out of an estimated million

USD The United States dollar (symbol: $; currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introduced the U.S. dollar at par with the Spanish silver dollar, divided it int ...

. In 1994, Neuvonen, then presenting himself as a citizen of

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

, was reported to be offering jobs in Europe to poor people in

Bulgaria Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey t ...

, defrauding about 400 people out of an estimated million

Status

Neuvonen was never caught, and has been declared dead due to disappearance by an Estonian court at request of his wife of hurried marriage, to whom he had fraudulently sold an

apartment An apartment (American English, Canadian English), flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), tenement (Scots English), or unit (Australian English) is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) that ...

Lasnamäe Lasnamäe is the most populous administrative district of Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. The district's population is about 119,000, the majority of which is Russian-speaking. Local housing is mostly represented by 5–16 stories high panel b ...

Sources

Estonian Criminals
*

Postimees is an Estonian daily newspaper established on 5 June 1857, by Johann Voldemar Jannsen. In 1891, it became the first daily newspaper in Estonia. Its current editor-in-chief is Priit Hõbemägi. The paper has approximately 250 employees. ''P ...

17 December 2005
Õnnis elu Ameerikas
*

7 February 2009
Superkelm lüpsis raha tuhandetelt ohvritelt
by Rasmus Kagge

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Neuvonen, Aarni Estonian criminals Fraudsters Fugitives wanted by Estonia People declared dead in absentia Possibly living people Year of birth unknown