Six members of a Russian spy ring run from a guesthouse in Great Yarmouth have been jailed for running espionage operations across Europe.
The spies conducted surveillance for Russia targeting journalists, dissidents and Ukrainian troops in London, Austria, Spain, Germany and Montenegro.
Ringleader Orlin Roussev, 47, who led the spy ring, was sentenced to 10 years and eight months.
Roussev admitted his role along with his second-in-command, Biser Dzhambazov, 44, who was jailed for 10 years and two months and Ivan Stoyanov, 33, who was handed five years and three weeks in prison.
Female “honeytrap” agents Katrin Ivanova, 33, and Vanya Gaberova, 30, and competitive swimmer Tihomir Ivanov Ivanchev, 39, were found guilty at the Old Bailey in March of activities which police have said put lives and national security at risk.
Ivanova was jailed for nine years and eight months.
Gaberova, of Euston, north London, was jailed for six years, eight months and three weeks, having found spying for Russia to be “exciting and glamorous”, the judge said.
Her ex-boyfriend Ivanchev, of Acton, west London, was sentenced to eight years in prison.
It is believed to be one of the “largest and most complex” enemy operations to be uncovered on UK soil.
The network engaged in a series of surveillance and intelligence operations over three years in which spies were referred to as Minions – characters from animated film Despicable Me.
Ivanova, a laboratory receptionist from Harrow, north London, and Gaberova, a beautician from Acton, west London, were in a love triangle with the operations chief of the spy ring.
Dzhambazov, a delivery driver who ran the ground operations of the spy ring, was pretending to have cancer to cover up his affair with Gaberova.
The group also included Dzhambazov’s best friend Stoyanov, 33, from Greenford, northwest London – a former cage fighter known as “The Rock” who had represented Bulgaria at judo and sambo.
At the centre of the operation was Roussev, 46, who worked for a technology company at the London Stock Exchange before setting himself up as a freelance spy for hire.
Roussev had lived near Tower Bridge in central London before moving to Great Yarmouth, where his partner bought the 33-room Haydee Guesthouse. It was there that he stashed his huge collection of spy equipment, much of which he had adapted himself.
Roussev is believed to have received “substantially more” than the £173,000 he paid to other members of the spy ring but he was paid in cryptocurrencies and the money has not been traced.
Read more:
Who were targets of Russian spy ring dubbed ‘the Minions’?
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