Illegal exports

Electronics Smuggler Sentenced

Sensitive Equipment Illegally Exported to Russia

For more than six years, a New Jersey man who owned four microelectronics export companies skirted U.S. export laws enacted under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). These laws are in place to help protect U.S. national security and make sure that items made in the U.S. don’t help strengthen another country’s military without proper licensing and careful consideration.

Alexander Brazhnikov, Jr., a 36-year-old naturalized American citizen born in Russia, admitted that, between January 2008 and June 2014, he smuggled $65 million worth of sensitive electronics components from the U.S. to Russia, where much of it eventually ended up in the hands of Russia’s Ministry of Defense and Federal Security Service.

In June 2015, Brazhnikov plead guilty in federal court—after a multiagency investigation by the FBI, the Department of Commerce, and Department of Homeland Security (DHS)—to the smuggling charges and to a charge of conspiring to commit money laundering to hide the illegal proceeds of his criminal activities. According to then-Newark FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard Frankel, Brazhnikov “significantly undermined the national security of the national security of the U.S.” and “enhanced the capabilities of both the Russian Military Service and the Russian Nuclear Weapons Program.” Last month, he was sentenced to more than five years in prison.