to kill their wives and children before going on a robbery. Russian gang leaders in the nineteenth century, however, developed a somewhat more humane way of ensuring that family ties did not supersede the criminal bond: they encouraged followers to marry women already in the criminal milieu, such as the daughters of other thieves or prostitutes (Handelman 31). During the Communist era, they seemed to be obscured from society as a silent partner in the black market economy. But, by 1985 when Gorbachev came into power, most major Russian cities already had powerful organized gangs (Handelman 9). While in their "silent" years!
             , they accumulated enough wealth to endure the failure of the old system and benefit from the new one.
             Russian organized crime groups use threats and violence to penetrate business activities making it almost impossible for businesses to be profitable without being constrained by the Mafia and extortion. Although there are many groups in the Russia Mafia, one of the largest gangs is the Solntsevskaya. The Solntsevskaya has around 5,000 members and specializes in drugs and gun smuggling but is not averse to extortion (The Rise and Rise...). They were founded in 1980 by one of Russia's most feared criminals, Vyatcheslav "Little Japanese" Ivankov. Owning banks seemed an easier task than simply having legitimate institutions hold their laundered money. The Solntsevskaya took over the Russian Exchange Bank in September 1992, allegedly replacing the accountants and financial managers with Mafia employees hired to oversee money laundering, embezzlement, and other illegal operations (Lindberg).
             Mob bosses everywhere could not sustain th
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