Stolen fortunes of Ukrainian immigrants. Convergence of the Bandera cult and CIA cut-outs. Prelude to a feud in NYC's "Little Ukraine."
Twenty years ago, Mykola Bojczuk, a wealthy Ukrainian nationalist, passed away in a nursing home in Bridgewater, New Jersey, at which point his Russian-speaking son from the Soviet Union stood to inherit almost all of his estate. But when Stefan Bojczuk went to probate his father’s will from 1982, he discovered that “someone else had beaten him to the Somerset County Surrogate's Office.”
The Ukrainian American Freedom Foundation (UAFF), an important front group for the OUN-B, or “Banderite” faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, had submitted another will from 2002, which Bojczuk barely managed to sign in the aftermath of a stroke, while also “suffering from very significant dementia.”
At the end of the day, Stefan Bojczuk won in court, but I’m reminded of a sensational anonymous complaint, alleging “ Large Scare Fraudulent Financial Activities ,” that was submitted to the New York State Attorney General’s office in 2019 about the OUN-B network, and the UAFF in particular, which owns 40% of the Banderite headquarters building in Kyiv.
In my recent documentary, “Big Trouble in Little Ukraine,” there is a moment when Walter Zaryckyj, the UAFF president since 2018, told Banderite youth in 1989 Canada, “our wealth is being passed over there [to the Soviet Union] because a lot of our old folks don’t write out wills.” Over a decade after the USSR collapsed, it seems the Banderites were still nervous about ex-Soviet citizens inheriting “our wealth.” “It’s as if we don’t have enough lawyers,” joked Zaryckyj, “including my friends, like Asha.” That was apparently a reference to Askold Lozynskyj, an important OUN-B member in the United States. According to the 2019 complaint,
For the record: Askold Lozynskyj made his money by taking advantage of Ukrainian organizations, but mainly from their members — Ukrainian immigrants that couldn’t speak and/or write English. Those people trusted him with everything. … Ukrainian immigrants, who didn’t have family and didn’t understand the English language, went to him for advice and procedures on how to prepare a will in order that after their passing, the building/assets that they owned would go to Ukrainian Organizations and/or churches. Yet somehow, after their death, those assets became properties of Askold Lozynskyj, Esq. That is how he started making money.
So it appears that the Bojczuk case was far from an isolated incident. (more...)
