The U.S. Customs Service received a request for assistance in 1996 from the U.S. Diplomatic Security Service and Finnish National Bureau of Investigation to locate a Finnish suspect and fugitive named Veli Tapani Virtanen.
Virtanen, who had been previously convicted of murdering his entire family in Finland in 1988, was out of prison and reportedly operating in South Florida. He had been released from prison in 1995 after serving half of his 14-year sentence (and reportedly being declared mentally ill). The fugitive joined a Finnish/Estonian/Russian smuggling organization in Palm Beach County that was outbound smuggling firearms, stolen vehicles and other contraband to Europe. It was the crazy days after the fall of the Berlin Wall and Soviet Union.
Smuggling was not the only concern. Virtanen was wanted for questioning regarding the 1995 car bombing of the Helsinki Police Department headquarters (Pasila Police House). He was also wanted for questioning regarding the homicide of a Finnish organized crime member with a firearm that he allegedly exported (smuggled) from Florida concealed within a stolen vehicle. He was a busy man.
This short story has other interesting twists to include the recovery of an exported altered stolen vehicle that was seized from the Finnish prime minister’s brother at the Finnish consulate in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Below is the salvaged vehicle that provided the vehicle identification number and documents to export the altered stolen vehicle to Finland. It was one of many.
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