Spies who planned to deploy a ‘true sexy b****’ honeytrap to target a journalist face years in jail after an international plot.
The group, dubbed ‘the Minions’ were found guilty of spying at an ‘industrial scale’ on UK soil.
Despite their cuddly nickname, the group’s operation put lives and national security at risk and could have ended in a tragedy like the Novichok poisonings, counterterrorism experts warned.
Bulgarians Katrin Ivanova, 33, Vanya Gaberova, 30, and Tihomir Ivanov Ivanchev, 39, were found guilty at the Old Bailey today over one of the ‘largest and most complex’ enemy operations ever discovered in the UK.
They were referred to as Despicable Me’s yellow sidekicks, but instead of the cartoon’s evil mastermind Gru, they spied for the Russian intelligence services, the GRU.
The group were directed by an alleged Russian agent Jan Marsalek, 44, an Austrian businessman on Interpol’s wanted list, who is thought to have plotted to ruin the reputation of a Bellingcat investigative journalist Christo Grozev in 2021. Chilling discussions also revealed Marsalek talking about kidnapping a Russian lawyer Kirill Kachur in Montenegro.
Why ‘the Minions’ were so dangerous
Their web of shadowy tactics involved other figures on top of the food chain, including ringleader Orlin Roussev, 47.
Orlin was handed more than £165,000 to fund spying activities.
Jurors at the Old Bailey heard how ‘the Minions’ were deployed with the second-in-command Biser Dzhambazov, 43, who was in a love triangle with two of the team – his partner Ivanova and beautician Gaberova.
Their modus operandi was to target people and places the Russian state was interested in – including Ukrainian soldiers.
They even schemed to hack mobile phone data of Ukrainian soldiers who were thought to be training at a US airbase in Germany before deployment at the front line in the Russia-Ukraine war.
Their six operations, which involved hidden listening devices inside everyday items like a rock, men’s ties, a Coke bottle and a Minions cuddly toy and a kit to make and test fake ID documents found at Roussev’s address, date back to August 2020.
A stash of fake passports was also found at Ivanova and Dzhambazov’s shared one-bedroom Harrow flat.
Met counter-terrorism chief Commander Dominic Murphy said: ‘This was industrial-scale espionage on behalf of Russia.
‘This is one of the largest and most complex examples of a group working for a foreign state to conduct intelligence surveillance operations here in the UK so it is a significant case and I am very proud of the investigation team and the success they have had.
‘Really sophisticated devices – the sort of thing you would really expect to see in a spy novel – were found here, in Great Yarmouth and London.
‘I have never seen anything like this in my more than 20 years in counter-terrorism. It was an extremely sophisticated operation.
‘Reading some of the messages and content on the devices you might be tempted to think this is not a serious threat, but behind those nicknames was an extremely sophisticated intelligence-gathering operation that posed a threat to national security and individuals, including journalists.’
If the group had evaded detection, people could have been killed in the light of previous spy operations such as the 2018 Novichock attack in Salisbury, Murphy said.
‘My concern has always been what that lifestyle surveillance was going to lead to and we have seen a long history of the Russian state conducting operations here in the UK, including lethal threat operations like the investigation in Salisbury,’ he said.
When discussing the plot to kidnap Kachur, Marsalek told Roussev they ‘dont mind if he dies by accident, but better if he manages to find his way to Moscow.’
But why are they called ‘the Minions’?
In more than 100,000 Telegram messages detectives found on Roussev’s phone, Roussev was nicknamed Jackie Chan, Dzhambazov was called Mad Max and Jean-Claude Van Damme and he called his spies The Minions.
How the honeytrap plot unfolded
Grozev became the target after he exposed Russian state links to the Novichok poisoning and the downing of Malaysia Airlines plane in July 2014.
Gaberova, of Euston, befriended the journalist on Facebook and took secret pictures of him at a conference in Spain while Grozev had breakfast with Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins.
Roussev and Marsalek discussed using a ‘true sexy b****’, Gaberova, as a trap against Grozev to ‘record something for Pornhub too,’ Marsalek said.
The plan was to push for a romance between Gaberova and the journalist without making Grozev suspicious. Roussev described the beautician as ‘very, very assertive and strongly independent…true sexy b****.’
The group is thought to have tracked him across Vienna, Valencia and Montenegro.
One of the group’s most bizarre plans included dropping 100 litres of pig’s blood on the Kazakhstan embassy in London.
The blood was part of an idea to stage a fake protest outside the embassy and Ivanova was tasked with arranging ‘blood’ in exchange for a bonus of £2,400. At the time, Dzhambazov and Ivan Stoyanov, a sixth defendant in the case, worked for a medical courier company.
What will happen to the spies now?
The defendants were expressionless when the verdicts were delivered at the Old Bailey today.
Ringleaders Roussev and Dzhambazov admitted having a stash of false ID documents ‘with improper intention’ and they also admitted the spy plot.
Stoyanov, 33, of Greenford, London, had also admitted spying for Russia.
They face up to 14 years in jail for the spy activities across the UK, Austria, Spain, Germany and Montenegro.
Giving evidence, Ivanova claimed she was deceived by her long-term partner, Dzhambazov, and did not know she was providing intelligence to Russia.
She told jurors: ‘I purely believed what I was told and that was my mistake.”
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Gaberova said she was ‘lied to, manipulated, used and exposed’ by her boyfriend Dzhambazov, who she thought was an Interpol officer with brain cancer.
She expressed horror at the honeytrap plot, saying: ‘These people had horrible plans for me.’
Former competitive swimmer Ivanchev declined to give evidence but claimed in his police interview Gaberova ‘manipulated’ him.
The group will be sentenced between May 7 and May 12.
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