
After a five week trial, four defendants have been convicted for their roles in one of the largest bank fraud and identity theft schemes in California history, one that left dozens of victims across four states and millions of dollars in losses.
Arman Sharopetrosian, (aka”Horse” or “Dzi”) a key member of Armenian Power, and three associates, Karen Markosian, (aka “Kar” and “Garen”), Artush Margaryan and Kristine Ogandzhanyan were convicted of conspiring to commit bank fraud, attempted bank fraud and various counts of aggravated identity theft. Sharopetrosian, Markosian and Ogandzhanyan waived their right to a trial by jury, and consented to trial by the judge. The fourth defendant, Margaryan, was tried by jury.

Sharopetrosian apparently masterminded the large scale fraud scheme from behind bars at Avenal State Prison. Along with codefendant Angus Brown he ran the op via cellphone. The group was able to obtain confidential information about individuals and, with names, social security numbers and dates of birth on hand, impersonated their victims when calling banks, transferring money between accounts and ordering checks. They would then use the victim’s signatures found on public documents to forge the checks. The group usually targeted high-value bank accounts. Over six years, the group stole more than $10 million from victims in Southern California, Nevada, Arizona and Texas.
“These defendants, including two individuals who were operating from a prison cell, perpetrated a massive fraudulent scheme on behalf of a dangerous criminal enterprise,” said Lanny Breuer, the Assistant Attorney General. He added that “We are doing everything possible to shut down dangerous gangs like ArmenianPower.”
Formed in East Hollywood in the 1980s, Armenian Power members are mostly Armenians and immigrants from former Soviet-bloc countries. The gang formed in response to other ethnic
street gangs in the area. From early on, Armenian Power was involved in murders, attempted murders, kidnappings, robberies, extortions, witness intimidation, drug trafficking and fraud, prosecutors say.
Today, Armenian Power is believed to have over 200 documented members and hundreds of associates across Los Angeles County. A younger generation of Eastern European gangster who speaks Russian and Armenian and maintains ties to his parents’ homeland brings a new level of sophistication to their criminal enterprises.
“The younger generation has helped to advance the organization’s technological abilities to commit fraud and to facilitate Internet crimes,” according to a report by the Eurasian Organized Crime Task Force, comprising local, state and federal officers in Southern California. “This technical savvy, coupled with their language capabilities and ability to interface with their countries of origin, makes them difficult to detect.”
The gang’s impact on youth in the area seems to have faded. Years ago, Armenian youths emulated Hispanic gangsters with shaved heads, tattoos, muscle shirts, and khaki pants. L.A. gang interventionists say they haven’t seen much activity by Armenian Power, a big change from years ago when police officers, teachers and school counselors would brace for fights that used to break out between Hispanic gangs and Armenian Power in and around some Glendale and Los Angeles schools, said William “Blinky” Rodriguez, the executive director of Communities in Schools, a gang intervention and prevention program. “AP has been pretty quiet for some time now.”
Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Sgt. Steve Opferman, who leads the Los Angeles County Health Authority Law Enforcement Task Force that combats health care fraud in Southern California, also noted a downtick in activity by Armenian Power.
“They’re not as highly visible. They’ve established themselves. They’ve gone a bit more underground.” Not surprising really as credit and debit card fraud and identity theft are now among their most lucrative schemes.
The four defendants just sentenced are among 20 people charged with running the bank fraud and identity theft scam. The indictments were unsealed on Feb. 16, 2011.
Sharopetrosian, Margaryan, Markosian and Ogandzhanyan face sentences of up to 30 years for each count of bank fraud, 30 years for each count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, as well as an additional mandatory two year sentences for each count of aggravated identity theft. Their sentencing is scheduled for Aug. 6, 2012.

A while ago I started getting links to a Youtube page in which an articulate young filmmaker, Jeremy Gilley, speaks about the International Day of Peace. Google him and you will discover he started thinking about this over a decade ago in 1998, when he wanted to make a film about peace;
“The millennium was coming, this big moment that everyone was talking about, so I wanted to record something about the world and why we’re not living peacefully. I was thinking about whether the United Nations could really unite the world and the more I thought about it, the more I realised that there was no international day of peace.”
“My goal became to make a film that would try and establish the first ever day of peace on this planet with a fixed calendar date, voted by every head of state in the world.”
He succeeded. In 2001, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a new resolution 55/282 declaring 21st September of each year as the International Day of Peace.
The resolution: “Declares that the International Day of Peace shall henceforth be observed as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence, an invitation to all nations and people to honour a cessation of hostilities for the duration of the Day.”
So what happens on peace day? Whatever you want. It is not just symbolic, as Gilley says, it is a day to make a commitment. A day to spend with your family, to have a picnic, to organize an immunization, to say sorry. It is a day to talk about peace with your neighbours, to spread the word.
And so, I have a simple request for the approaching day. This September 21st we should visit our enemies, take them by the hand and say, “I don’t care.”
“I don’t care that you are Turkish, Armenian, Greek, Cypriot, Muslim, Jewish, Maronite, Protestant, Catholic, Druze, Shiaa, Kurd. I don’t care what you are because you are the neighbour that fed our cat while we were away and lent my son your bicycle and taught him tennis and I don’t want to be your enemy because actually, I like you.”
If you look at the human aspect of it, Turks, Armenians and Greeks have lived together for centuries without a problem. Look for the Armenian quarter and it is always slap-bang next to the Turks. We may be scared to admit it, but we get on with each other. We wear the same clothes, shop in the same stores and eat the same food. So why are we enemies? Because our governments tell us we are. One day something happens, the next we are at war and then we become addicted to enmity. We are fed it at school, through religious intolerance, through racial stereotyping, through politics.
How many Turks in the Ottoman Empire do you think were horrified by what happened to their neighbours between 1895 and 1922? How many abhorred watching their friends stripped of their belongings and marched off into the desert to die? And how many do you think are confused today by acts of violence against writers and thinkers who speak out against what happened years ago?
And how many kids went back to school after the 1974 invasion in Cyprus to find that their favourite teacher was gone? That their classmates had disappeared? That, not only were their homes and favourite beaches inaccessible, but they could no longer pick up a phone and call their neighbour at the end of the street because of an arbitrary border?
And how do we ever expect to get answers to these questions if we don’t greet our enemies as friends and ask them?
If we want to move from a culture of war to a culture of peace we must unite. We cannot wait for governments to make a difference- they’re too busy politicking, creating more borders and perpetuating enmity. It is down to us- you and me- to take our neighbours by the hand and say,
“I don’t care. I don’t care who you are or whatever happened to us in the past, right here, right now, you are my friend.”
Let us celebrate Peace.