Body Found In A Hudson Valley Home Linked To Organized Crime Extortion Case

ELLENVILLE, NY — A body found dumped in a remote area of the Hudson Valley is at the center of an violent organized crime extortion plot, according to the FBI.

A federal jury in Brooklyn has convicted Shlomo Patchiav, also known as “Slava Fatkhiev,” of participating in the extortion conspiracy in which he repeatedly threatened a victim for money. The verdict was returned after a three-week federal trial.

Joseph Nocella, Jr., United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York and James C. Barnacle, Jr., Assistant Director in Charge, FBI New York Field Office, announced the verdict.

“Shlomo Patchiav agreed to extort a victim for money before trying to hide his connection to this conspiracy once the victim was found murdered," Barnacle said. "May today’s verdict emphasize the FBI’s commitment to ensuring violent intimidation tactics and attempts to cover up crimes do not go unpunished."

When sentenced, Patchiav faces up to 20 years in prison.

“Today’s verdict holds the defendant accountable for extorting a victim for money and threatening to hold him ‘hostage,’ and then covering up his connection to the victim after the victim’s murder by concealing his body,” Nocella.

Patchiav and a co-conspirator engaged in an extortion plot in which they used threats and violence against the victim, Shehroz Tokhirov, after the three men failed to reach an agreement in a luxury watch deal. Patchiav owned a wholesale jewelry and diamond business.

In June 2022, Patchiav and the co-conspirator engaged in negotiations with the victim about the potential sale of several luxury watches for approximately $500,000. Patchiav and his co-conspirator, however, began demanding money from Tokhirov and threatening him.

On the morning of June 25, 2022, the victim left his Brooklyn home carrying a plastic bag full of cash. Video surveillance footage showed Tokhirov and the co-conspirator at a TD Bank in Brooklyn, where the victim withdrew approximately $10,000 in cash and obtained a cashier’s check for $20,000 that was made out to the co-conspirator.

The two men then went to a tax services store where Tokhirov signed a document turning over his Mercedes Benz SUV to the co-conspirator. Tokhirov was not seen or heard from after that meeting, and, eight months later, his body was discovered in a home in Ellenville.

Evidence admitted at trial, including cell phone location data, placed Patchiav and the Co-Conspirator in Ellenville on June 26, 2022, the day after Tokhirov’s disappearance.

On June 27, 2022, the co-conspirator purchased a ticket for a Turkish Airlines flight from John F. Kennedy International Airport to the Republic of Georgia, departing on June 28, 2022. On the date of his departure, law enforcement officers seized from the co-conspirator approximately $26,500 in cash and a receipt for the $20,000 check that Tokhirov had obtained at TD Bank on the day of his disappearance.

That co-Conspirator remains at large, according to feds.