A Russian spy ring amassed thousands of items of electronic surveillance equipment at its lair in Great Yarmouth, a court has heard.
Photographs of scanners, listening devices, cameras and fake ID printers seized by police were shown to an Old Bailey jury for the first time today.
The alleged spy ring – led by Orlin Roussev, a Kremlin agent, from his home in a converted hotel in the seaside town – had gathered more than 3,000 items of surveillance equipment, worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, to use on espionage missions in the UK by the time police arrested them in February 2023.
Roussev, 46, and Bizer Dzhambazov, 43, his second-in-command, have already admitted to conspiracy to spy with a Russian agent using the alias Rupert Ticz, who prosecutors allege is Jan Marsalek, the fugitive boss of the German payments processor Wirecard.
Marsalek is wanted by Interpol in connection with a £1.6 billion fraud at Wirecard, which collapsed in 2020.
Katrin Ivanova, Dzhambazov’s 33-year-old girlfriend, Vanya Gaberova, his 30-year-old lover, and Tihomir Ivanchev, Gaberova’s ex-boyfriend, 39, all deny being part of the conspiracy and are on trial at the Old Bailey.
Orlin Roussev, centre, and Bizer Dzhambazov, right, have admitted to conspiracy to spy. Katrin Ivanova, centre, denies the charges
Fake IDs, drones and tracking device found
The jury were shown several photographs taken by Metropolitan Police counter-terrorism officers inside the office from where Roussev masterminded the spying operation.
Among the devices physically passed around members of the jury for closer inspection, was one described in court as a “law enforcement grade” eavesdropping device for phones, also known as an IMSI grabber.
The device, the size of a large shoe box, contained a software radio board “used in government and law enforcement telecoms intercept equipment”.
Police photographs showed piles of equipment scattered around the room in the former hotel in Princes Road, which Roussev used as a headquarters from which to run the spying operation.
The converted hotel is said to have been the location from which the spy ring was run
Also seized from the rooms rented by Roussev were printers and scanners capable of producing fake IDs, a large number of mobile phones, drones and numerous fake British, Slovenian, Bulgarian, Italian and Greek passports and ID cards, including a fake Czech passport in the name of Jan Marsalek.
Officers found piles of equipment in Roussev’s rooms
Fake ID documents were found at the converted hotel
The jury was also shown a mobile phone tracking device, also described as of the type used by law enforcement agencies, which the prosecution said could be used along with the IMSI grabber “to intercept and or disrupt specifically targeted mobile phone operations … and identify an individual by their IMSI codes and locate them within five metres”.
Secret cameras ‘in Coke bottle and Minion toy’
Similar surveillance equipment is alleged to have also been found in the home shared by Dzhambazov and Ms Ivanova in Harrow, north-west London, including GPs trackers, radio frequency jammers.
Devices and equipment were also found in a house in Harrow
Two fake rocks with cameras hidden inside were also allegedly found at their address, along with a camera hidden in a watch and others hidden in a car key and a lighter. One hidden camera was allegedly hidden inside a child’s Minion toy.
Large numbers of mobile phones were also found by police, along with what the prosecution described as “a vast array” of computing equipment.
Bizer Dzhambazov, left, and Katrin Ivanova, right. Surveillance equipment was found at their home in Harrow – Central News/Web Collect
Dan Pawson-Pounds, prosecuting, told the jury: “A vast amount of surveillance devices which could be used to enable intrusive surveillance were recovered from the addresses which form part of this investigation.”
Counter-terror officers who searched the Harrow address also found a safe hidden inside a wardrobe, inside of which was a pink decorated box with false ID documents and a Samsung mobile phone belonging to Ms Ivanova.
A tracking device was found in Dzhambazov’s bedside drawer, along with a radio jammer. Elsewhere in the property officers found a secret camera hidden inside a Coke bottle.
The trial continues.