NYT: Natalia Veselnitskaya, attorney, seen as "fearsome Moscow insider."
The Russian attorney who met with Donald, Jared, and Paul last summer got her big NY money-laundering case settled in May by the US attorney who replaced Preet Bharara.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/11/world/europe/natalia-veselnitskaya-donald-trump-jr-russian-lawyer.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=0
Ms. Veselnitskaya built her career in the sharp-elbowed struggle for land as the Moscow suburbs expanded, as once derelict factory sites and other plots became wildly valuable with the spread of shopping centers and new highways. And she forged an important connection to the Katsyv family.
William Browder, an American-born hedge fund manager who has tussled repeatedly with Ms. Veselnitskaya, said of the elder Mr. Katsyv: “In the world of Russia he’d be the equivalent of a Chris Christie: no formal relationship to the Kremlin, but with very strong relations to the powers that be.”
The family’s trust in Ms. Veselnitskaya was rewarded in May, when she helped Denis P. Katsyv, Petr’s son, fight the money laundering claims in New York brought by the Manhattan federal prosecutor at the time, Preet Bharara. Mr. Bharara tangled with Ms. Veselnitskaya several times and protested at one point that she had been charging the government for a $995-a-night room at the Plaza Hotel.
The case was settled two months after Mr. Bharara was dismissed by President Trump.
Prevezon Holdings, Mr. Katsyv’s company, paid $6 million to resolve the claim without admitting any crime. While the prosecution portrayed the settlement as a victory, Ms. Veselnitskaya told the newspaper Izvestia that it was “almost an apology from the government.”