The Magnitsky Act was the invention of Bill Browder. He started a hedge fund in Russia that made a fortune. He bought shares in corrupt companies. As a shareholder he could expose them. That forced them to reform. That made the share price rocket up.

The Russians came after him. He got out with most of his money. However, the Russian police seized corporate documents and used them to commit massive frauds. Browder’s lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, who had stayed in Russia, discovered the scams. But the perps were the police. They counter-accused. Sergei was arrested. The application of bail in Russia is arbitrary and rare. Magnitsky was held in pretrial detention. During that year, he was tormented, tortured, and finally murdered.

Browder knew Russia in depth and detail. He crafted a plan that targeted the individuals responsible and got it passed as American law. It froze the assets they held in the United States, banned them from bringing more money in, and stopped them from getting U.S. visas. The act could be expanded, and it was, to cover more people. Uniquely, it targeted the rich, powerful, and criminal, Putin’s inner circle.

A syllogism is deductive reasoning based on two or more propositions assumed to be true. Oligarchs who are not friends of Putin are no longer oligarchs, or are in exile, or they’re dead. Therefore, a live oligarch, domiciled in Russia, or even passing through regularly, is a friend of Putin. If Voloshin was a Russian billionaire, he was a friend of Putin. If he was listed under the Magnitsky Act, the U.S. State Department considered him some sort of criminal.

There’s riches at her command.

She married for wealth, not for love.

‘Though she lives in a mansion grand,

She’s only a bird in a gilded cage.

Kaylee wanted to come to America. Her parents, her family, were here. Even to move back. God only allowed her the shortest trips. One, two, three days, at the most. When she came to America, where he couldn’t follow, he kept Leo. Whenever she traveled alone, anywhere, he kept Leo.

She wanted a divorce. He’d said no.

“Aren’t divorces easy in Russia? Very common, too,” I said.

“Judges are easy to bribe in Russia,” Kaylee stated. Silver chains and diamond-studded shackles.