US court documents reveal story of alleged 'Russian mafia associate' arrested in Saskatoon

US court documents provide insight into Alex Alexidze's winding path from the former Soviet Union to a Saskatoon prison cell.

The 48-year-old man, described by American police as a “proven associate of the Russian mafia,” faces multiple charges in Saskatoon. Police arrested him on May 14 at the West End apartment where he lived. Police say they recovered several fake and falsified documents from the apartment.

Alexidze is charged with procuring false identity documents, possession of credit cards obtained during the commission of an offense, possession of proceeds of crime over $5,000, possession of citizenship documents in a fraudulent purpose, fraud over $5,000 and use of false documents.

Police also allege he had a 2019 Chevrolet Malibu stolen.

According to US documents, this is not the first time Alexidze has faced such allegations.

In 2015, he pleaded guilty in an Akron, Ohio, court to trying to illegally obtain a legal permanent resident card, also known as a “green card.” At the time, he had a Canadian Indian status card in the name of John Peters and a letter claiming he was a member of the Teslin Tlingit First Nation in southern Yukon.

As part of the trial, defense lawyer Damian Billak submitted Alexidze's personal history.

“Mr. Alexidze grew up in a stable, middle-class family in the Soviet Union. Due to his father's political involvement, Mr. Alexidze was sent to the United States in 1998 due to violent threats against the family, but ended up in Canada Between 1998 and 2014, Mr. Alexidze lived in Canada, in Brooklyn, New York and Akron, Ohio,” Billak wrote.

“Mr. Alexidze graduated from high school in 1992 in the former Soviet Union and later earned a bachelor's degree in hotel management from Georgia State University in the Republic of Georgia in 1997. Then, while While living in Canada, Mr. Alexidze obtained his (commercial driver's license) and was employed at Horizon Transportation until the time of his arrest.

Fingerprint file

Alexidze appeared on the Department of Homeland Security's radar in April 2015 when he walked into a Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Cleveland, according to an affidavit from Special Agent Mark Bodo.

The man introduced himself as “John Peters” and was applying for a green card. As part of the process, staff conducted a check of the law enforcement database, which included fingerprints, Bodo wrote.

“The computer system returned the prints of ‘Peters’ as belonging to Alex Alexide (sic), a Russian national, who had previously been processed and deported from Harlingen, Texas,” Bodo wrote.

Alexidze maintained that he was John Peters, even correctly identifying the names of Peters' parents.

In the meantime, Ohio officers contacted their New York counterparts. They learned that agents in Albany were already investigating.

An officer passed Bodo an RCMP document showing a photo of Alexidze side-by-side with a photo of the real John Peters.

It was only after this revelation, and when Bodo read him his rights, that Alexidze requested a lawyer and requested asylum for political reasons.

When Bodo asked him what the political reason was, the man replied that “his father was involved in politics in the Free Georgian Party from 1989 to 1998.”

To Canada

Alexidze was handed over to Canadian authorities in February 2016.

“Provincial authorities in Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario have active arrest warrants for Alexidze on multiple charges related to theft, identity fraud, forged documents and other charges” , says a press release from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

He allegedly committed these frauds in Canada from 2013 to 2015, sometimes using the pseudonym “Alex Row”.

Saskatoon police are not saying how Alexidze came to their attention in March.

He returns to court Wednesday for a bail hearing.