Imre Arakas

In 1979, aged twenty, he and a friend broke into a shooting club in Tallinn and stole 13 handguns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.[2] Some saw the theft as a blow against the Soviet regime.[2] Arakas was quickly arrested and escaped from the courthouse on 18 April 1979, evading authorities by jumping from the Kohtuotsa viewing platform on Toompea hill.[2] He was arrested again after 87 days and sentenced to 15 years in jail, mostly in a high-security Russian facility.[2]

After release from prison he joined an Estonian organised crime gang and took part in a feud with Russian organised crime that killed over a hundred people.[2] Arakas was nearly killed on more than one occasion.[2]

He left Estonia for Spain in 1998.[2] A failed assassination attempt was made in Marbella and two Estonians were jailed for their part in it.[2]

After this he became a freelance professional killer who is suspected of being responsible for a number of murders across Europe.[2]

He was employed by the Kinahan gang as part of the Kinahan-Hutch feud.[2] He was hired to kill James "Mago" Gately.[2] Arakas owed a lot of money and the €100,000 payment for murdering Gately would pay off a large amount of it.[2] Gardaí received intelligence that he was going to arrive in Ireland and put him under surveillance.[2] The assassination was prevented and in 2018, he was jailed for six years by the Special Criminal Court.[2][4][3] While in Mountjoy Prison he suffered a stroke.[4]

He is expected to be deported to Lithuania after release from prison where he faces murder charges.[5] He is a suspect in the murder of Deimantas Bugavicius, lover of Lithuanian pop star Vita Jakutienė, on 6 November 2015.[5] The victim was shot by a three-man gang.[5] In June 2020 he announced that he would challenge the extradition.[1][6]