Felix Sater

Felix Henry Sater (born Felix Mikhailovich Sheferovsky; Фе́ликс Миха́йлович Шеферовский; March 2, 1966) is a Russian-American mobster, convicted felon, real estate developer and former managing director of Bayrock Group LLC, a real estate conglomerate based out of New York City.

He has been an advisor to corporations such as The Trump Organization, and the Mirax Group.

The family emigrated to Israel when Felix was 8 years old to avoid religious persecution in the Soviet Union, and eventually came to the United States, living in Baltimore, Maryland before settling in Brighton Beach, New York in 1974.

Felix and his sister adopted the surname Sater.

Mikhail Sheferovsky (also known as Michael Sheferofsky) states that the family name was Saterov at some point (Сатаров).

According to the FBI, Mikhail Sheferovsky was an underboss for Russian Mafia "boss of bosses" Semion Mogilevich, and was convicted of extorting money from local restaurants, grocery stores, and a medical clinic.

Felix Sater was reportedly a childhood friend of Michael Cohen.

Sater attended Pace University, dropping out at the age of 18 to work on Wall Street, initially as a cold-caller at Bear Stearns.

He subsequently worked at brokerages Ladenburg Thalmann, Broadchild Securities, Rooney Pace, Shearson, Moseley Securities, Gruntal & Co., and Lehman Brothers.

In 1991, he smashed a margarita glass in a bar and used it to stab a commodities broker in the face, causing the man to need 110 stitches.

In 1991, Sater got into an argument with a commodities broker at the El Rio Grande restaurant and bar in Midtown Manhattan.

He stabbed the man's cheek and neck with the stem of a cocktail glass, breaking his jaw, lacerating his face, and severing nerves, creating a wound that would require 110 stitches to treat.

Sater was convicted of first degree assault, and spent 15 months in minimum security Edgecombe Correctional Facility in New York City before being paroled.

For this, Sater was convicted of first-degree assault in 1993; spent 15 months in prison, and was barred by the National Association of Securities Dealers from acting as a broker or otherwise associating with a broker-dealer firm.

In January 2022, Sater claimed that the barfight victim had tried to decline pressing charges, but that the U.S. government kept pressing because they wanted cooperation from Sater's father.

In 1998, Sater pleaded guilty to his involvement in a $40 million stock fraud scheme orchestrated by the Russian Mafia, and became an informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and federal prosecutors, assisting with organized crime investigations.

In 1998, Sater was convicted of fraud in connection to a $40 million penny stock pump and dump scheme conducted by the Russian Mafia involving his company White Rock Partners.

In return for a guilty plea, Sater agreed to assist the FBI and federal prosecutors as an informant on organized crime.

Sater joined Bayrock Group LLC as a senior advisor in 2003 at the behest of the company's owner and founder, Tevfik Arif.

As a senior advisor, he assisted with several projects, including executive decisions in the Trump SoHo project.

Felix Sater was a managing director of Bayrock Group LLC, as well as a senior advisor to Donald Trump and The Trump Organization when construction of the Trump SoHo began in 2006.

In 2008, Sater joined the board of the Russian real estate company Mirax Group, owned by Sergei Polonsky.

He left Bayrock Group LLC in 2008 after the New York Times disclosed his pending criminal case.

In 2009, he was sentenced to pay a $25,000 fine; he served no prison time and paid no restitution to his stock-fraud victims.

He played a major role throughout the process of the building's construction, and remained managing director of Bayrock Group when the Trump SoHo project was completed in 2010.

The building is a $450 million, 46-story, 391-unit hotel condominium located at 246 Spring Street in SoHo, New York City.

The project was a collaboration between The Trump Organization, Bayrock Group LLC and Tamir Sapir.

During Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, Sater worked with Michael Cohen, former attorney for The Trump Organization, to broker a deal to build a Trump Tower Moscow, asserting to Cohen that he could boost Trump's election prospects through his Russian contacts.

In 2017, Sater agreed to cooperate with investigators into international money laundering schemes.

In December 2017, the Trump SoHo was renamed to The Dominick.

Sater has been an advisor, investor, or developer in notable real estate projects including the Trump International Hotel & Residence in Phoenix, Arizona, the Conrad Fort Lauderdale and Midtown Miami in Florida, and Cornwall Terrace and 1 Blackfriars in London.

In addition to real estate development endeavors, Sater also has started businesses in the fields of philanthropy, investment, retail, and energy.

In late January 2017, Sater met with Ukrainian politician Andrey Artemenko and Donald Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, at the Loews Regency in Manhattan to discuss a plan to lift sanctions against Russia.

The proposed plan would require that Russian forces withdraw from eastern Ukraine and that Ukraine hold a referendum on whether Crimea should be "leased" to Russia for 50 or 100 years.

On 20 February 2017, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov rejected Russia "leasing" Crimea from Ukraine claiming "we cannot rent from ourselves".

Felix Sater has been described as a career criminal due to his links to organized crime.

On June 21, 2019, Sater was issued a subpoena by the House Intelligence Committee after he refused a request to testify voluntarily.

On July 9, 2019, Sater appeared before the House Intelligence Committee, but repeatedly withheld testimony and documents concerning the details of a false joint defense agreement and thus remains under subpoena.

Sater was born in Moscow into a Russian Jewish family, the son of Mikhail Sheferovsky and Rachel Sheferovskaya.

He has a sister, Regina.