“Russian Spy’s Hotel Hideout: A Real-Life Q with a Cache of High-Tech Espionage Tools, Court Reveals”

A Russian spy resided in a “typical coastal hotel” along the English seaboard, packed with electronic surveillance devices, as presented in court.

Orlin Roussev bragged to his supervisor that he was becoming akin to the James Bond character “Q” while he readied his espionage “gadgets” for kidnapping and surveillance missions throughout Europe.

It is alleged that he received directives from a handler named Jan Marsalek, who is sought after in relation to a £1.6bn technology scam associated with a firm known as Wirecard.

Roussev, a 46-year-old Bulgarian citizen, has admitted to operating a spy network for the Russians, yet three other associates of the group refute the accusations.

The Old Bailey was informed that a “huge” inventory of technological gear for “intrusive surveillance” was discovered at Roussev’s location in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, which he referred to in messages as his “Indiana Jones warehouse”.

The Haydee guesthouse on Prince’s Road featured 33 rooms, according to Dan Pawson-Pounds, the prosecutor.

Within three of the rooms, there was a “substantial amount of IT and surveillance apparatus”. It was stored in two storage areas and an office utilized by Roussev, as stated in court.

The jury learned that Operation Skirp seized 3,540 pieces of evidence from several sites, including 1,650 digital items, and exhibited two “IMSI grabbers” – a black metal box capable of acquiring mobile phone numbers from the surrounding vicinity.

Both instruments were labeled as “law enforcement caliber” and could intercept or interrupt targeted mobile phone communications, as well as identify a specific phone via its IMSI and IMEI numbers, alongside a direction-finding system.

The operatives aimed to use them near a US military installation in Stuttgart, Germany, to gather data from the phones of Ukrainian soldiers being trained to operate Patriot missile defense systems, according to the prosecution.

The intelligence would have allowed them to trace the servicemen back to Ukraine and ascertain where the missiles were launched from, but the scheme was thwarted when the individuals were detained in February of the previous year.

Read more about the trial:
Five accused of spying for Russia charged, CPS states
Spies entangled in love triangle utilized in ‘honeytrap’ throughout Europe
Spies conspired to abduct a journalist linked to the Salisbury incident

Devices with concealed cameras part of the evidence

Additional discoveries comprised pendant necklaces equipped with hidden cameras, water containers with mobile phone-linked video monitoring functionalities, a Pandora car key cloning apparatus, and more conventional surveillance devices such as night vision binoculars and portable radios.

Among the members of the espionage network were reportedly Katrin Ivanova, 33, a laboratory technician from Harrow in North London, Vanya Gaberova, 30, a beautician from Acton in West London, and Tihomir Ivanchev, 39, a painter and decorator from Enfield.

Both Roussev and Biser Dzhambazov, a 43-year-old man from London suspected to be part of the group, have both confessed to conspiracy to gather intelligence beneficial to an adversary.

Gaberova, Ivanova, and Ivanchev all contest the accusations, and the trial is ongoing. All five individuals are Bulgarian nationals with “settled status” in the UK.

Moreover, further paraphernalia – including a black cap with a concealed camera and a one-liter plastic Coke bottle featuring a waterproof camera behind the label – was discovered in the lounge of a North London apartment shared by Ivanova and Dzhambazov, as the trial has revealed.

The trial is still in progress.