“Diamond Enterprise” Members And Associates Indicted For Racketeering, Gambling, Extortion, Fraud, Money Laundering, And Obstruction Offenses

Enterprise Members and Co-Defendants Charged with an Array of Crimes Including Extortion and Fraud on the Federal Paycheck Protection Program

Audrey Strauss, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, William F. Sweeney Jr., Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), Dermot Shea, Commissioner of the New York City Police Department (“NYPD”), and Amaleka McCall-Brathwaite, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Eastern Region Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Small Business Administration (“SBA-OIG”), announced the unsealing of an Indictment charging 16 defendants in counts including racketeering, gambling, extortion, fraud, money laundering, and obstruction of justice offenses.  Of the 16 defendants, ABDURAMAN ISENI, a/k/a “Diamond,” ERVIN MAKISHTI, a/k/a “Vinny,” SOKOL GJONI, MIRALEM LJULJANOVIC, and JETMIR SULAJ, are associated with a racketeering enterprise referred to in the Indictment as the “Diamond Enterprise,” a criminal group overseen by ISENI, and are charged in United States v. Iseni, et al. (the “Indictment”), which has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Andrew J. Carter.

Eleven additional defendants are charged in the Indictment with various offenses, many relating to the operations of the overarching Diamond Enterprise, including extortion, operation of illegal gambling establishments, money laundering, bank fraud, fraud on the federal Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”), and obstruction of justice. Specifically:

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