Murder incites speculation in media
By The Baltic Times

Baltic times, Latvia
May 27 2004

TALLINN – Estonia’s media on Wednesday was inundated with speculation
on the murder of ethnic Russian Estonian businessman and former member
of Tallinn City Council, Gennady Ever.

The Postimees daily speculated that the murder could have been revenge
on the part of the Estonian underworld for Ever’s unfulfilled promises
to local crime lords. Anonymous sources told the paper that Ever’s
garrulous relations with several figures of the mob might have lead
to the murder.

“Ever enjoyed their attention, he wanted to look influential and
authoritative,” a police source was quoted by the paper as saying.
Police sources said one promise that Ever gave but never fulfilled
to underworld boss Harun Dikayev was to obtain all necessary permits
to build a mosque in Tallinn. Another possible motive for the death
could be Ever’s business ties to Russia. As the Postimees reported,
Ever’s partner in the restaurant business in Pskov, just across the
border, was an ethnic Armenian businessman known as Rubik who had
been active in Estonia in the early 1990s.

Rubik, who moved to Russia years ago, was assassinated in Pskov two
months ago.

Eesti Paevaleht, another leading daily, has linked Ever’s murder to
the gunning down of Estonian media mogul Vitaly Haitov in front of his
Tallinn home in 2001. Sources told the newspaper that Ever may have
been killed by the underworld for being too open-mouthed and telling
his acquaintances how he ordered the murder of Haitov for Dikayev,
an ethnic Chechen. The paper said that this was why Ever recently
sold most of his business interests and real estate in Estonia and
moved to Russia.

Ever was shot seven times by a Kalashnikov equipped with a silencer
in Pskov on Tuesday morning.