STRIP CLUB OWNER, FEDS MAKE DEAL

MIAMI (AP) A strip club owner has agreed to cooperate with federal
authorities investigating reputed Russian crime figures in south Florida.

The Feb. 19 deal means Ludwig Fainberg, 41, will receive protection and a
possible lighter sentence for his part in a drug conspiracy and
racketeering case, The Miami Herald reported today.

Federal authorities are expected to confiscate Fainberg's club, Porky's, as
part of the deal. The club has been a hangout for suspected Russian
mobsters and the focus of a three-year federal operation that involved
11,000 taped conversations, undercover agents and informants.

"Fainberg is not the bad guy here," said Porky's Inc. attorney Louis J.
Terminello. "He's just got a big mouth he uses to try to impress people,
and now look where it's gotten him."

While federal investigators listened, Fainberg and other Russians
reportedly discussed the attempted transfer of a Cold War-era Russian
nuclear attack submarine to Colombian drug lords, as well as prostitution,
extortion, drug trafficking, counterfeiting and fraud.

In 1997, Fainberg was charged with plotting to help cocaine suppliers
negotiate with former Soviet military officials to buy submarines, planes
and helicopters, U.S. officials said.

Fainberg, who emigrated from the Soviet Union in the 1980s, faces up to 8
1/2 years in prison. Federal authorities have offered him and his
6-year-old daughter a place in the Federal Witness Protection Program and a
special visa to prevent his deportation.