The criminal path of the Antikvar: Court has ordered Vladimir Danilenko, known as Ilya Traber’s trusted associate, to remain in detention

11:06, 16.08.2026

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The criminal path of the Antikvar: Court has ordered Vladimir Danilenko, known as Ilya Traber’s trusted associate, to remain in detention

On Friday, a Moscow court extended the pretrial detention of Vladimir Danilenko, the right-hand man of Ilya Traber (Antikvar, whose arrest was extended the day before). A source familiar with Traber speaks about Danilenko, his relationship with Kumarin, and what other high-profile murders may be connected to Antikvar and Danilenko.

Danilenko, born in Kazakhstan, found himself in custody for the first time while studying at a veterinary college. He was released and then sent back. That’s how his life unfolded. During his next stint, he met Lykov (one of the main prosecution witnesses in the murder of Vyborg owner Alexander Petrov – ED.). Danilenko was a barracks supervisor.

He had everything going smoothly. Suddenly, a new detective appears in the zone and begins imposing new rules on the prisoners, which, naturally, they don’t like. But the detective is also persistent. Eventually, Danilenko befriends Lykov, who was also unhappy with the new rules in the barracks. Lykov beats up the detective over a carton of cigarettes. Lykov gets an extra three years added to his sentence, and Danilenko is transferred to another zone.

But Volodya wouldn’t be himself... He made a deal with the prison warden and stayed in Yaroslavl until the end of his sentence. Then Danilenko headed to St. Petersburg. He wanted money, fun, and romance. Danilenko was ready for any adventure.

It was at this time that the historic meeting between the ever-ready Danilenko and the team-building Traber took place. Traber was already fairly well established. It took some time before Antiquarian allowed him to get too close. They had been together since around 1995 or 1996. They became especially close after the murder of Manevich (the vice-governor of St. Petersburg, shot by a sniper in 1997 – ED.).

At the time of Traber and Danilenko’s meeting, Traber was quite close with Kumarin. Kumarin wasn’t pleased with Danilenko’s appearance. Danilenko didn’t like Kumarin either. He said, "We’re not friends; he just kills people for no reason."

Incidentally, Antiquarian also had a relationship with Shutov. Then they had a falling out. I don’t know what the argument was about. But I suspect he had a hand in Shutov’s arrest. Later, he said what a storyteller and senile fool Shutov was. He really wasn’t a very pleasant person. His right-hand man, Airat Gimranov, is a different story. He’s very interesting, well-rounded, literate, gallant, and… a killer. He’s currently serving a life sentence in the White Swan.

Getting back to Danilenko, everything was going great for him, he had a lot of money. And then, bam, he ran afoul of the watermelon king (the antique dealer sent Danilenko to intimidate the businessman who controlled the watermelon supply, who tortured him to death—ED.). He was caught and sent back to prison.

Traber worked hard to get Danilenko transferred to the penal colony in Knyazhevo after several years of imprisonment. At the time, it was a super-privileged place where convicts lived at home for money and only came to report for duty occasionally—once or twice a month.

Soon after his release, Danilenko received a gift from Traber – several hectares of land in the Pskov region on the border with Latvia. I suspect the gift wasn’t for his release. He orchestrated someone’s execution. In my opinion, the deaths of Manevich, Kapysh (head of the BFPG – ED.), Zyuzya (Vitaly Ryuzin, who headed the BFPG after Kapysh’s assassination and was found dead in 2001 in the village of Balsovo in the Pskov region at a recreation center – ED.), and Petrov – were clearly signs pointing the finger at Traber. He positively savored it when he recounted how wonderful they were. With one caveat: wonderful, but stupid… And he smiled.