A prominent businessman in exile in the United States after criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin was found dead in front of the home where he lived in an upscale neighborhood in Washington, DC, reports the New York Post tabloid, taken by Radar.

Dan RapoportPhoto: Not provided / WillWest News / Profimedia

Dan Rapoport, 52, was found lying on the sidewalk in front of an apartment building in the 2400 block of Main Street in the Georgetown neighborhood around 9 p.m. Sunday, according to police sources.

Police said they made the gruesome discovery after receiving a call about “a person who allegedly jumped off the floor.”

The cause of death has not been released, but police said: “At this time, we do not believe it is a homicide.”

Dan Rapoport’s widow: “It’s not suicide”

His death was first reported by Yunia Pugacheva, former editor of Tatler Russia, who reported in her Telegram account that Rapoport committed suicide, and his dog – a mongrel named Boy – was found nearby. the park along with the obituary and cash.

Pugacheva claimed she last saw Rapoport, an investment banker and former co-owner of popular Moscow nightclub Soho Rooms, at the Connaught bar in London, where she said he was “as usual surrounded by young women” after his wife allegedly left . him.

However, Rapoport’s widow, Alena Rapoport, denied that her husband committed suicide.

“There were no tickets with a message about suicide, not about any suicide, not about a trip to London, not about a breakup,” Olena emphasized on the air of the Russian news site RBC, adding that Rapoport’s death is now the subject of an open investigation. authorities.

What the police found at the scene of death

Two days before his death, Rapoport posted what later turned out to be his last Facebook message – a dark photo of Marlon Brando as Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now, accompanied by the text: “Horror, horror.”

As the British newspaper Daily Mail reports, at the scene of the incident, the police found a number of personal items that could belong to Rapoport – more than $2,600 in cash, a broken mobile phone and a broken headset.

The newspaper also reported that in the months before his death, Rapoport had been involved in a conflict with a Russian financial firm that tried to steal $10,000 from him, he said in a text message to a friend.

He sold the house to Ivanka Trump

Rapoport was born in Latvia, when the Baltic country was part of the Soviet Union. In 1980, his family immigrated to the United States after receiving political asylum.

In 1991, Rapoport graduated from the University of Houston, and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, he moved to Russia to pursue a career as an investment banker.

Rapoport left Russia in 2012 because of his support for dissident Alexei Navalny, who is now serving years in a notorious high-security prison, and returned to the US with his first wife, Irina, a model.

The Rapoports settled in a majestic multi-million dollar mansion in the Calorma area of ​​Washington

In 2016, Rapoport sold the property to Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, who moved to the capital to join Donald Trump’s administration.

He criticized Putin for the annexation of Crimea

Soon after, Rapoport, who was already divorced at the time, went to Kyiv, Ukraine, where he met his second wife, Alyona, a virologist by profession.

Rapoport distinguished himself as an ardent supporter of Ukrainian independence and criticized Putin after the annexation of Crimea.

After the war with Russia broke out in February, Alena Rapoport told the BBC that her husband managed to evacuate her and their daughter from Kyiv, after which he returned “to come to the aid of my country”. Later, we were going to meet again in the US,” she said.

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