Obscurity in L.A. for Notorious Fugitive

In Lithuania, newspapers dubbed him “The Octopus,” an elusive bank president and political insider who disappeared after being accused of a massive financial swindle.

On Hollywood Boulevard, Gintaras Petrikas was known as the friendly, soft-spoken owner of a sunglasses and souvenir shop. During smoking breaks outside, he told neighboring merchants that he was a former boxer from Russia who had just moved from Las Vegas.

“He seemed relaxed, very normal and nice,” said Sergio Barrera, who works next door at Hollywood Souvenirs.

Petrikas, 43, is now in a Los Angeles jail, awaiting extradition proceedings to determine if he will be sent back to Lithuania to face charges of bilking investors out of more than $10 million in the mid-1990s.

In that nation, he is a notorious figure accused of issuing large unsecured loans to companies in which he had financial stakes. Then, he mysteriously vanished in 1997 just before his trial was to begin.

Lithuania and U.S. authorities searched for him for years, but only in the last year discovered Petrikas’ new life in California, where he has used the alias Alexander Davidoff.

“He’s the No. 1 most-wanted fugitive in Lithuania,” said Jeff Nelson, executive director of the U.S.-Baltic Foundation. “This is really important to people in Lithuania. If you want to do business in Lithuania, you have to play by the rules.”

In the early and mid-’90s, Petrikas was a prominent citizen in the Baltic country of 3.6 million people: chairman of a large bank and a business group known as EBSW. Newspapers ran photos of him standing with Pope John Paul II and Lithuania’s president.

But in 1996, EBSW filed for bankruptcy, and $10 million in deposits could not be accounted for. Petrikas was placed under house arrest while awaiting trial on charges of fraud and theft. During that time, he ran for a seat in parliament, the Seimas, but according to news reports, received just 3% of the vote.

A year later, as his trial neared, Petrikas disappeared. Officials thought he might have fled to Russia, as other Lithuanian fugitives have.

The Lithuanian government requested help from the FBI earlier this year after receiving intelligence that Petrikas might be living in New Jersey.

Agents from the Newark field office circulated his picture in the Lithuanian community. He was identified, but under another name and supposedly living in California, said Stephen Kodak, FBI spokesman in Newark. Agents also found his fingerprint on an application to the state of California for a liquor license and passed the case to the Los Angeles field office.

Agents here quickly determined that Petrikas lived in Burbank under the name Alexander Davidoff and owned souvenir shops in Palm Springs and Hollywood, the FBI said.

Agents said Petrikas had undergone a transformation from financial magnate to modest merchant selling sunglasses, magnets, miniskirts and T-shirts.

Fellow merchants said Petrikas and Joanna Davidoff, his companion of many years, visited the store several times a week, sometimes with their children, unloading bags of clothing from their minivan.

An employee at the shop, who requested anonymity, described the couple as “normal, happy people. They don’t seem like bad people at all.”

In an undated picture released by the FBI, Petrikas sits at an office desk wearing a brown suit and striped tie, his dark brown hair combed to the side.

Workers at neighboring stores who were shown the picture didn’t initially recognize Petrikas in his starched suit. Since opening his store, half a block west of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, they said, he had sported shorter hair and often wore jeans and T-shirts.

They said he told them he was a former boxer who worked in the clothing business in Las Vegas before coming to Hollywood.

Petrikas and Davidoff, 26, have a 6-year-old son and a 3-year-old daughter. Davidoff, who is expecting a third child, said in a brief interview Friday that she met Petrikas in Lithuania 11 years ago. They moved to California in 1999. She declined to comment on whether she knew of his alleged financial improprieties in his homeland.

“He’s the very best guy I’ve ever known,” she said. “Believe me, we don’t have those millions.”

Petrikas’ attorney, Alan Rubin, said his client was simply trying to live a modest life in the United States and had done nothing wrong.

The extradition request is “based on alleged crimes that happened 10 years ago, a long time ago,” Rubin said. “There’s no indication he has done anything other than live a low-profile, ordinary, solid American person’s life.

“They don’t live the ostentatious life that would be consistent with somebody who has $10 million,” he added. “They live in Burbank, not Bel-Air.”

Petrikas was arrested May 3 when he and Davidoff left their Burbank apartment and went to a nearby bank.

He has been ordered detained without bail and remanded to federal custody. On Friday, Petrikas appeared in Los Angeles before a magistrate in U.S. District Court, where prosecutors said they expected to file a petition for extradition within two weeks.

When Petrikas entered the courtroom in handcuffs, he exchanged glances with Davidoff, and they mouthed endearments at each other.