Fwd: Russian Criminal Tattoos

[Psy Ling]

your student may be interested in photos of Donald Weber who made a trip to 
Siberia a couple of year ago
http://donaldweber.com/category/drunken-bride/in-the-underworld/

 Psy Ling




________________________________
From: "gfowler at INDIANA.EDU" <gfowler at INDIANA.EDU>
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Sent: Thu, March 31, 2011 7:37:24 AM
Subject: [SEELANGS] Fwd: Russian Criminal Tattoos

Greetings!

A student in my second-year Russian class asked me yesterday about Russian 
criminal tattoos. Of course I know nothing at all about this, but I asked her to 
write up her question in forwardable form. If anyone can help her, I'd be 
delighted to pass along any information sent directly to me or posted to this 
list. Thanks in advance!

George Fowler

The student writes:

I've had a few questions about Russian criminal tattoos pop up recently. First 
of all I'll make the disclaimer that I don't know exactly what the proper name 
for the Russian Mafia/Mob/Cartel/Bratva is, so I'll just be using Mafia as a 
catch all - feel free to specify or to not get into it (I'd like to learn, but 
my point in asking is the tattoos)

My first question is: at what frequency these are given in prisons versus
those who get them done outside of prison. For example, the stars on the
collar bone and knees seem to be done mostly outside of prison (from my
extremely limited understanding, do correct me if I'm wrong), while
something like shackles would be more likely than not acquired during
incarceration. The tattoos I have specific questions about are the hands
holding the Kremlin, the stars for ranking, and the epaulets on the
shoulders (more specifically with the imperialist rankings over the soviet,
but any information will do) What are the exact meanings of these tattoos,
in what organizations/rings of crime are people more likely to get them, and
how are they likely to be acquired? Is prison most likely for them all, or
are they concevably gained while outside of jail?

----- End forwarded message -----


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