Russian Billionaire Sergey Grishin, Who Criticized Putin & Sold Prince Harry His Home, Dies Mysteriously At 56

Sergey Grishin, the Russian billionaire who sold Prince Harry and Meghan Markle their home in Montecito, California has died at a hospital in Moscow.

According to reports, the cause of death was due to “circulatory problems in his brain,” which eventually led to sepsis.

Grishin’s death is notable given that he is the latest prominent Russian businessperson to have died suddenly in the past year. Many of these deaths have included Russian oligarchs who have expressed concern over President Vladimir Putin‘s war in Ukraine. The first was on January 30, 2022, when Leonid Shulman, transport chief for the Russian energy company Gazprom was found dead in his house with a suicide note found next to his body.

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Grishin, who is also known as the “Scarface Oligarch” for owning the mansion where the 1983 movie starring Al Pacino was filmed, sold Harry and Meghan the Montecito home for $14.7 million.

Grishin had previously bought the mansion, which is known as the “Chateau of Riven Rock,” in 2009. It sits on seven acres of land and contains a pool, seven bedrooms, a tennis court and a guest house.

Much of Grishin’s wealth came from being a former co-owner of RosEvroBank. He has also spoken about his involvement in a $60 billion heist of Russia’s Central Bank in the 1990s as the Soviet Union dissolved, calling it the “largest fraud scheme” because no one knew how much money was stolen.

After criticizing President Putin, he pleaded with then-President Donald Trump to give him a U.S. passport “to be safe” from Russian government officials. He tried to use his fraud scheme as a way to persuade U.S. officials to grant him entry but was not successful.