A former Vice Media editor used the outlet’s Canadian headquarters as a recruiting hub for his cocaine-smuggling ring — luring young journalists and artists with no criminal records to be international drug mules, according to a report.
On the surface, Yaroslav Pastukhov seemed like a rising star at the edgy news company.
The 26-year-old, who went by the name Slava Pastuk, had served as the editor of their online publication Noisey, and was in charge of the Vice Canada music coverage.
In addition to managing new staffers and interns, his duties included commissioning freelance articles and videos, penning pieces for the website, and hosting online videos.
But there was apparently one role that Pastukhov took on during his time at Vice that wasn’t listed under his job description: international drug-smuggler.
At least three journalists who used to work for the company, or still do, independently told the Canadian newspaper, the National Post, that Pastukhov had tried to recruit them to be his personal drug couriers during his time as music editor.
He allegedly offered each of them $10,000 to smuggle illicit cargo from Las Vegas to Australia, to which they refused, the Post reports.
While the claims against Pastukhov have yet to be corroborated by police or proven in court, his one-time roommate — renowned Toronto DJ Jordan Gardner, whom Vice did a profile on — is currently awaiting sentencing after being caught at an airport in Sydney with a large stash of cocaine, worth between $5.1 million and $6.6 million, authorities said.
Pastukhov was joined by three other Canadians and one American — Nathanial Carty, 22, of New York — when he was arrested on December 22, 2015, the Post reports.
Gardner and Carty were both charged with importing a commercial quantity of cocaine after authorities found the stash in the lining of their suitcases.
In an interview with the Post, Gardner’s lawyer, Eidan Havas, claimed his client had been forced into cocaine-smuggling by Pastukhov, who is allegedly part of a massive drug scheme headed by the Mexican cartel.
“What they’re doing is they’re manipulating young kids such as Jordan and Jordan’s friends and the manipulation is very strong,” Havas explained. “They were lied to, they were all vulnerable or in vulnerable situations and they were taken advantage of.
“They’re finding young Canadians, or young individuals who for all intents and purposes don’t have any criminal histories and are productive members of their community, and manipulating them into making the wrong choice,” he added. “They got him to a situation where they pulled a gun to his head, they knew where his family lived. The family received death threats. They put him in a position where he couldn’t return.”
Throughout his career, Pastukhov’s writing included edgy, in-depth looks at the world of sex, drugs and music — and often included seemingly-personal references to illicit activities.
At first glance, the young man was a perfect fit for Vice, which tends to pride itself on publishing unabashedly honest stories about life’s brutal underbelly.
The news outlet, which first started as a counterculture magazine in 1994, was founded by Suroosh Alvi, Gavin McInnes and Shane Smith — who co-authered “The Vice Guide to Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll” in 2003, documenting their crazy pasts.
Smith, now Vice CEO, has claimed in the past that he spent time “slinging coke” as a teenager, saying: “I learned all my business acumen being a drug dealer because it’s pretty f–king simple.”
“You have to make a margin and you have to do this and you have to mitigate risk and you have to do all this stuff,” he told comedian Joe Rogan, during an interview on his podcast in 2015.
Pastukhov was fired from Vice Canada last February after several employees filed complaints against him. An anonymous email had reportedly gone out about Gardner and Carty’s arrests and the editor’s alleged involvement just before he was terminated, the Post reports.
Jordan Pearson, who currently writes for Vice’s tech site Motherboard, and Matt Braga, who is a former Vice Canada editor, both told the Canadian newspaper that they had heard staff-members discussing Pastukhov’s alleged drug-running and recruitment efforts.
Just a few months after his firing, the disgraced editor tweeted: “friendly reminder that journalists are just professional snitches.”
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