A Former Putin Backer Steps Through the Looking Glass

To understand what makes both Russia and Ukraine tick these days, one needs to look no further than the story of Denis Voronenkov, a Russian ex-legislator who defected to Kiev with his wife, a former Russian parliament member. For them, crossing the border into the neighboring post-Soviet country was like going through the looking glass.

Voronenkov, 45, typifies the new elite under President Vladimir Putin. A military lawyer who served in Russia's now defunct anti-drug agency under an old Putin crony, made a government career in an oil-rich region, and was elected to parliament in the rigged vote of 2011, Voronenkov never worked in the private sector. Yet somehow he amassed a stunning amount of expensive real estate and a stable of luxury cars. While in parliament, he married fellow legislator Maria Maksakova, a renowned opera singer with St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theater and a member of the Putin loyalist United Russia faction. Then-parliament speaker Sergei Naryshkin, who now heads Russia's foreign intelligence service, sang at the power couple's wedding.