A former Army soldier turned mercenary has been charged with murder and fraud in a crime spree spanning three states after being extradited from Ukraine by the FBI, federal prosecutors announced Monday.
Craig Austin Lang, 34, a former mercenary who fought in Venezuela, Africa and Ukraine, made his first appearance in federal court on charges he committed a double murder in Florida and then used forged passports in Arizona and North Carolina to flee overseas. Federal prosecutors.
“Lang’s actions are shocking in their scope and callous disregard for human life,” Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Nicole Argentieri of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division said in a statement.
“But his misconduct was no match for the efforts of dedicated law enforcement officers and prosecutors in the United States and abroad,” Argentieri said.
Prosecutors allege that in April 2018, Lang and former Army veteran Alex Jared Zwiefelhofer posted online ads selling their stock of weapons, then killed a couple who responded to the ads and stole $3,000 to buy them.
Prosecutors said Zwiefelhofer, 27, told investigators he met Lang in Ukraine in 2017, where they were both fighting with Russian separatists, and planned to use stolen money to travel to Venezuela and take on the country’s controversial regime.
Zwiefelhofer was convicted by a federal jury in Florida in March and is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 6.
According to federal agents, in September 2018, Lang and another associate allegedly made a deal with two others in North Carolina to use their identities to obtain fake U.S. passports and receive $1,500 in cash, a suitcase “containing multiple firearms” and military-grade smoke grenades.
Then, in June 2019, prosecutors said Lang used his U.S. passport to obtain a Mexican visa, which violated the conditions of holding a U.S. passport.
Lang was detained in Ukraine and then extradited to the United States after the European Court of Human Rights dismissed his human rights complaint, and he was placed back under FBI supervision.
According to the Justice Department, Lang faces life in prison if convicted on the Florida murder count and up to 35 years in prison if convicted on the charges in North Carolina and Arizona.
