Russians' American refuge is upended

Asylum claims, work documents may not protect L.A. couple from deportation.

- BY HANNAH FRY

JULIANA YAMADA Los Angeles Times ANTON PEREVALOV and Tatiana Zaiko stand in their Westlake Village home.

The August sun was already warming Westlake Village when Anton Perevalov dressed in athletic shorts and decided to take an early morning stroll with his miniature pinscher, Ben, while his wife slept.

As he turned right onto Hillcrest Drive — a route he'd taken so many mornings before — an unmarked car stopped in front of him and a man he'd never met emerged and peppered him with questions: “Are you Anton Perevalov?” “Are you a citizen of Russia?”

When Perevalov, 43, answered in the affirmative, two other men exited the car and approached him. One took his phone and the other slapped handcuffs on him, ushering him and Ben into the car. As they drove toward his home, they instructed Perevalov to call his wife so she could come out and get the dog.

Perevalov pleaded with the men, saying that there had to be a mistake. He had documents proving he was legal to live and work in the United States. It didn’t matter, one of the men told him.

“You overstayed your visa,” he said. “You are under arrest and coming with us.”

Tatiana Zaiko sprinted out of the house in her pajamas and slippers, telling her 17-year-old son that his dad had been arrested and to lock the door. She'd be right back, she recalled telling him.

She wasn't. Friends would later find the boy huddled under his parents’ bed, fearful that immigration agents may return for him too.

“I never imagined that something like this could happen in this country,” Zaiko, 43, said.

For years, Russian nationals and others seeking asylum in the United States were allowed to live and work here while their cases were being decided. That began to change in 2024 under the Biden administration and has been completely upended in the wake of President Trump’s efforts to boost deportation numbers, experts say.