Alimzan Tokhtakhounov, shown in this undated file photo, an alleged Russian crime boss was arrested in Italy on U.S. charges that he tried to fix the pairs and ice dancing figure skating competitions at the Salt Lake City Olympics, according to a federal criminal complaint filed Wednesday. Photo: Louis Lanzano/AP

An alleged Russian mob boss has been charged with trying to fix the pairs and ice dancing events at the Salt Lake City Olympics six months ago — not for money, but because he wanted to live in France.

The judging scandal, which made worldwide stars of Canada's Jamie Salé and David Pelletier, has taken on the drama of a crime thriller, involving the FBI, wiretaps, backstage intrigue and a police swoop in Italy.

Alimazan Tokhtakhounov, a native of Uzbekistan, was arrested Wednesday at his luxury villa in the Tuscan resort of Forte Dei Marmi. He is being held in Venice, where anti-Mafia police are conducting the probe, and is likely to be extradited to the U.S.

His arrest has been met with a mixture of shock and relief that the dirty underbelly of ice-skating might finally be cleaned up.

Mr. Pelletier — who with Ms. Salé was initially denied the pairs gold despite a clearly superior performance — Wednesday said he wasn't surprised by the arrest.

"Wherever there's power, wherever there's money, there's always bad people around," he said. "It's everywhere."

A criminal complaint filed in Manhattan federal court alleges Mr. Tokhtakhounov attempted to influence members of the Russian and French skating federations to fix both events at the Games. The complaint says others were involved in the conspiracy.

"The long arm of Russian organized crime reached across the globe with a pair of fixes at the Olympics," said U.S. prosecutor James Comey.

Mr. Comey said Mr. Tokhtakhounov's motive was not money. Instead, he said, the Russian wanted to establish good relations with French authorities in order to have his French visa renewed.

News of the arrest spread through the skating world like wildfire. Nikolai Morozov, who helps coach Canadian ice dancers Shae-Lynn Bourne of Chatham, Ont., and Victor Kraatz of Vancouver, said he learned of the allegations of mob meddling from Ms. Bourne. She phoned him from a stop on the Tom Collins skating tour where skaters were buzzing about the news.

"I just wish our sport would be more clean," Mr. Morozov said. "I know it's going on. I know it's not a clean sport. At least somebody is trying [to clean it up]. ... It's great."

Ms. Bourne and Mr. Kraatz placed fourth at the Olympics, while a French pair placed first. They had already been involved in a scandal over suspect judging at the Nagano Olympics in 1998.

Mr. Tokhtakhounov is charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit bribery to influence a sporting competition. He faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each count.

While the Olympics were under way, The Globe and Mail reported that the French federation planned to help Russians win the pairs event over Ms. Salé and Mr. Pelletier. In return, the Russians would line up support to give the gold medal to French ice dancers Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat.

According to an FBI affidavit, wiretaps captured a conversation after the pairs event in which Mr. Tokhtakhounov was told by another Russian that "our French have amazed me in a good way [by voting for the Russians in the pairs event]. ... The Canadians were 10 times better and in spite of that, the French, with their vote, gave us first place."

Russians Elena Berezhnaia and Anton Sikharulidze won the pairs event, while the French won the ice dancing competition.

In the ensuing uproar, French judge Marie-Reine Le Gougne signed an International Skating Union document saying that she had been pressured to vote for the Russians over the Canadians. She then recanted her story, saying she had placed them first because she thought them best.

The ISU conducted an internal investigation that resulted in three-year suspensions for Ms. Le Gougne and French federation president Didier Gailhaguet, but did not deal with the issue of Russian influence.

However, it has emerged that the FBI already had Mr. Tokhtakhounov under surveillance in a probe of other organized crime activities. It then received an anonymous tip about his possible involvement in fixing the Olympic skating contests. When the scandal broke, FBI agents interviewed Ms. Le Gougne to ask her if she knew of him. Although she denied knowledge of the alleged mobster — a denial authorities say was genuine — they conducted wiretapes of the suspect's phone calls.

Mr. Tokhtakhounov "arranged a classic quid pro quo: 'You'll line up support for the Russian pair, we'll line up support for the French pair and everybody will go away with the gold, and perhaps there'll be a little gold for me,' " Mr. Comey said.

Among the taps were conversations between Mr. Tokhtakhounov and a French ice dancer, in which the suspect bragged about being able to influence the outcome of events. The taps also caught Mr. Tokhtakhounov talking to the mother of a female ice dancer, telling her "we are going to make your daughter an Olympic champion — even if she falls, we will make sure she is No. 1."

Ms. Anissina, who is Russian-born, won two world junior titles for her native country before moving to France to skate with Mr. Peizerat under the French flag.

When asked about the charges Wednesday, Mr. Peizerat told The Associated Press: "I have never heard of this man."

Despite the recurring allegations of corruption in judging that surfaced at the Olympics, the arrest Wednesday landed like a bomb on the skating community.

"We all were concerned about the possibility of influence from outside pressures, but I don't think any of us ever had any idea that it could be this severe, that these types of people could be alleged to be involved," said Pam Coburn, chief executive officer for Skate Canada. "It's quite shocking."

Benjamin Kaplan, a lawyer for two skating judges who testified against Le Gougne during the ISU hearing, said: "Just like men in power used to have ballerinas in Russia, now the thing is to have champion skaters or other champions in other sports. The Russian mafia is deep into sport."

Over the past four years, skaters have been loathe to speak out about event fixing, fearing they would be punished in subsequent competitions. But Lithuanian ice dancers Margarita Drobiazko and Povilas Vanagas filed a rare protest at the Salt Lake City Olympics over their fifth-place finish behind two couples that had fallen. The protest was dismissed.

The Olympic competition was far different from the Grand Prix Final in Kitchener, Ont., two months before, when there was no Russian judge on the panel. Ms. Bourne and Mr. Kraatz won that event.

The judges' opinion at the Grand Prix Final clearly reflected the quality of skating on the ice, Mr. Vanagas said.

"There was no former Soviet Union domination of the judges," he said. "Usually what takes place when lots of former Soviet Union judges are on the panel, much, much more games are played around ... They were really the ones who in the last 10 years were making the most of the dangerous, dirty game situations in ice dancing."

Three weeks later, Ms. Drobiazko and Mr. Vanagas lost the bronze medal at the world championships to unheralded Israeli skaters Galit Chait and Sergei Sakhonovsky, a former world junior champion from Russia. The result sparked a rare outcry from athletes; 20 of 24 couples signed a petition protesting the result. Even one of the judges on the panel, French judge Christine Hurth, added her name to the petition, which got her into some hot water with referee Courtney Jones.

With a report from Associated Press