Yakov was born in 1890 into a convict family and started stealing as a child. By age 27, he had 10 indictments to his name as a pickpocket. | Yakov Kuznetsov was just another Moscow gangster of the 1910s, but he earned instant notoriety after robbing Vladimir Lenin himself – although he didn’t realize it at the time. His nickname “Koshel’kov” meant “man of purses.” On January 6, 1919, he and five associates stopped a Rolls Royce in Moscow – the bandits needed a ride for a robbery. It happened to be Lenin’s car. |  |