Mad Bomber of Remsen Making Friends in Rikers

It’s been some time since we’ve heard the name Ivaylo Ivanov. The would-be bomber of Remsen Street has spent the last two years in jail on Rikers Island on charges involving spray-painting anti-Jewish slurs and swastikas in the Heights.

So what’s he been up to? Turns out, Ivanov’s been making friends with Ronald Tackmann, an illustrious thief, considered the Keyser Soze of NYC’s prison system because he keeps escaping.

New York: Recently, [Tackmann] invited me to the Hanukkah party at Rikers Island. The party is held at night in a gym. Through the gates of their cells, inmates howl at the female guests (“Hey, mami!”) and bark at me (“What the fuck you looking at, f—–t?”) as we enter the facility.
Tackmann scans the room as Lubavitch boys sing and dance to a keyboard klezmer. In Rikers, he decided to become Jewish because he likes the kosher food and the rabbi. He declines to wear a yarmulke (“It messes up my hair”) and eyes the gefilte fish suspiciously. At other tables, inmates sit with wives whose fresh eyeliner applied in the visitor’s bathroom now washes away in tears. …

I ask Tackmann’s tablemates what they think of him.

“He’s meshuga,” says Kenneth Glassman-Blanco, who has spent three years on Rikers awaiting trial on attempted murder.

“Well done,” Ivaylo Ivanov of Bulgaria says of the escape.

If we hear/read anything further about inmate #09557033Q, you’ll be the first to know.

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  • Publius

    The wheels of justice are turning mighty slow in this case. We’re coming up on the two year anniversary of Ivan’s arrest and I believe he’s only had one or two pre-trial hearings.

  • my2cents

    So does this mean that our local anti-semite was at a Hanukkah party in jail? How perfect.

  • nabeguy

    Not exactly the typical jail-house conversion. Perhaps he was too meshuga for the Muslims.

  • my2cents

    It’s just like Arrested Development!

  • nabeguy

    Definitely arrested.

  • bklyn20

    Why is it that he’s only got weapons possession listed, along w/some kind of harassment, on the sheet? Wasn’t the bigger issue that his apartment was loaded with firearms, and that he confessed to being the Swastika painter? Those are pretty serious issues — wasn’t charged with them?

    Actually, I knew him a bit from the dog run. He orginally thought I was Jewish (never said anything anti-semitic) and when he found out I wasn’t mJewish, he didn’t say anything anti-semitic then either. So if he did that hateful graffiti, he was keeping his hatred pretty close to the vest. I could see him fitting in just fine with the Lubavitchers — he was always quite friendly and, as I said, never said anything offensive.

  • Kenneth Glassman-Blanco

    I found this man Ivaylo Ivanov to be of the best of men, even diamonds need a cleaning . People go astray as people do. This man has nothing but remorse and regret for the crimes he has been accused of. I am Jewish and I love him and forgive him. Don’t be so quick to judge.

  • Kenneth Glassman-Blanco

    I was there for 3 1/2 years not 3 as reported, awaiting trial charged with Attempted Murder and found not guilty and released. I will be back as a visitor to see Ivanov.

  • nabeguy

    But would you let him marry your daughter?