WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (KNX) — When the Russian Federation invaded Ukraine last month, a passport and foreign travel business in a heavily ethnic-Russian part of West Hollywood began receiving threatening phone calls.
Daniel Lerman, who has owned and operated Russian Universal Services for 25 years, said calls from strangers started rolling in telling him to shut down his business and leave the country. Threats became so frequent that Lerman decided to change the name of his business. It’s now called Dokument USA.
“They think we are affiliated with the Russian government, but this is not so,” Lerman told ABC Los Angeles. “We just help Russian-speaking people to file documents, to do various documentation stuff. We help Ukrainians. We help Jewish people.”
Though Lerman deals primarily with Russian speakers, he himself was born and raised in Ukraine and speaks both languages.
“When I came to this country, there was no separation. We all speak Russian. We all came from the Soviet Union,” he said.
New signage for Dokument USA arrives next week.
Related
Follow KNX News 97.1 FM
Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok