If Alex Rodriguez takes flight from the Yankees, he can do it aboard a luxurious jet he just bought from a hotel operator whose family allegedly had been linked to the Russian mob, sources told The Post.
The seller of the Gulfstream IV was Arik Kislin, a principal in Manhattan’s Hotel Gansevoort, whose former company once sponsored a visa sought by an alleged hit man, and whose uncle was named by the FBI as being an associate of the Brighton Beach-based Russian mob.
Earlier this month, A-Rod – who is opting out of his Yankee contract – denied buying the plane. But his pilot, Craig Frost, last night confirmed he and Rodriguez bought it in a partnership last month.
“We’ve been looking for some time, and it happened to be the best plane on the market for the money,” Frost said.
The plane “mostly” will be rented out for charter, but Rodriguez also will use it for his own travel, said Frost, who has piloted the slugger for more than seven years.
Rodriguez’s purchase of the plush, 16-passenger Gulfstream for an undisclosed amount happened about a month before last night’s revelation that he’s becoming a free agent, who could bag $30 million a year. The jet’s tail number has been changed to N113AR – a nod to Rodriguez’s number, 13, and his initials. That number had belonged to the plane he owned before, a Gulfstream II that skidded off a California runway last year with Frost at the controls – while carrying the married A-Rod and his stripper gal pal, Joslyn Morse.
The Gulfstream IV was bought from a corporation whose mailing address is in care of the company that owns the trendy Gansevoort in the Meatpacking District. A source said that the plane’s real owner until the A-Rod sale was Kislin, and that he paid $15.55 million for the jet last December.
In the 1990s, Kislin ran a Manhattan company that sponsored a U.S. visa sought by an alleged Russian hit man. Kislin’s commodity-trader uncle, Sam Kislin, was named in a 1994 FBI report as being “a member or associate” of a Brighton Beach-based organized-crime group.
Kislin did not return a call. Frost said neither he nor A-Rod knew Kislin had owned the aircraft.