In Ussuriysk, the gang that attacked the Primorye police was put to rest

In the Primorsky Territory, a gang whose members are accused of a series of attacks on police officers has been neutralized. Of the six suspects, four were detained, two decided not to surrender and shot themselves. According to investigators, the gang members are not ideological fighters against “police lawlessness,” and police officers were attacked only in order to take possession of weapons, which were then used in robberies.

Last Friday, a special operation that had no analogues in the region was completed, in which over a thousand law enforcement officers were involved. At about 13.00, security forces blocked the four members of the gang that remained at large, who committed attacks on police officers (due to the fact that the group periodically hid from security forces in the taiga, its members in the region began to be called “partisans”), in one of the apartments of the house No. 73 on the street Timiryazev in the center of Ussuriysk (100 km from Vladivostok). By this time, two other members of the group had already been detained - Roman Savchenko and Maxim Kirillov, who supplied their accomplices with food.

The bandits rented an apartment in the center of Ussuriysk the day before, apparently hoping to hide there from persecution for a while. When the evacuation of civilians in the surrounding area began, the militants realized that their location had been revealed. They opened fire from several pistols from the balcony, wounding two policemen. In response, the security forces used loudspeakers to ask the blocked gang members to surrender. Two of the besieged - Andrei Sukhorada and Alexander Sladkikh - shot themselves, as the head of the Primorye Internal Affairs Directorate, Major General Andrei Nikolaev, later explained, “out of despair and unwillingness to fall into the hands of justice.” Another, Vladimir Ilyutikov, surrendered immediately after the gang leaders committed suicide. And Alexander Kovtun decided to surrender a few hours later, after negotiations with the participation of his mother and lawyer. Before this, 20-year-old Kovtun shouted that he was afraid that he would be killed as soon as he laid down his arms.

Representatives of the investigation have already come to a clear conclusion: the bandits did not attack the police for ideological reasons. “Comments in online forums and some media about “cop lawlessness that pushed boys into armed struggle” do not correspond to reality and are dictated solely by the desire to put pressure on law enforcement agencies, to create the image of fighters for a just cause. But romanticizing the image of partisans can be extremely dangerous ", said the head of the Internal Affairs Directorate for Primorye, Andrei Nikolaev, following the results of the operation. According to him, objects with fascist symbols and radical literature were found in the hiding places of the partisans. “The suspects are not fighters for justice; they attacked police officers in order to take possession of weapons that they used in robbery attacks on ordinary citizens,” Aurora Rimskaya, senior assistant to the head of the investigative department of the Investigative Committee at the Russian Prosecutor’s Office for Primorye, outlined the position of the investigation. She added that the information previously disseminated by the regional police department, according to which 32-year-old Roman Muromtsev was named among the suspects, does not correspond to reality. “Muromtsev has nothing to do with this gang,” said Mrs. Rimskaya. Meanwhile, as Kommersant has already reported, on June 8, one of the websites posted the “Appeal of the Partisans,” allegedly signed by Roman Muromtsev, an Airborne Forces veteran. The author of the appeal reported that, together with like-minded people, they “rose up to fight against the evil that enslaved our country.”

According to investigators, members of the liquidated bandit group committed at least four attacks on police officers. According to security officials, in February of this year, bandits killed one and wounded another policeman in Vladivostok, stealing Makarov’s service pistol. On May 27, in the building of the police department in the village of Rakitnoye, Dalnerechensky district, the suspects, according to investigators, stabbed to death an on-duty policeman (the attackers stole police uniforms, bulletproof vests and a radio station). On May 29, at the 61st kilometer of the Spassk-Dalniy-Varfolomeevka highway section, a traffic police car was fired upon, and one policeman was injured. On June 8, near the village of Khvalynka, Spassky District, another traffic police unit was fired upon, two policemen were wounded. “In between these crimes, the attackers committed thefts, car thefts, and arson in the Kirovsky, Dalnerechensky and Spassky districts of the Primorsky Territory,” said Aurora Rimskaya.

However, in the village of Kirovsky, where members of the bandit group lived, not everyone agrees with the conclusions of the investigation. On June 13, about 200 people staged an unauthorized rally here, and then a procession through the center of the village with flowers in their hands. Those gathered said that the actions of their fellow countrymen were a response to the beatings, bullying and threats to which local youth were exposed by the police. Roman Savchenko's father, Vladimir, told Kommersant yesterday that his son, like the rest of the detainees, was taken to Vladivostok for investigative actions. Savchenko Sr. refused to say whether his son would plead guilty. “The investigation took a non-disclosure agreement from all relatives,” he explained.

Alexey Chernyshev, Vladivostok

The shootings ended with crossbows