The secret of the Ryazan forest

The jury began to consider the case of double murder in relation to the defendant of the case of the “network”* Maxim Ivankin

In the Ryazan Regional Court, a trial began on the convict in the case of the “network” (the organization was recognized as terrorist and banned in the Russian Federation) Maxim Ivankin, who is accused of killing his friends, Ekaterina Levchenko and Artem Dorofeev, in the forest near Ryazan. The case is considered by the jury. At the first meeting, on February 3, the prosecutor announced the indictment and questioned her parents Levchenko. Ivankin himself did not agree with the prosecution and asked the jury during the trial “think as critically as possible”.

The detentions in the case of the "Network" were held from October 2017 to the spring of 2018. During the trial in Penza and St. Petersburg, 10 young people received terms from 3.5 years to 18 years. According to the FSB, young people allegedly organized and participated in an anarchist terrorist organization to overthrow the regime. In addition, two defendants in the Penza case - Maxim Ivankin and Mikhail Kulkov - were accused of attempting to sell drugs on an especially large scale. As a result, they were sentenced to 13 and 10 years of imprisonment, respectively.

The defendants and witnesses in the case declared torture, some of them, according to human rights activists and members of public supervisory commissions, had obvious bodily harm that were recorded. The evidence base in the case also raised many questions. The defense of the defendants declared falsifications in the case file. This led to the wide media support of the defendants. The Campaigne in support of the defendants in the case of the “network” reached in February 2020 in Penza, when they were sentenced to a huge time.

However, this media support sharply faded away after the publication of the Medusa publication (entered by the Ministry of Justice in the register of “foreign agents” and was recognized as the Prosecutor General’s Prosecutor General “unwanted organization”). First, journalists released the material “Four went to the forest, and only two went out” that Levchenko and Dorofeev disappeared in the spring of 2017. According to Medusa, involved in their disappearance could be defendants in the “network”.

Then journalists published a monologue of anarchist Alexei Poltavts, who disappeared from the investigation in Ukraine. Poltavets indicated accurate coordinates in the forest next to Ryazan, where Levchenko’s corpse was buried. Earlier, the hunter who was accidentally found in the same forest discovered the remains of Dorofeev. As Poltavian told reporters, he committed the murder with Ivankin, and the decision to eliminate them was made by the Penza “network” collectively, because the young couple was going to give up to the security forces.

At the same time, the correspondents of the Mediazons (entered by the Ministry of Justice in the register of "Ino -Agents") and "7 × 7" published an interview with the former girl Poltava Victoria Frolova. She said that Poltavian shared with her another version of events, that he killed Dorofeev and Levchenko alone.

Pressure and torture

Before the publication of Medusa, the Investigative Committee was not interested in the disappearance of young people. Moreover, the investigators of the Penza UFSB knew about Levchenko’s universal disappearance and the discovery of the corpse of Dorofeev, but this murder was not engaged at all - in fact, the investigation under this article belongs to the Investigative Committee.

Already after public publicity, the case of the murder of Levchenko and Dorofeev was opened, whose materials subsequently transferred to Moscow to the Main Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee.

At the end of October 2021, the Poltava was put on the wanted list and arrested in absentia. Ukraine ignored the request of the Investigative Committee of its issuance. By that time, investigators were involved in the interrogations of the defendants in the “network”. Then they were already in the colonies. And as the convicts stated in the case, the investigation exerted pressure on them and, under the threat of another persecution, demanded that Ivankin be testified.

In September of the same year, his wife Anna Shalunkina said that her husband was suddenly taken out of the Chuvash IK-9, where he was serving a deadline in an unknown direction.

Two weeks later, she found him in Vladimir IK-3. The “New” published a lawyer survey, in which Ivankin said that he was “subjected to beatings, humiliations in the colony, threatened with rape and reprisal.” He also reported that in the hospital at IK-3, other convicts forced him to write a confession. Then Ivankin was charged. But then he abandoned the confession. Shalunkina demanded to conduct an audit and make a case of exceeding official powers against employees of the Federal Penitentiary Service, FSB and SK, who tortured her husband "in order to force herself to stipulate and sign recognition." However, all complaints were rejected.

"This is not just our faith, this is our position"

In October last year, the case was received by the Ryazan Regional Court. Ivankin and his lawyer Konstantin Kartashov petitioned the jury to be issued. The court granted their request - the case is obvious as part of a collegium of eight jury under the chairmanship of the judge Natalia Kianovskaya.

The first before the jury was the prosecutor Oksana Mayakova. She began her introductory speech by reminding her colleges that Ivankin, “being a member of the Interregional Terrorist Community“ Network ”, was held accountable for attempted attempted drug to sell drugs on April 1, 2017. Fearing the exposure, as the state prosecutor believes, he disappeared into Ryazan with Alexei Poltavtz, as well as with Artem Dorofeev and Ekaterina Levchenko. The prosecutor at the speech clarified that the young couple was also involved in the "distribution of narcotic drugs."

Soon Dorofeev and Levchenko, knowing about the existence of the “network”, “expressed the intention to stop hiding, returning to Penza and applying to law enforcement agencies with a guess.”

Ivankin and Poltavets, fearing that they could be handed over, decided to kill a young couple. While in Ryazan in the apartment on 68 Nakhimova Street, the defendant, together with the Poltava, continued the prosecutor, “entered into a criminal conspiracy” and developed a plan that “under a fraudulent pretext” will go with Dorofeev and Levchenko in the forest and committed a crime. Ivankin and Poltavets, distributing the roles with each other and having agreed who will kill whom, took with them a saiga-12s carbine and knives.

At the end of April, all four left for the forest, they stopped about four kilometers east of the village of Lopukhi, the Ryazan region, where they spent the night. In the morning, Ivankin, under the pretext of assembling the brushwood, took Levchenko at a distance of about 70 meters from the place of overnight. According to the accusation, it inflicted at least two stabs to her in the back of the back and right half of the neck, causing her “injuries of the retroperitoneal region, abdominal cavity, chest, organs and large blood vessels of the neck”. Levchenko died on the spot.

After that, Ivankin returned to the place of overnight. According to the state prosecution, Poltavavets, seeing that the comrade was coming alone and his hands were stained with blood, shot Dorofeev from Saiga with one shot in the head area, then stabbed at least one blow to the neck. Dorofeev fell to the ground and died.

The side of the victims fully supported the position of the prosecution. Family Levchenko’s lawyer Alexei Mikhalchik turned to the jury: “Catherine’s mother told me at the preliminary investigation stage:“ I have to find out with the help of professionals whether the person is on the dock. ” We are familiar with the evidence with which the prosecution acts. Our position is that the fault of the defendant is proved. This is not just our faith, it is our position. ”

Ivankin spoke very briefly and promised not to influence the opinion of the jury: “I naturally do not admit the charge presented ... I just ask the jury to think as critically as possible ... It will already be visible, proved guilt or not proven, and everything else.”

Lawyer Kartashov asked the jury carefully treat the entire arguments of the parties.

“We are not afraid of any evidence from the prosecution,” the defender added. He was immediately interrupted by the judge and asked not to give any evaluative judgments about evidence, but not to pay attention to the jury to the commentary of the lawyer.

“Found a couple of bones. Then they found a few more "

The presentation of evidence of the prosecution began with the interrogation of the parents of the murdered Catherine. Her mother Tatyana and Father Sergey Levchenko told the jury that the last time they talked with her daughter at the end of March 2017 in Penza. At that time, the girl periodically lived with her friend Artem. He rented a two -room apartment with Mikhail Kulkov. Then, according to his mother Levchenko, Ivankin began to appear in the apartment.

On March 31, Tatyana and her daughter agreed to go to the therapeutic massage. But instead of going to the procedure, Katya unexpectedly decided to go to Artem. On that day, according to her mother, the daughter was worried that Ivankin and Kulkov did not answer calls for a long time. On April 1, Catherine herself stopped taking the phone. But later she called her mother from Dorofeev’s phone and reassured that everything was in order with her and she would return home soon. But then the connection with the daughter was interrupted. Artem did not answer calls.

“I didn’t communicate with her anymore. On April 25, in a mailbox, she found a note allegedly from Katya with a request to install the Jabber messenger, enter a login and password. The text was printed. I installed this application on the phone and sent a message. After a couple of hours they answered me. I ask who it is? In response: "This is Artem." Then he wrote that Katya could not answer now. Then Katya supposedly answered that she was all good that they were going to leave, that she was not to blame for anything. She also asked to find out if I saw the police near the house, ”said Levchenko’s mother, adding that she already knew that Ivankina was looking for drugs.

Tatyana seemed strange to the conversation, and she decided to check whether her daughter really communicates with her. She asked the interlocutor about Katya's favorite dish. “I knew that she loved herring under a fur coat. She answered like that, ”Tatyana said.

She asked her daughter to return and not be afraid of anything. In response, Katya asked to transfer Artem’s mother that he was in order, and then she stopped answering Tatyana's messages. A week later, the chat from the application disappeared.

On April 8, Tatyana filed a statement about the disappearance of her daughter to the police. “I wanted to know at least some information. Living or what ... at least bury, ”Tatyana could not stand it, and tears did not let her finish.

The prosecutor asked to tell in detail how her daughter was eventually found. According to the mother, in 2019, when the process of the “network” began, she went to the court to support the accused. At that time, law enforcement agencies did not particularly attempt to find Katya and Artem. “I strongly supported Katya's friends. I thought they were good. I went to support Kulkov and Ivankin. The public supported them too, ”the victim continued.

On the day of the sentence in the case of the “Network”, on February 10, 2020, in Vkontakte Ilya Hesin contacted her ( familiar defendants in the case of the “Network”. - Ed. ). At that time, it was known that at the end of February 2019, under Ryazan near the village of Lopukhi, the remains of Dorofeev, Levchenko, were still listed as missing.

Hesin and Katya's mother agreed on a meeting in Moscow, at which she recognized his version of events in the forest. “Hesin said that he was a friend of Julian Boyarshinov ( convicted of St. Petersburg’s case“ Network ”. - Ed. ). He suggested that Katya was also killed. He said that he could not calmly watch that I supported the guys from the "network", and they were involved in the murder. He meant Maxim Ivankin and Poltavets, ”Tatyana explained in a trembling voice.

Later, Medusa journalists contacted Poltava, who is hiding outside of Russia. Actually, he and Khesin became key sources in the article “Medusa”, after which the SK began to actively investigate the murder of Levchenko and Dorofeev.

“I continued to look for Katya. I was sure that she was alive. I took this article and went to the prosecutor’s office to already be opened. To find at least something. The case was still brought up. <...> In March, they found the remains of Katya. Where Poltavian said exactly. Found a couple of bones. Then they found a few more. So that at least something could be buried, ”Tatyana said in an undertone.

Ivankin himself asked his clarifying questions to his mother Katya. First of all, he asked if she considers the facts outlined in the article “Medusa” reliable. “I can't know for sure. But I think it is like the truth, ”the victim answered.

Catherine’s father Sergei Levchenko told the jury that he initially suspected that the disappearance of her daughter could be associated with her friends who took place in the case of the “network”. After they discovered the remains of Dorofeev and it was already known about the arrest of Ivankin, Father Katya turned to an operational employee who was engaged in the search for his daughter, and asked Ivankin to interrogate. “We insisted on interrogation, and after a couple of weeks he called us. He said that the loss of "family ties" is confirmed.

Ivankin confirmed that they met in the Ryazan forests, and Katya and Artem went to the Krasnodar Territory. I did not believe this, ”said Sergey Levchenko.

After the study of written materials, the jury was released. At the next meeting, the interrogation of the parents of Dorofeev and witnesses of the prosecution is planned. Continuation of the process on February 15.

* The organization is recognized as terrorist and prohibited in Russia.