Russian veteran and former convict stabs ex-girlfriend to death in front of daughter

A court in the southern Russian city of Astrakhan has sentenced a Ukraine war veteran and former convict to 9.5 years in a high-security penal colony for murdering his ex-girlfriend, independent TV news channel Dozhd reported on Friday, citing the court verdict.

According to the verdict, Ivan Polunin, 41, was serving a prison sentence for drug offences but was pardoned in 2023 to go to fight in Ukraine, where he suffered concussion and returned to his home village of Sasykoli in the Astrakhan region in early 2024.

Upon returning home, Polunin decided to reacquaint himself with his 13-year-old daughter, whom he had not seen since her birth. Prior to his previous conviction, he had served sentences for robbery and probation violations. The girl’s mother, an unnamed 48-year-old woman who said that Polunin had threatened her, was opposed to her daughter having any contact with her father.

Despite her objections, Polunin began visiting his daughter, and in February took her from Astrakhan, where she lived with her mother, to Sasykoli. Polunin promised to introduce the child to his parents and bring her home, but instead he took her to an apartment he was renting in Astrakhan.

Her mother found her there the next day. Polunin was also present, and the two began arguing. In the course of the argument, Polunin took a kitchen knife and stabbed the woman several times, killing her.

When she asked about her mother, he told her that she had “gone to America”.

He then proceeded to cover her body with a blanket and took his daughter to a hotel. When she asked about her mother, he told her that she had “gone to America”. At the subsequent trial, the girl said that she had heard the stabbing, and her mother screaming and groaning, and also saw her body, but decided to listen to her father, because she was afraid of him.

Polunin returned to the apartment and dismembered the victim that same evening. He hid parts of the body near a nearby store, and disposed of the rest in a garbage bin. Polunin was detained the next morning when a taxi driver whose car he was in complained to the police about him.

Polunin said in court that during the argument, the victim had insulted Vladimir Putin and soldiers fighting in the war in Ukraine.

Polunin said in court that during the argument, the victim had insulted Vladimir Putin and soldiers fighting in the war in Ukraine. According to Polunin, she had said that she had Ukrainian roots and the Russian military was “killing her relatives”. Polunin said he tried to convince her that the Russians were “defending their homeland from Western aggression”, and felt provoked by her words.

Witnesses said that Polunin almost never took off his military uniform since returning from the war and talked a lot about “terrible events” at the front, saying he also knew how to kill someone with a single blow. His daughter said she had heard “dad talking about religion” and saying that he had “killed a lot” in the war. The court deemed the man sane.

Polunin pleaded guilty. The court named his service in the war a mitigating circumstance.