About the author

Managing editor Carl Schreck cut his journalism teeth as a crime reporter for The Moscow Times and now spends an unhealthy amount of time scanning the web for the most disturbing and tragicomic crimes Russia has to offer. You can email him at schreck@imedia.ru.

In a quirky case that mirrors the plot of a famous Russian movie, a St. Petersburg police investigator is suspected of organizing the escape of an jailed felon with whom she had apparent romantic links.
 
Prosecutors say Yana Antonova, an investigator for "especially important cases" with the St. Petersburg police, forged an order for the jail transfer of suspect Mikhail Beryukov and then spirited him off to a rented apartment, where they spent a week together.
 
It turns out that Antonova was working on a case in which Beryukov, who's already served time for murder, was charged with fraud. A court had ordered him remanded to a St. Petersburg detention facility, but in February, Antonova — "acting out of her own personal interest" — forged her boss' signature on an order to transfer Beryukov to a different facility, investigators said.
 
But forging the order was just the beginning, authorities say. On Feb. 24, Antonova then managed to convince the police convoy carrying out the transfer order that the case against Beryukov had actually been dropped, meaning that he should be released immediately, investigators said.
 
"After that she drove Beryukov in her own car to an apartment in St. Petersburg that Antonova had rented earlier," the Investigative Committee said in a statement.
 
It appears that Antonova had no intention of breaking him out for good. It looks like she may have just wanted a little "us" time for the star-crossed lovers.
 
After spending a week holed up in the apartment, she tried in vain to get him to go back to jail. While Beryukov was drunk, Antonova called the cops and claimed he had escaped from jail, and he was promptly returned to his detention facility.
 
Antonova was kicked off the force on March 5, and authorities are investigating her on suspicion of abusing her position.
 
If any of this sounds familiar to you Russian cinema buffs, you may recall the 1993 film "Tyuremny Romans," or "Prison Romance," starring Marina Neyolova and Alexander Abdulov.
 
Neyolova played Yelena Shemelova, a senior police investigator and wife of a State Duma deputy who falls in love with crime boss Sergei Maduyev, played by Abdulov, who goes by the nickname "Chervonets," or "Tenner" (as in "ten-ruble bill").
 
She falls in love with Tenner, breaks him out of jail, and dramatic things happen, though Shemelova doesn't end up behind bars.
 
Curiously, that movie is based on a true story, in which a female lawyer broke the real Sergei Maduyev — a half-Korean, half-Chechen gangster also nicknamed "Tenner" — out of jail.
 
The lawyer, Natalya Vorontsovaya, did a stint in the can for organizing the break.