Two women have been found murdered in their apartment in Tatarstan with the slogan "Free Pussy Riot" written on the wall above them, apparently in blood, investigators said Thursday.
The bodies of two women, a pensioner, 76, and her daughter, 38, were discovered Wednesday in their apartment in the Tatarstan capital of Kazan, the Investigative Committee said Thursday in a statement on its website, citing Tatarstan investigators.
Both bodies had multiple stab wounds, the statement said. The women were presumably killed some time between Friday and Sunday, it said.
Nikolai Polozov, a lawyer for the three female members of punk group Pussy Riot who were sentenced earlier this month to two years imprisonment, called the inscription "a dirty provocation," Interfax reported.
Polozov told the news agency that Pussy Riot supporters are "mostly people who stick to legal ways of protest."
On Twitter, he warned journalists against calling the murderers Pussy Riot supporters.
A headline Thursday afternoon on state-run news website Vesti.ru seemed to do just that, saying "People Have Begun to Kill for Pussy Riot."
Regional investigators have opened a criminal case in connection with the incident on murder charges, which carry a maximum term of life in prison.
Pussy Riot members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 22, Maria Alyokhina, 24, and Yekaterina Samutsevich, 30, were sentenced to two years in a prison colony on Aug. 17 for participating in a February performance denouncing President Vladimir Putin and Patriarch Kirill at Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral.
Related articles: