| About the author
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| 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. He is currently a freelance writer based in Moscow and can be reached by e-mail at this address. |
One such day of relaxation turned tragic recently in the republic of Bashkortistan, when a local police officer and a group of friends murdered a pair of nearby revelers, dumping the man’s body in the river and burning the woman’s corpse in the forest.
The bloody developments unfolded July 24 on the banks of the Yuryuzan River, a tributary of the Ufa River in the city of Yuryuzan.
The couple — identified by local media as Fail Galyamov and Irina Kildiyarova — was relaxing on the riverbank next to a group of five people, including a police interrogator from the Chelyabinsk region city of Katav-Ivanovsk, investigators said.
The police investigator — identified by authorities only as 38-year-old Eduard I. — and his friends were drinking heavily and ingesting unspecified narcotics, resulting in behavior that sparked an argument with the couple.
In the trunk of his car, the policeman had a 12-gauge pump-action shotgun, which he retrieved and handed to his friend, a convicted drug felon, investigators said. The friend shot Galyamov, 31, in the face, killing him and leaving his body in the river.
The group then packed Kildiyarova, 27, into their car, drove her into the woods and shot her twice in the head. In order to hide evidence of the crime, the two men poured gasoline over the woman’s body and set the remains alight, investigators said.
Both suspects were detained several days later and have since been placed under arrest on murder charges after admitting to the double homicide, regional Investigative Committee spokesman Andrei Ovchinnikov told Interfax on Wednesday.
There’s at least a month of picnic weather left, so be safe out there. Heed the advice of my old chess teacher on how to respond subtly to wild, sloppy moves by opponents: “If you see a drunk man, just step out of the way.”