The husband of a Russian beauty influencer has been jailed for 8 years on charges of murdering his wife, authorities said Thursday.
Kristina Zhuravleva, 28, who boasted tens of thousands of Instagram followers, was found dead in the woods near Russia’s fourth-largest city of Yekaterinburg in April.
Zhuravleva’s husband Dmitry Zhuravlev, who had reported her missing, confessed to her murder weeks later.
The high-profile case has been another stain on Russia's domestic violence record, where studies show more than two-thirds of women who are killed die at the hands of their partners or relatives.
A court in central Russia’s Sverdlovsk region found Zhuravlev guilty of murder and sentenced him to 8 years in a maximum-security penal colony Thursday.
Zhuravlev “strangled the victim out of personal hostility during a domestic quarrel,” the Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, said in a statement.
“A few days later, on the night of April 9, the defendant hid the murdered woman’s body in a forest area,” it added.
“On April 16, the body was accidentally discovered by a citizen who reported the terrible discovery to the law enforcement agencies.”
The Investigative Committee said it was only able to identify Zhuravleva’s body after Zhuravlev declared her missing on April 30.
Activists say Russia’s decriminalization of first-time domestic violence offenses in 2017 emboldens abusers and fosters a culture of impunity.
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