Dispute over Putin

Russian ex-soldier murders wife next to daughter

The propaganda poster promotes military service. "We defend the fatherland", it says in bold letters.

(Bild: AFP)

A pardoned ex-soldier from the Russian city of Astrakhan, recruited in a sinister penal colony, has savagely stabbed and dismembered the mother of his 13-year-old daughter. Beforehand, the woman is said to have insulted Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin and the military. Particularly shocking: their child was in the apartment at the time of the crime.

In court, Ivan Polunin absurdly claimed that it was actually the woman who provoked him to commit this terrible act. According to his account, she insulted the Russian warring parties and President Vladimir Putin during the argument, reports the independent Russian-language TV channel "TV Rain", citing the criminal file on the strange justification.

She had relatives in Ukraine and said that the Russian soldiers were "killing her relatives". Polunin wanted to convince her that the Russian army was "defending the homeland from Western aggression".

On the front line for freedom
According to the court document, the now 41-year-old served on the front line from April 2023. It was a "deal" to avoid having to serve his prison sentence, which he had served for a drug offense. He returned home with a bruise in 2024.

Back at home as a free man, he sought contact with his daughter. He had not seen her since she was born, as he had spent 13 years in prison, reports "TV Rain". However, the mother did not approve of the contact.

This is Ivan Polunin:

"Moved to America"
 Polunin nevertheless kept visiting the teenager until a heated argument broke out. The ex-soldier lost his temper so badly that he stabbed the child's mother several times with a kitchen knife. He covered the lifeless body with a blanket. The daughter was in the next room at the time. The 41-year-old then took the 13-year-old to a hotel and told her that her mother had "moved to America". At the court hearing, the daughter described seeing her mother lying on the floor and hearing blows, screams and gasps.

Body dismembered and thrown in the garbage
On the day of the murder, Polunin returned to the apartment, dismembered the woman, hid some of the body parts near a store and threw the rest in a garbage can.

The district court sentenced Polunin to nine and a half years in a maximum security colony. The man was convicted by the cab driver who had transported the former soldier with the body parts.