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Starovoitova murder case taken to court

The Russian politician and human rights activist Galina Starovoitova was shot dead overnight on November 21, 1998, in her apartment building in central St. Petersburg

© ITAR-TASS/Ruslan Shamukov

ST. PETERSBURG, July 20. /TASS/. The St. Petersburg prosecutor’s office has approved the indictment in the case of the 1998 murder of Russian politician and human rights activist Galina Starovoitova, the lawyer of former member of Russia’s State Duma Mikhail Glushchenko who is accused of the murder, told TASS on Monday.

"The criminal case with the confirmed bill of indictment will be handed over to Oktyabrsky district court for consideration tomorrow," Alexander Afanasyev said.

In June, a criminal case against Glushchenko was separated for considering it in a separate procedure. In March, he made a deal with the investigation, according to which he will give testimony against the person who ordered Starovoitova’s murder. According to Afanasyev, during the interrogation in April 2014 Glushchenko confessed to complicity in Starovoitova’s murder naming another perpetrator of the crime — Barsukov (Kumarin) — one of the leaders of the Tambov criminal gang that used to operate in St. Petersburg.

The investigation into the murder of Starovoitova was resumed by the FSB St.Petersburg branch in August 2013. The politician was shot dead overnight on November 21, 1998, in her apartment building in central St.Petersburg. According to investigators, the crime was politically motivated. The person who was behind the crime has not been found.

Glushchenko is serving an 8-year sentence in a high-security penal colony for extortion. He is also a suspect in the case of contract killing of St. Petersburg businessman Vyacheslav Shevchenko and two more Russians in Cyrprus in 2004.

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