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St. Petersburg court arrests granny suspected of more than ten killings

Officially, pensioner Tamara Samsonova is suspected of only one murder at this stage — the poisoning and dismembering of a 79-year-old woman she was looking after

© ITAR-TASS/Mikhail Pochuev

St. PETERSBURG, July 29. /TASS/. A district court in St. Petersburg has arrested the pensioner Tamara Samsonova, who is charged with killing more than ten people, the city’s Prosecution Office said on Wednesday.

"The court authorized taking Samsonova to custody," a spokesperson for the office said.

Officially, she is suspected of only one murder at this stage — the poisoning of a 79-year-old woman she was looking after.

Officials at the St. Petersburg and Leningrad region Main Department of the Interior on Wednesday refuted the media reports quoting a local police source who alleged Samsonova had killed more than ten people.

They said police had exposed one more murder she had committed. The episode dates back to 2003 when she finished off a 44-year-old man who was renting a room in her apartment.

In both cases, the old woman dismembered the bodies of her victims and threw the fragments away on the street.

Media reports claimed, however, the police had found the pensioner’s diary containing descriptions of ten murders she had committed.

As part of investigation, forensic psychiatric tests have been appointed.

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