MOSCOW, January 24. /TASS/. Investigators have detained two suspected accomplices of a a 15-year-old teenager, who attacked schoolchildren in East Siberia’s Ulan Ude on January 19, Russian Investigative Committee spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko told TASS on Wednesday.
"Two accomplices have been detained. Charges have already been laid against them, and the investigators requested the court to place them in pretrial custody," she said.
"After the questioning of the attacker, eyewitnesses and victims, and as a result of other investigative procedures, it was established that the attacker committed his crime together with his classmates, one aged 15 and the other - 14," the spokeswoman said.
She said the suspected accomplices were aware of the attacker’s plans and helped him to prepare a Molotov cocktail. They also made sure that the teacher was in the classroom at the time of the attack.
On the morning of January 19, a ninth-grader wielding an axe attacked seventh-graders and a teacher in public school number five in an Ulan-Ude suburb. The teen attacker then set the school facility on fire and wounded himself with a knife. Seven children were hospitalized, including the teacher and the attacker. According to Petrenko, two of the victims are in critical condition.
The 15-year-old teenager was charged with attempted murder and placed in custody for two months.