Screenshot from Periscope broadcast by Denis Muravyev
Snob’s reporter-at-large Polina Eremenko spent a week in the Pskov [A town in North-West Russia, an 8 hour bus ride away from Saint Petersburg] collecting details of the story of Denis Muravyov and Katerina Vlasova – two teenagers who barricaded themselves in a house, shot at the police and committed suicide.
Polina Eremenko tells the story of Katya and Denis: who were these kids, what troubled them and what led them to decide that suicide is the best option.
Several kids turn around at the sound of gunshots coming from a funeral procession honoring the death of a high ranked police officer. Together with the gunshots, an orchestra made of a conductor, two drums and four wind instruments, breaks the cemetery silence, in which a few minutes ago only the sniffles of a hundred kids gathered around the grave of 15-year-old Denis Muravyov could be heard.
It’s noon, November 17. At the Krestovskoye cemetery, located on the outskirts of Pskov. Snow is falling, the wind is shaking the trees, kids, shifting from foot to foot in the cold, are silent. Denis is buried in a closed coffin. His framed photo stands on top of the coffin. The children throw a handful of ground on Denis’s coffin one by one.
The friends of the police officer at the neighboring burial plot loudly read speeches about the sudden death of a beloved friend, the orchestra plays the Russian anthem, five officers fire guns into the air, the kids turn away silently. Denis’s girlfriend Katya Vlasova is buried right next to Denis. After their death, dozens of social networks pages, memes and posts were dedicated to them. Denis and Katya would have been glad to see so many mourners – three days ago, while broadcasting their suicide on Periscope, they were worried that upset about having so little viewers [Periscope was popular live streaming social app in Russia in 2016, which allowed it’s users to broadcast
their socials interactions and other explorations of the world].
Katya and Denis chose to hide away from life in a freezing summer house in the village Strugi Krasnie. When the police found them, they shot at the police and a stray dog from a hunting rifle they found in the house. Then Denis, at the request of Katya, shot her and then killed himself. The house was then raided by the police with the use of grenades. Then came conspiracy theories about what really happened and also requests from the police to ban
video games and the internet for good.
The police comrades toast with vodka shots to the long and honorable life of their commander, the school kids lay flowers on the fresh grave of their friends without speaking words and head towards the bus that will take them back to Pskov.
The kids from the schools No. 24, No. 25, No. 26 and No. 8 located in the outskirts of Pskov are used to meeting up after school at the Aquapolis shopping center. Socializing starts at 4 pm, by 9pm many of them need to be home. If weather allows, they roam the streets and bridges and drink. Then they come back to Aquapolis, they ride up and down the escalators with an air of importance, gather in the food court, a crowd of 30 around a single table and
talk quietly for hours. Nobody has much money, so the kids buy just a couple of ice creams in order not to get kicked out. The cashier selling pizza yells at them for taking space and the security guard scolds them for messing with the artificial flowers decorating the food court. They don’t come from poor families, some of their parents work at Lexus and Gazprom [Gazprom is Russia’s largest oil company], but no one has pocket money, so the big
question is always the same: where to get alcohol and who has cigarettes?
They buy cigarettes per piece, 8 roubles per cigarette. The night before the funeral one of the kids puts a whole pack of berry flavored Winston on the table for everyone to share. Some are vaping – under the table – in order not to get kicked out of the mall. Today they are drinking canned Gin Tonic and a local drink “Grape day”. One of the girls explains: “I drink boy problems away, it’s how I get rid of stress. My parents don’t understand. They keep asking me why I drink, why do I not read books”. To get drunk faster and cheaper, they make “bubblers”: a hole is made in the bottle with a cigarette, then they blow in smoke and drink. They used to hang out at the club “R-16”, but it’s closed now. Sometimes a party is held in school #24, but the kids are expecting the New Year party to be canceled after what happened to Denis and Katya.
The kids play: they push back a chair, so their friend falls on the floor, they drop ice cream on each other saying “That’s my cum, mate”. On November 16 everyone is discussing the upcoming funeral. How much money to spend on flowers? Can they bring champagne? Will
Denis have an open or closed coffin? Is he allowed to be burried inside the cemetery walls or does he have to lie outside the fence after murdering and commiting suicide? Katya was already buried a couple of days ago. They say her mother is a witch and wanted no witnesses. The couple was last seen at the mall early last week.
Denis and Katya met two years ago, after Denis moved with his family to Pskov from Arkhangelsk. They studied in parallel classes and began dating this spring. They were
considered the most beautiful couple in school. “They were perfect and very beautiful, and he forgave her everything,” says a friend of Denis and Katya, who asked not to indicate his name. The school principal prohibited the teenagers from speaking to any journalists and
also advised them not to discuss the incident among each other.
Friends describe Katya as someone who always gave good advice, but never followed it herself. She taught those around her to be positive, but cried a lot. Denis was one of those guys who was always late for class and made everyone laugh. The school principal, Elvira Vasicheva, pointed out that Katya was “a little hysterical at some moments.” A representative of the Investigative Committee said that earlier this year Denis attracted the attention of law enforcement agencies due to his low academic performance, absenteeism and misbehavior.
According to the head of the Strugi Krasnie village, Katya’s stepfather is a military officer and her grandfather was a local entrepreneur and owned several stores. Apparently, the teenagers’ parents couldn’t stand each other and were against their children’s relationship.
Katya drank and smoked a lot, especially this summer – she drank almost every day. Denis also began to drink more this summer and started smoking. “They fell in love with each other too deeply,” explains their friend, “they did everything together. And they drank together. What can you do when you quarrel with your parents all the time? Drink and run away.”
According to one of Katya’s friends, this summer she began to talk more and more about suicide, in September she cut her wrists, said that she was “tired and wants everything to be over,” she cheated on Denis, and after another quarrel she drank even more. “They broke
up, then made up, it all took its toll on their minds,” says one friend.
-Katya cheated on him a lot, he always forgave her.
-Yes, Katya kissed others a lot.
-They met, broke up, made up. Every time they separated, Katya drank a lot.
-Katya trusted him. And he killed her in return.
-Yes, she believed in him, but he also believed in her. She did what he said, and he did what
she said.
The kids say everyone here starts drinking and smoking at age 10, having sex at age of 12. The last thing they want to talk about is problems at home and in life. Many here have issues with their parents, but discussing this with friends is taboo: friends are needed to relax, not to go over household matters with.
“Katya had problems with her mother, Denis had problems with his stepfather. They didn’t talk about it. We don’t share such problems. It’s too personal. Nobody asks how things are at home—that’s not what we talk about.” Denis and Katya ran away from home after Katya had a quarrel with her mom. “Well, I had a fight with my mom because I was late coming home or something. I asked to go to my friend’s house for a sleepover, mom said no, I ran away, they found me and beat the shit out of me” she mentioned in one of her last Periscope broadcasts.
Their friends watched those last periscopes with their full attention. Some kids couldn’t believe that Katya dyed her hair, other kids couldn’t believe that Denis and Katya would kill themselves. “It’s not like Denis to shoot the girl he loves.” But at the same time, most friends understand why Denis and Katya did this: “If they would have surrendered to the police their lives would be destroyed anyway and they would definitely lose each other”. “They had a good time until the police tracked them down. Denis mentions how good they were, on Periscope. They just wanted to be together”. “They had no choice: problems at school,
problems at home, problems everywhere”.
On Sunday, November 13, one of the inhabitants of Strugi Krasnie village, Lyubov, noticed the lights were on at the neighbor’s house. She got uneasy about this: the light in the Vlasovs’ [Katya’s stepfather] house was never on at this time of year. The Vlasovs only came here in the summer – to visit the banya [Russian steam bath] , to relax – but never in the winter. Lyubov liked the Vlasovs, she said they were always quiet, pleasant, never quarreling. That’s why she never considered building a fence between their plots of land.
But when she saw the lights on in Vlasov’s house, she was alarmed: that same morning a father of six strangled his 33-year-old wife to death out of jealousy. This village of only 7,000 inhabitants was not used to being in the criminal news, so everyone was in shock. The killer was hiding the whole day and Lubov was worried: had he snuck into the Vlasovs’ house and was now hiding there with the lights on?
Katya and Denis had been hiding in the house for two days. In their Periscope broadcast they said that on Friday Denis withdrew money from his mother’s bank card and they rode the bus for 80 kilometers from Pskov to the unspectacular village Strugi Krasnie. They spent an hour trying to open a window with a knife before they could finally get in. The house was freezing cold, there was nothing to light the fireplace with. They opened her stepfather’s safe locker with a knife, which contained a “surprise,” as Katya called it: a photo posted on Instagram shows a box containing large-caliber ammunition, stacks of cash, and several shotguns and pistols. According to Katya, her stepfather is “a special forces soldier, an FSB
agent, a hunter.”
They spent the whole weekend sleeping. On Monday morning, Lyubov was taking her daughter to school at the same time Katya’s mother arrived at the house. It is not known how her mother figured out where Katya was. In
Periscope Katya said: “Well, we were peacefully sleeping, then I heard knocking on the door. I thought it might be my grandma. I opened the door, it was my grandma and my mom, I let them in, I had a knife in my hands. Grandma jumped on me “Give me the knife, give me the knife!”. Mom jumped on grandma and then somehow my hands where bleeding, I’m not sure if they cut me or I cut myself. I didn’t even feel pain. Denis told them they better leave, he was calm but zero reaction came from their side. That’s when he freaked out and shot my mother in the leg, they left”.
Next morning at 9 am the police arrived. In Periscope Denis says: “The cops arrived, started banging on the door”. He fired the first bullets at the police car. And if he shot Katya’s mother with a pneumatic gun, by the time he was shooting at the police, he was doing it with a real
gun.
In a video posted on Instagram, Denis says as he prepares for the next shot: “Gonna spend last minutes of my life so fucking cool”. When Lyubov was returning from school, the road to the house was already blocked by the police. She was told that the neighbors were having some trouble and she was asked to stand behind the cordon
At 11.16 am Katya posted on her VKontakte page [Vkontakte is the Russian equivalent of Facebook]:
“I loved you, but you destroyed my psyche and life, without even noticing. Goodbye all, friends, family. Don’t worry, I’ll leave in style. Good luck to everyone, please don’t be afraid to live the way you want to. The best life is when you’re happy. Love you”.
One of policemen anonymously explained the logic of the further actions of the police: “At 11 am they already wrote they are going to commit suicide. There was no way to help them after. Our mission was only to prevent new victims”.
Lyubov, who was stuck behind the cordon, learned the news only from the Internet. Her anxiety peaked when she read that the kids shot a dog. She was afraid that it was her shepherd Lassie that had been shot. “They shot at houses, the TV and dogs. They just wanted to shoot, shoot, shoot. And when there was nothing else to shoot at, they shot the dogs. Why did they have to kill dogs?” asks the police officer.
After a couple of hours of the siege, around 13:00, the police tried to negotiate with Denis and Katya. “We tried to find out how many hostages were in the house, what the hostage’s demands were. They said there were no demands and there were no hostages”. At 13:33 Katya wrote on her VKontakte page: “I am not being held hostage, this is my conscious choice.”
Why was a psychologist not sent to speak to the kids? The police officer says that there is simply no such person in the local police: “But through megaphones we negotiated
according to protocol. We spoke like human beings, those of our employees who mastered the art of speech spoke. You may ask, why didn’t we just go into the house and take away their weapons? They were shooting left and right, none of us wanted to die.”
Katya’s school teacher is confident that she could have prevented the tragedy if she had been on the spot: “If I was there, I could have helped. I would have talked Denis and Katya out of what they were doing. Those children were waiting for someone to help them, but no
one arrived”.
Just a two-minute walk from the Vlasovs’ house stands a church. The priest was at home that day: “In the morning I heard what was happening and began to pray. I prayed at home. I didn’t go talk to the children. A priest couldn’t help them. These children belong to social media, they cannot hear the priest. So I stayed home and prayed.”
At one point Denis came to the idea that if they surrender, they will get a minimum of 25 years in prison. “If we give in, life will basically be over: a criminal record, problems with parents, problems at school”, Katya said in the broadcast. Then, according to the broadcast, Denis’s mother approached the house and took the gun from them through the window: “She took the gun. There are no more bullets.” According to Denis and Katya, they only had two
cigarettes left, a drop of alcohol and a bent ladle.
According to a source in the police of the Pskov newspaper, Katya’s stepfather, Alexey Vlasov, was next to the police behind the cordon line and gave detailed information about the number of weapons and ammunition in the house. Alexey Vlasov told the police that in fact there were still weapons in the house.
The last broadcast ended with a dialogue between Katya and Denis (in quotes are questions from the audience read out loud):
Katya: We have the option to surrender. No way. But then what do we do?
Denis: If we don’t surrender, they will kill us.
Katya: And if we don’t give up… “Everyone is watching you guys”… Who’s everyone? The whole class is watching me! (Laughs). “I will miss you so much!” Max, we will miss you
very much too! Honestly. We’re gonna miss all of you! “What’s wrong with you?” My hands got a little cut from my mom. We are morally destroyed, honestly.
Denis: It’s just that if we give up, we’re unlikely to see you all again. We will be shoved into different cities and different schools.
Katya: “Where did you get the money?” Well, first we withdrew money from Denis’s mother’s card, and then…
Denis: Then my grandma got us some money. And then we got some more money, but we won’t tell you how, ‘cause it’s a secret.
Katya: “What are the cops up to?” The cops are standing there and doing nothing! They’re just waiting it out. We shot at them a couple of times.
Denis: The funny thing is that the cop gave permission to shoot at him, and now the motherfucker … [sound interrupts].
It is not clear what happened next. According to one of Denis’s friends, who asked that his name not be mentioned, he received a message from Denis. The message said that Denis is going to shoot Katya in the back of her head because she was scared: “Denis told Katya: ‘Turn your back to me.’”
At about 4 p.m, the teenagers stopped answering calls and messages. The police officer said in the megaphone: “Denis, come out”. There was no answer. “Come out, stop fooling around”. “We’re going to break the door otherwise, we’re all tired here, just come out, don’t do anything stupid”.
A video, filmed by the neighbors, shows how the police officer throws a grenade into the house and windows fly out. The officers enter the house and then shout: “Ambulance! Call an ambulance!”. The ambulance arrived shortly.
A statement from Investigative Committee representative Svetlana Petrenko summed up dryly: “A 15-year-old young man shot his peer and then committed suicide.” The Press
Service of the Northwestern District Police office stated that the officers did not open fire when entering the house. The bodies were sent by ambulance to Pskov for a forensic examination. The broken door of the house was sealed with boards.
When the cordon was lifted, Lyubov the neighbor rushed to see if her dog Lassie was ok. Lassie was ok. Lyubov recalls that when her family bought a house in Strugi Krasnie village, they were told this village is as peaceful as it gets. Now, after two murders, she is not sure what to do: “I just want to leave this village now, but who will ever buy my house with a view on the murder site now?”.
Otherwise, the events in the Vlasovs’ house did not greatly affect the life of Strugi Krasnie. Deputy Head of the village’s Administration, Irina Gavrilova, says she doesn’t have much to say about the situation, because she learned all she knows from the internet. “These guys!
What a mess they made, huh?”. A day after the assault, an elderly inhabitant of the village walks past the house. She is wearing a fur coat and a fur hat and her eyebrows are painted black. “The television is to blame for this, the state is to blame,” she says with confidence. “Children don’t wash floors these days anymore, they don’t respect old people. We washed the floors for our old people, oh, how we washed them. There is no purity in the world, there
is no kindness in the world. Only prostitutes remain! There should be more patriotism, more kindness on TV”.
At the bus stop where the bus to Pskov departs two locals are discussing the Sunday murder of the mother of six: “He killed her and then washed her and changed her into clean
clothes, that scumbag. I feel so sorry for Svetka. That fucking faggot! They were together for 11 years, 6 children, I hate the fucker. He told the cops he found her dead, he’s going to get away with it. And then to come to church with the children on Sunday?”. The man at the bus station says he wants to kill the guy, he just needs to get his instruments he can kill with from Pskov first.
The local newspaper “Strugi” (est. May 12, 1931, circulation 1000 copies) wrote nothing about what happened. The front page came out with a poem
“How to lose some nasty
weight? //
The whole world is waiting for an answer //
So much advice around, so many
“solutions” //
Here is our take: be the first one to leave the table!”.
The journalists at the newsroom explained this by saying the editor-in-chief left for Pskov to get guidelines from
the city Administration on how to cover the story and has not returned yet.
The classmates of Denis and Katya are haunted by several questions. They work on their conspiracy theories while riding the escalators at Aquapolis. They can talk about the matter only here – teachers at school prohibit mentioning Denis and Katya. The teachers say Denis and Katya did it to themselves, end of story.
It is easier for the kids to believe that Katya and Denis were killed by the police than that Denis killed them both. “Denis wouldn’t have had the courage to kill her or kill himself,” says one of his friends. “Remember on Periscope when Katya shot at the TV and Denis said: ‘Hey, careful there, you’re going to kill us like that, I still wanna live!’”. Another thing the kids don’t understand is why on the video released by the police after entering the house they see that the gun is in the same corner it was during the Periscope broadcast. “Are we supposed to believe Denis shot Katya, then himself and then put the gun back in its place and died?”.
The kids also don’t understand how Denis and Katya could shoot themselves if they mentioned in the broadcast that they had used up all the bullets. Their classmates also
noticed that if you listen carefully to the video posted in Denis’s Instagram where he is shooting at the police you can hear a voice saying “aim higher” at 00:08. And none of the kids can understand why the policemen watching the Periscope broadcast could not have intervened and entered the house while Denis and Katya were simply sitting on the sofa and eating snacks.
An hour after the ending of Denis’s funeral, a couple stands at the grave of Katya. The man tugs at the hairs on his head, then takes a bottle of vodka from his bag and starts drinking from the bottle. He says: “I am Katya’s biological father”. According to him, he served in the
army during the Chechnya war. When he came back, Katya’s mother had already remarried Katya’s stepfather Vlasov, and deprived him of parental rights. Katya’s father says it’s her mother’s fault Katya is dead. He says if we would’ve known about the broadcast, he would have come running to the house and saved his daughter and her boyfriend. The man lays two roses on Denis’s grave and promises soon there will be one more corpse to this story – he wants to find Katya’s stepfather Vlasov and kill him.
Originally published in Snob magazine (Russia), 2016
https://snob.ru/selected/entry/116768/
Archive of published stories (2009-2019) about the life of common people in RUssia by Polina Eremenko 