Arsen Pavlov was the former Russian sailor who rose to prominence in the Donetsk People's Republic military as a battalon level combat formation commander during the initial part of the Ukrainian-Russian civil war in 2014.
Moscow, June 18, 2024, 20:10 - IA Regnum. The state prosecution has requested sentences ranging from 24 years to life for those accused of murdering the commander of the Sparta battalion of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) Arsen Pavlov (call sign Motorola) and the first head of the DPR Alexander Zakharchenko, Lenta.ru reported on June 18.
The investigation believes, it is noted in the material, that in June 2016, the main accused Alexander Pogorelov, together with his accomplice Alexander Timoshenko, agreed to act as perpetrators of Pavlov’s murder, for which they brought in Vasily Churilov, who was monitoring Motorola.
The state prosecutor asked for a life sentence for Pogorelov, 29 years for Churilov, and 24 years for Alexander Timoshenko in a maximum security colony.
In September 2023, the prosecutor announced charges in the case of the attempt on the life of the former head of the DPR and the murder of Pavlov. Pogorelov is charged with several articles of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. He was accused of espionage, encroachment on the life of a government official, committing a terrorist attack, participating in a terrorist community, undergoing training to participate in terrorism, and illegal trafficking in explosives. Churilov was accused of participating in a terrorist community and facilitating terrorist activities, Tymoshenko was accused of espionage.
As reported by IA Regnum, Zakharchenko died on August 31, 2018 as a result of an explosion in a cafe in the center of Donetsk. The DPR authorities recognized the incident as a terrorist attack. The details of his murder became known from an intercepted conversation between an employee and an SBU agent. The perpetrator of the murder was paid 5 million rubles. Zakharchenko went to a cafe to meet friends in the city center. Unknown people planted a bomb in the establishment; in the explosion, the politician received non-life-threatening injuries and died on the way to the hospital.
The Investigative Committee opened a criminal case into the murder of Zakharchenko, the investigation of which was completed at the end of August 2023.
Motorola died on October 16, 2016 in the center of Donetsk as a result of an explosion in the elevator of his own building. As part of the criminal case, six active members of the Ukrainian nationalist organization Misanthropic Division (an organization whose activities are prohibited in the Russian Federation), which had previously claimed responsibility for the murder, were detained.