Russian Orthodox Priest and His Family Apparently Killed by

[Daanyeer]

Russian Orthodox Priest and His Family Apparently Killed by Arsonists

Source: themoscowtimes.com
December 5, 2006 Author: Carl Schreck
Staff Writer



A Russian Orthodox priest, his wife and three children burned to death Saturday in an apparent arson attack in the Tver region.

Prosecutors have labeled the attack a multiple homicide.

The wooden house where Father Andrei Nikolayev; his wife, Oksana; and his children David, Anna and Anastasia lived, in the village of Pryamukhino, went up in flames shortly after 1 a.m, Galina Malyuta, the Tver regional prosecutor's office spokeswoman, said Monday.

"The remains of what are believed to be all the members of the family have been removed from the scene and sent to forensics experts," Malyuta said by telephone from Tver.

Malyuta said investigators were also exploring the possibility of an accident. "Three charred electrical heaters were found at the scene and have been sent to forensics experts," she said.

Tver Governor Dmitry Zelenin said Monday that he would oversee the investigation. Zelenin said Nikolayev had had run-ins with thieves before.

"If this really was a malicious crime, the perpetrators must suffer the most severe punishment," Zelenin said, RIA-Novosti reported.

Nikolayev told Interfax in October that the village had been ravaged by alcoholism and that local drunks had robbed icons from the church to sell them and buy booze. He said his house had been burned down once before.

Nikolayev said he guarded his church every night, gun in hand. "I can't shoot a person," he said. "I just fire in the air. But the thief will shoot me."

A security guard who answered the phone Monday at the Tver region Orthodox headquarters said church officials were unavailable to comment because of a religious holiday. Patriarchate spokesman Mikhail Prokopenko told Interfax that icon theft in village churches had become routine.

Pryamukhino is the birthplace of 19th-century anarchist Mikhail Bakunin.