MOSCOW, November 10 (RIA Novosti) - An ex-Russian police office has been sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for cutting off the head of a 20-year-old man in the Urals over a dispute over just 60 rubles (slightly more than $2).
Vasily Rukavishnikov, who resigned from the force shortly after the March incident, was found guilty by a court in the Chelyabinsk Region, the regional prosecutor said.
The court heard that on March 12 this year, Rukavishnikov had been sitting in acquaintance and taxi driver Alexander Yegorov's stationary vehicle in the small town of Varna when a group of young people asked for a ride to their respective homes. Yegorov agreed and Rukavishnikov stayed in the car.
However, after reaching the home of the last passenger, identified only as Nikolai, a conflict arose over the fare. The court heard that 30 rubles was the usual fare for a journey in the town, but that Yegorov demanded three times this sum.
After Nikolai protested that he was unable to pay, Rukavishnikov punched him in the face. The victim was then driven to an allotment owned by a local vocational school and taken to an on-site toilet, where Rukavishnikov proceeded to cut at his neck with a knife concealed about his person.
"After cutting his victim's head off, the attacker, with the help of his friend, took the corpse to a local dump," the prosecutor's statement said.
Yegorov was given a 12-month suspended sentence.
The court handed out its sentence on the day that Russian Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev used his annual Police Day address to remind police chiefs that officers should point their weapons at criminals, and not aim them at law-abiding citizens.
There have been a number of murder cases in 2009 involving Russian police officers. The most high-profile case saw a southern Moscow district chief kill three people and injure two during a supermarket shooting spree in April.
"Department chiefs who take people on and hand out IDs and weapons must understand that these weapons should be pointed only in the direction of criminals, and not aimed at peaceful citizens," Nurgaliyev said.
