Simferopol military court sentences Russian soldier to ten years in prison for killing Russian National Guard officer in Ukraine

A military court in annexed Simferopol has sentenced a Russian contract soldier named Alexey Usenko to ten years in prison for the murder of a Russian National Guard officer.

According to investigators, Usenko killed the officer after mistaking him for a “Ukrainian saboteur.” The Russian newspaper Kommersant reported that in 2022, Usenko stopped a car containing two Russian National Guard officers before threatening them with a weapon and demanding they exit their vehicle.

According to testimony from the car’s driver, he introduced himself and showed Usenko his documents. After that, according to case materials, Usenko shot the second officer in the stomach and demanded that the driver lie on the ground. Usenko’s fellow service members then convinced him to drop his gun. They later said he smelled of alcohol and was behaving aggressively.

Throughout the investigation, Usenko has maintained his innocense, claiming the shot that killed the second officer could have been fired by the “saboteurs” or by other Russian soldiers, and that the driver who claims he saw Usenko fire his weapon is mistaken.