The savage gang rape of a young woman by two suspected police lieutenants has sparked the ire of a southern Ukrainian town and has outraged a nation not wishing to tolerate official impunity and massive human rights abuses any longer.
It took mob rule teetering on the edge of mayhem in the town of Vradiyivka in Mykolaiv Oblast, where the heinous crime took place, to prevent a police cover up in tandem with local prosecutors.
Three high-ranking regional police officials and a local prosecutor have thus far been sacked. And the crime’s three suspects, two local police officers and a civilian, are in custody. Odesa police investigators have been brought in to investigate to ensure objectivity, top cop Vitaliy Zakharchenko told parliament on July 3.
The three suspects face up to 12 years in prison if found guilty of gang rape.
Late on June 26, Iryna Krashkova, a 29-year-old grocery store cashier, was heading home from a nightclub when three men abducted her.
They drove her to a nearby forest, beat and robbed her. Two of them raped her and then left her bleeding in the forest. Suffering from skull fractures, cuts and bruises, Krashkova struggled to make it back to town by dawn.
Krashkova personally knew the attackers and identified them to the police. The problem was two of them were also men in uniform from the same town of 8,600 people: Lieutenant Dmytro Polishchuk and First Lieutenant Yevhen Dryzhak. The third man, who allegedly drove the car and beat her, was civilian Serhiy Ryabinenko. The three suspects are 25 to 30 years old.
The police triumphantly proclaimed the case was solved on June 28 when they arrested Ryabinenko and Polishchuk. Ryabinenko took the blame of beating and raping her all to himself.
Dryzhak, who allegedly raped the victim first, claimed to have an alibi. But Krashkova told local media that “This alibi is 100 percent fake.”
“Dryzhak raped me first. Then he told Polishchiuk, ‘Want her? Take (her),’ Krashkova recounted.
District prosecutor Serhiy Mochalko told the local media that Dryzhak was on duty at the local police station the night of the attack, as evidenced by surveillance cameras.
This is when riots started in the town. Outraged over what it perceived to be a cover up by a friendly prosecutor, a crowd of about 100 people initially rallied outside the court building in Vradiyivka to demand justice. The protest grew tenfold (by some accounts) the following day when a mob stormed the police station, pushing through gates, smashing doors and breaking windows while demanding Dryzhak’s arrest.
According to some media reports, the police used tear gas in a failed attempt to disperse the crowd. Police officials denied this, however. At least four people sustained injuries during the riots.
The following day Dryzhak was detained. His alibi appeared to fall apart when another prosecutor from the same district office admitted that there was no video footage proving that he was at the station on the night of June 26.
“The camera recorded Dryzhak at 11 p.m. (on June 26) and then at 6 a.m.,” said Anatoliy Titus, a Mykolaiv regional department prosecutor, on July 3. One of Dryzhak’s colleagues turned off the lights (for a period of) time, and the video footage is blank as a result.
“In theory, Dryzhak could have left the station,” said Titus.
Two of the suspects turned out to have friends and relatives in high places. Polishchuk is the nephew of the prosecutor of one of the districts of Mykolaiv, a regional center.
Also, Mykolaiv human rights activist Elena Kabashnaya claimed that Dryzhak was the godson to General Valentyn Parseniuk, head of Mykolaiv Oblast police. He was dismissed from his job on July 2, the day following mass riots in Vradiyivka.
The town’s top policeman and prosecutor were also dismissed, and its deputy chief of police was arrested and charged with abuse of power that involved violence after he was discovered to have tampered with the crime report.
Prosecutors also discovered that Oksana Rostova, the chief doctor of Vradiyivka’s city hospital, which treated the victim after the crime, falsified medical reports about Krashkova’s condition.
The victim’s injuries were called “light.” The report also indicated that Krashkova had a “promiscuous lifestyle.” According to Prestupnosti.Net, a Mykolaiv criminal news outlet, Rostova is the wife of Vitaliy Rostov, head of the Vradiyivka State Administration and local Party of Regions branch.
On July 4, President Viktor Yanukovych demanded “some fundamental staff decisions (within the interior ministry).”
“I won’t tolerate impunity, especially when it’s about those who must defend people, not violate the law,” he said in an official statement, which observers said will help to investigate the crime more thoroughly.
Meanwhile, Krashkovska’s gang rape has helped to uncover details of another case in the same town. A 15-year-old girl was raped and murdered in Vradiyivka in 2011. Her case remains unsolved despite being under the interior ministry’s personal control.
Also, Krashkova is the second high-profile rape victim in Mykolaiv Oblast in 16 months. Last year, the nation was incensed by the gang-rape of 18-year-old Oksana Makar. She was set on fire and soon died of her wounds in the hospital. Three rapists, some of them relatives of authoritative local officials, were sentenced to life, 15 and 14 years in prison.
Kyiv Post editor Olga Rudenko can be reached at [email protected].
