MYKOLAYIV, Ukraine -- Tissue fragments of Lyubov Frolova’s son, Oleksandr, were found in a car seized by the Security Service of Ukraine on Feb. 24. After learning that his corpse was cut up after in December at the Mykolaiv Forensic Medicine bureau, the 65-year-old woman fell ill, became weak and rarely leaves her small two-room apartment in a rundown multi-story apartment building.
One source of her strength is the hope those who committed the crime against her son’s body will be punished. Here is her story:
“My son [36-year-old Oleksandr Frolov] died when he had an epileptic seizure. When my daughter-in-law called the ambulance, it came and did nothing. She asked please give him artificial respiration … but they told her ‘he’s done,’ and called the administrator from the morgue. It was on Dec. 20 [2011] at 3:30 a.m.
“So this guy from the forensic medicine bureau came immediately and then he called the police and the body was taken away. They told me he was already dead, swallowed his tongue during an epileptic seizure. So they told me there is an order that all young people need to undergo an autopsy.
“When my brother and I went to do the funeral-related paperwork, they offered us a really fancy coffin. I told them, this coffin is too short, as my son is 1 meter, 85 centimeters in height and weighed 95 kilograms. And they told me that this is a standard-sized coffin. Now I understand why it was so small.
“When we saw my son, we didn’t recognize him, as he was as short as when he was 17 years old and very thin.
“During the wake they kept telling us not to touch the body. Also, when we went to buy the cover for the body, we wanted something light and transparent … They talked us out of it, insisting that we take a heavier one, made of atlas. Only later did we realize that it makes the body invisible underneath it.
“So, during the wake they kept hurrying us up to get to the cemetery. When we got there, my daughter wanted to untie his hands and feet [according to the funeral tradition]. They wouldn’t let her. Instead, the funeral steward did it by himself under the cover.
“On the way to the cemetery, when we were in the hearse … we noticed that one of the shoes slipped off his foot, which seemed to be hanging loose. When my daughter-in-law touched it, she said that his foot was empty.
“At the time we came to do the paperwork necessary to bury him, a doctor was waiting for me there. I don’t know who it was, but she started showing me some document about organs’ charity donation. She asked if she could get a piece of my son’s tendon from his foot. She explained that it’s needed to make a valuable medicine for the burns unit for the newborn babies. Also said it was approved by the church.
“You know, I am a mom, grandmother, so I said okay if you take just one, nothing bad will happen. She told me to sign the permission. I did.
“So, when the guys from the Security Service of Ukraine came, they showed me a copy of what I signed. It just said ‘organs,’ it didn’t say that it was just about the tendon. And I was in such a state, didn’t have glasses on, and couldn’t see anything. And there was also an attached list of what has been taken from him. Two ribs, two Achilles’ heels, two elbows, two eardrums, two teeth and so on. I couldn’t read it till the end, as I felt sick. I couldn’t read it — 36 fragments total.
“When I saw the video showing the bus [carrying the tissue fragments from Mykolaiv to Kyiv and ceased by the SBU on Feb. 23], my son’s [tissue fragments] were there, according to the documents they showed me. I understand that the company receiving them demanded that the documents are in place. When I saw all this, I really felt bad. So, I think that these people have to be punished for their lies and for profiteering on this.
“If they asked me to give it to [someone who really needed it], even the elbow, I would do it without any doubts.
“But these people are making a lot of money by deceiving people and then charge those people who need these [tissues], these people have to be punished. All my friends who watched the news about our forensic medicine bureau say that they need to be punished.
“But I already heard that our health department is claiming that this practice is for the good of people. I understand that it’s for the good of people, but you can’t violate the law.
“I heard that [the tissues] were shipped to Germany to be used for the plastic surgeries and also for donation. I have nothing against donation, but it should be done according to the law.
“Not like they do, disassembling the body completely. I buried not my son, but his mummy. I had a psychiatrist working with me after I learned all of this.
“My son was a strong, healthy man. It’s just that he fell off a tree, several years ago, when the kids asked him to fetch some fruit. He was a sailor, cheerful, tender guy. His daughter is 2.5 year olds. She’s still waiting and looking for him.”
Kyiv Post staff writer Vlad Lavrov can be reached at [email protected]
