The 2nd Western District Military Court sentenced serviceman Stanislav Ionkin to 20 years in a maximum security colony in the case of a fire in the Kostroma Polygon club. An Interfax correspondent reported this from the courtroom.
The imposed punishment turned out to be more severe than the prosecutor requested during the debate — 16 years in prison. In addition, the court recovered 14.5 million rubles from Ionkin in favor of the victims and relatives of the victims, as well as 45 million rubles in favor of the club owners. The 23-year-old serviceman was stripped of the rank of guard sergeant and the medal “For Courage.”
A fire in the club occurred on the night of November 5, 2022, killing 13 visitors. According to investigators, the drunken Ionkin had a conflict with Russian Guard member Maxim Egorov. To intimidate the security officer, the military man took a flare gun and fired it upward, causing the ceiling of the club to catch fire, then the fire quickly spread throughout the building. Later, Ionkin, already on the street, fired seven more times from a rocket launcher in the direction of the Polygon.
Ionkin’s defense insisted that the sergeant could not objectively assess what was happening in the club, since he received shell shock due to his participation in the war in Ukraine. “In a difficult situation, Ionkin gets lost and is prone to implementing ill-considered decisions, which is confirmed by a psychological and psychiatric examination,” noted lawyer Yuri Khromtsov.
Baza, SHOT and “Verstka” claimed that Ionkin came under fire in Ukraine in August 2022 while he was carrying ammunition with his colleagues. After treatment in the Astrakhan region, he went on long sick leave to Kostroma.
Therefore, the defense insisted on reclassifying the charges as more lenient. The case against the military man was investigated under articles about murder, hooliganism with the use of weapons, intentional damage to someone else's propertyand causing moderate harm.
In the case of the fire at Polygon, the owner of the club, deputy of the Kostroma Regional Duma from United Russia, Ikhtiyar Mirzoev, and Natalya Belenogova, the head of the Empire company, which organized the work of the establishment, were also arrested. Later they were both transferred to house arrest. Belenogova is charged with provision of services that do not meet security requirements , and Mirzoev — violation of fire safety requirements.