Moscow [Russia], January 26: Darya Trepova was sentenced to 27 years in prison on Thursday for a deadly bomb attack on a Russian military blogger.
A court in St Petersburg found the 26-year-old woman guilty of handing blogger Vladlen Tatarsky a miniature statue packed with explosives at an event in April 2023.
The explosion killed Tatarsky, whose real name was Maxim Fomin, and injured more than 50 people in a cafe. The defendant was unharmed.
The court convicted her of a terrorist attack, unauthorized possession of explosives and forgery of documents, Russian agencies reported. The public prosecutor's office had demanded 28 years in prison. An accomplice who had briefly harboured her was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison.
Tatarsky was a well-known supporter of the Russian war against Ukraine. His death caused a stir, as did the killing of Darya Dugina, the daughter of ultranationalist Aleksandr Dugin, in 2022.
According to the Russian judiciary, the masterminds behind the attack on Tatarsky are based in Ukraine. They include a Russian journalist who used to be a member of the banned National Bolshevik Party in Russia. Trepova largely confirmed the course of events during the trial, but emphasized in her closing statement that she had known nothing about the explosives in the figurine.
"I am sorry that I did not throw the statue into [the river] Neva on the way," she said, according to the MediaZona media portal.
Source: Qatar Tribune