The latest member of Russia’s suspicious suicide squad? Railway executive, 52, is found shot dead on the balcony of his Moscow home
- Pavel Pchelnikov, 52, found dead at his home in Moscow on Wednesday morning
- Pchelnikov, a railway PR executive, found with gunshot wounds on his balcony
- Death has been deemed a suicide, but investigators have not disclosed motive
- He is at least the tenth Russian executive to die in suspicious circumstances since Putin invaded Ukraine in late February
A Russian executive has been found dead on the balcony of his Moscow home – just the latest in a series of ‘suicides’ that appear suspicious.
Pavel Pchelnikov, 52, a PR manager for the Russian Railways, was found shot dead at his home in the leafy Kolomenskaya Embankment neighbourhood early Wednesday.
It makes him at least the tenth high-profile Russian to have met their death in mysterious circumstances since Putin invaded Ukraine back in February.
Pavel Pchelnikov, 52, a railways PR executive, has been found dead at his home in Moscow in what has been deemed a ‘suicide’
Pchelnikov had been on holiday with his family recently (left) and his death has been branded suspicious, just the latest in a line of ‘suicides’ among Russia executives that raise questions
Pchelnikov had boasted about being ‘the most experienced PR manager in Russian Railways company’ and went on holiday with his family just a month ago.
He had uploaded smiling images of himself while on vacation to social media in the weeks before he died.
A preliminary investigation concluded that Pchelnikov had killed himself, but gave no details and did not explain his motive. A full investigation is underway.
On 1 September, oil tycoon Ravil Maganov, 67,fell to his death from the sixth floor window of a Moscow hospital.
One report says the chairman of Lukoil – Russia’s second largest oil company – was ‘beaten’ before he was ‘thrown out of a window’, however this is not confirmed officially.
His company had voiced opposition to the war in Ukraine.
Strangely, Putin arrived at the elite Central Clinical Hospital very soon after Maganov’s body was found to pay his last respects to final Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who had died at the hospital.
In July, Yuri Voronov, 61, head of a transport and logistics company for a Gazprom-linked company, was found dead in his swimming pool, with a leading friend who is a top criminologist warning of foul play.
Two more deaths of Gazprom-linked executives were reported in elite homes near St Petersburg amid suspicions that apparent suicides may have been murders.
Alexander Tyulakov, 61, a senior Gazprom financial and security official at deputy general director level, was discovered by his lover the day after war started in Ukraine in February.
His neck was in a noose in his £500,000 home .
Yet reports say he had been badly beaten shortly before he ‘took his own life’, leading to speculation he was under intense pressure.
In the same elite Leninsky gated housing development in Leningrad region three weeks earlier, Leonid Shulman, 60, head of transport at Gazprom Invest, was found dead with multiple stab wounds in a pool of blood on his bathroom floor.
Billionaire Alexander Subbotin, 43, also linked to Kremlin-friendly energy giant Lukoil where he was a top manager, was found dead in May after ‘taking advice from shamans’.
One theory is that Subbotin – who also owned a shipping company – was poisoned by toad venom triggering a heart attack.
In April, wealthy Vladislav Avayev, 51, a former Kremlin official, appeared to have taken his own life after killing his wife Yelena, 47, and daughter, 13.
He had high level links to leading Russian financial institution Gazprombank.
Friends have disputed reports that he was jealous after his wife admitted she was pregnant by their driver.
There are claims he had access to the financial secrets of the Kremlin elite.
Yuri Voronov, 61, was found dead in August
Two more deaths of Gazprom-linked executives were reported in elite homes near St Petersburg, stoking suspicions that the deaths may well have been murders
Billionaire Alexander Subbotin, 43 former top executive with energy giant Lukoil, died in May
Several days later multimillionaire Sergey Protosenya, 55, was found hanged in Spain, after evidently killing with an axe his wife Natalia, 53, and their teenage daughter, Maria.
He was a former deputy chairman of Novatek, a company also closely linked to the Kremlin.
There have also been questions over the death of Putin’s point man for developing Russia’s vast Arctic resources who ‘fell overboard’ to his death from a boat sailing off the country’s Pacific coast.
Ivan Pechorin, 39, had recently attended a major conference hosted by the Kremlin warmonger in Vladivostok.
The high-flyer was managing director of Putin’s Far East and Arctic Development Corporation.
And in another case a mobile phone multi-millionaire and his wife were found stabbed to death, with the official version of events raising questions.
Naked Yevgeny Palant, 47, and his wife Olga, 50, both Ukrainian-born, were found with multiple knife wounds by their daughter Polina, 20.
Immediate briefing to the media claimed the woman took her own life in a jealous rage after Palant said he was leaving her.
Yet this was strongly disputed by the couple’s best friend.
Former Kremlin official and Gazprombank vice-president Vladislav Avayev, 51, appeared to have taken his own life after killing his wife and one of his daughters in April
Russian gas tycoon Sergey Protosenya (pictured), his wife Natalya, 53, and their teenage daughter Maria were found dead in their Spanish mansion, in Lloret de Mar, on April 19
Ukrainian born multi-millionaire Yevgeny Palant, 47, and his wife Olga Palant, 50, were found stabbed to death in their family house in Moscow region last week
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