The key facts

  • The woman died in the ambulance after being stabbed at the entrance to the women's crisis center
  • According to 112, the suspect was fined 70,000 rubles in 2018 for failure to report a planned terrorist attack at Kazan Cathedral
  • The attacker called the police himself half an hour later and was detained; a criminal case has been opened

Attack outside a women's crisis center

In St. Petersburg on November 12, a man attacked a woman on the porch of a women's crisis center on Vavilovykh Street as she tried to enter the building. According to Gazeta.Ru, citing the Telegram channel 112, it was her former partner: he dragged the woman away from the entrance and stabbed her several times. Everything was captured on surveillance camera footage. The wounded woman died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. About half an hour later, the attacker himself called the police and reported what had happened; a criminal case has been opened and the perpetrator has been detained. According to the outlet, the victim leaves behind a child.

The suspect's past: a fine for failure to report

The detainee, whom 112 identifies as Yakub S., previously appeared in the case concerning the preparation of a terrorist attack at St. Petersburg's Kazan Cathedral. According to the channel, he knew the organizer of the failed attack, who rented a garage to manufacture explosives and told his acquaintance that he was ready to carry out the bombing. Yakub tried to talk him out of it, but did not report the planned crime to the police — in 2018 he was fined 70,000 rubles for failure to report. The terrorist attack itself was prevented by officers of Russia's FSB in 2017: supporters of a banned terrorist group planned to detonate a bomb in the cathedral during a service, and the organizer was sentenced to five years in a strict-regime penal colony.

What is known and what remains unclear

All information about the suspect's past comes from the Telegram channel 112 as retold by Gazeta.Ru; law enforcement agencies have provided no official confirmation of this part in the publications. The sources do not name a motive for the attack; it is only known that the detainee was the victim's former partner. A case has been opened and the suspect detained — further details, including his status in the new criminal case, have not yet been reported.