Right Sector coordinator Muzychko killed in shootout with police – Interior Ministry
(Interfax – March 25, 2014) Oleksandr Muzychko, also known as Sashko Biliy, a member of an organized criminal group earlier placed on a wanted list, was gravely injured during his detention because he opened fire on law enforcement officers.
“While he was being detained, he was still alive and the ambulance, which was called, pronounced him dead,” Ukrainian First Deputy Interior Minister Volodymyr Yevdokymov said at a briefing in Kyiv on Tuesday.
Late on March 24 employees of the main department for fighting organized crime, including the special-purpose unit Sokol, were holding a special operation in the Rivne region on detaining an organized criminal group. The detention was carried out in the Three Crucians cafe near Rivne, Yevdokymov said.
“Three people from the organized criminal group were detained and an assault rifle and a pistol were seized from them,” Yevdokymov said.
According to Yevdokymov, during the detention, in response to the officers telling the suspects to “Freeze!”, Muzychko jumped from the window and then opened fire at a Sokol officer.
“The bullet Muzychko fired hit the Sokol employee’s goggles and then got stuck in his helmet, in response the injured policeman started shooting at the man. Then during the detention itself a fight occurred and more shots were fired,” Yevdokymov said.
The three detained bandits have been brought to Kyiv and investigative proceedings are being held with them. “Signs of a crime stipulated in the Criminal Code Article 257, banditry, are seen in the actions of the organized criminal group members,” Yevdokymov said.
Yevdokymov said he asked the region’s residents for assistance for “a more detailed investigation of facts of this group’s activities.”
Sa shko Biliy, suspected of creating an organized criminal group and resisting law enforcement authorities, has been placed on the wanted list. He has become known recently thanks to the informal communication with representatives of the Ukrainian authorities – local prosecutor and deputies, whom he taught how to behave and what decisions to make.
The Russian Investigative Committee’s North Caucasus branch has opened a criminal case regarding Ukrainian citizen Muzychko on the counts of forming a permanent armed group (gang) in order to attack Russian citizens and leading it, Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin has said.
A resolution assigning Muzychko as a defendant and putting him on the international most wanted list was issued on March 7, 2014. The Essentuki city court ruled to place Muzychko under arrest on March 13.
The investigation of the criminal case was launched in response to information received in the course of a crimin al inquiry into an armed clash between illegal armed groups led by Shamil Basayev and Khattab and soldiers from a Pskov Airborne Troop division near the village of Ulus-Kert in Chechnya in 2000, Markin said.
A member of the Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian National Self-Defense (UNA-UNSO), who fought on the militant side in Chechnya in 1994-2000, was questioned in the framework of this criminal case and according to this man, he joined UNA-UNSO in 1991 and got acquainted with other members of this organization, including its leader Muzychko, during a visit to an UNA-UNSO training base in the Ukrainian city of Ivano-Frankivsk.
According to the information of the Russian Investigative Committee, in 1994-1995 Muzychko and other UNA-UNSO members were involved in battles against federal forces during a raid in Grozny.
“In January 1995 the man questioned witnessed repeatedly Muzychko brutally torture and kill captured servicemen of the Russian federal forces. Throughout the named period, Muzychko personally tortured and subsequently killed at least 20 federal soldiers held in captivity, demanding information he needed,” he Markin said.