Urals court sentences man for killing nine-year-old witness in 1999

Talitsa District Court sentenced Pervouralsk resident Igor Rukhlov to 16 years in a strict-regime penal colony for killing a nine-year-old girl in 1999, the Sverdlovsk region’s courts press service said.

The court also imposed a fine of 50 thousand rubles and ordered 3 million rubles in compensation for moral harm to the victims. Rukhlov was convicted under paragraphs b and v of Part 2 of Article 105 of the Criminal Code.

According to the court and the Investigative Committee, the girl had testified in a murder case against Rukhlov’s friends. On August 7, 1999, he abducted her from a courtyard on Stroiteley Street in Kuznetsovsky, took her to a deserted location and strangled her. He hid the body in a vegetable storage pit behind a house.

Investigators opened a case after her mother reported her missing. The perpetrator and the girl’s whereabouts remained unknown for years. Rukhlov was arrested on August 22, 2025, 26 years after the killing.

The regional Investigative Committee credited joint work by investigators, forensic specialists and police with solving the case. The agency said Rukhlov admitted guilt and identified the place where he had hidden the body.