2 Brothers and a Grim Tale of Cannibalism
Two teenage brothers in the Rostov region have
been arrested and charged with killing an acquaintance and,
together with their mother, eating his heart and liver following
a drunken brawl over a stolen stereo.
Police arrested brothers Sergei Zimbovich,
19, and Igor Zimbovich, 16, earlier this week after a group
of locals gathering mushrooms discovered human remains in a
ravine near Krasny Sulin in the Rostov region, Maxim Yudin,
the town's deputy prosecutor, said by telephone Thursday.
The mushroom-gatherers alerted police after
finding the dismembered body Saturday, and the victim was identified
shortly thereafter as 26-year-old Mikhail Sheremet, Yudin said.
The Zimbovich brothers were identified as the primary suspects,
and Sergei and Igor were arrested on Monday and Tuesday, respectively,
after which they confessed to the crime, the prosecutor said.
The murder, dismemberment and subsequent consumption
of Sheremet's organs appear to have been the result of a volatile
concoction of alcohol and unsettled scores.
According to Krasny Sulin investigators, on
Nov. 3 a Krasny Sulin court convicted Sergei Zimbovich of theft
after Sheremet reported to police that he had stolen his stereo.
Zimbovich was given an 18-month suspended sentence, investigator
Igor Shcherbakov told Gazeta.ru on Wednesday. On Friday, Sheremet
decided to patch things up between them.
"Sheremet approached Sergei Zimbovich
in order to make peace," Yudin said. "He came with
a bottle of vodka and suggested that they go drink together."
The two young men returned to Zimbovich's apartment
in the village of Pervomaisky to drink and were joined by Igor
Zimbovich, Yudin said. Trouble started after the three became
heavily inebriated and began rehashing the case of the stolen
stereo.
"A fight began between Sheremet and the
brothers, and they strangled Sheremet to death with a scarf,"
Yudin said.
While the brothers were dismembering Sheremet's
body in order to make it easier to dispose of, their mother,
38-year-old Nadezhda Zimbovich, walked into the room and discovered
the grisly scene. For reasons that have yet to be established,
Nadezhda Zimbovich suggested that they remove the innards and
eat them, Yudin said.
"They cut open the body, took out the
heart and liver and fried them up on the stove along with some
potatoes," Yudin said.
After the family had eaten Sheremet's organs,
they packed up the remains of the body in a plastic bag and
took it to a ravine outside of town, where it was discovered
the next day by the mushroom-gatherers, Yudin said.
The brothers have confessed, and the version
of events they gave to police has been consistent with what
investigators have established at the crime scene, he said.
If convicted, the brothers face a possible
life sentence. Prosecutors had considered charging Nadezhda
Zimbovich with covering up the crime but, given her relation
to the two suspects, opted not to.
