Emerson Phillips
Within two days of each other, two Russian oligarchs – both linked to giant Russian gas companies – apparently murdered their wives and daughters before killing themselves.
The evidence supporting these theories is muddled by the fact that the events happened so close together, but for now both are believed by police to be cases of murder-suicide.
On Monday, 51-year-old former Kremlin official and Gazprombank vice-president Vladislav Avayev was found dead in his luxury Moscow apartment alongside the bodies of his wife and 13-year-old daughter.
The apartment was locked from the inside, and a pistol was found in Avaev’s hands, leading investigators to explore the theory that Avaev shot his wife and his 13-year-old daughter before killing himself.
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Privately-owned Gazprombank is the third-largest bank by assets in Russia.
Then on Tuesday, three more bodies were found in a rented villa in Spain.
55-year-old millionaire Sergei Protosenya, former top manager of Russia’s energy giant Novatek, was found hanged in the garden of the villa in Lloret de Mar by Catalonian police, Spanish media reported, while his wife and daughter were found in their beds, dead from stab wounds.
According to local media outlets, an axe and a knife were found next to Protosenya’s body.
Police are investigating two possible scenarios: either the Russian oligarch killed his wife and daughter and then hanged himself, or the entire family was murdered and the crime scene was later staged to look like a murder-suicide.
Protosenya’s death was confirmed by Russian state media TASS on Thursday.
Novatek is the second largest company in Russia involved in the production of natural gas.
The first death linked to Russian energy giant Gazprom dates back to January before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
60-year-old Leonid Shulman, Gazprom’s top manager, was found dead in the bathroom of a cottage in the Leningrad region, next to a note that led police to believe he committed suicide, according to Gazeta and Russian media group RBC.
RBC reports that Gazprom Invest said it was investigating the death of Schulman. “Our colleague, the head of the transport service, Leonid Aleksandrovich Shulman, has passed away. The circumstances are being investigated,” the company said.
Additionally, on March 24, billionaire Vasily Melnikov was found dead in his luxury apartment along with his family members.
Reports mentioned the Melnikov—who worked for the medical firm MedStom—was found dead with his wife Galina and the couples’ two sons. All had died from stab wounds and the knives used for the murders were recovered at the crime scene.
The working theory is that Melnikov killed his 41-year-old wife then 10-year-old and 4-year-old children before killing himself. That version is not being easily believed by locals and the media.
Putin told the Clintons that Melnikov and his family had something on them and next thing you know ……..?
WTF??? Are you an idiot or do you work for Putin. Angelo J DiPietro???? Now is not the time to bring the Clintons into your bullshit
This makes more sense than any other theory that’s out there.
I imagine this is misdirection and these guys are very much alive. Just because your yacht is seized and some of your bank accounts are frozen doesn’t mean you shoot yourself and your family. On the other hand, if they crossed Vladi, they could be murdered in an instant.
Russians who have died mysteriously:
But Alexei Navalny, Putin opponent still alive. UPDATE: 08/20/2020 Before getting on a plane flying from Siberia to Moscow he was poisoned having only drunk a cup of tea at an airport concession. Updates to come.(He was transferred to a Hospital in Germany for special care and did survive the poisoning.)
Below, the suspicious arrests/disappearances and deaths of Russian dignitaries:
In 2006, In London, former KGB officer and whistleblower Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned with radioactive polonium. Six years later, whistleblower Alexander Perepilichny died from a toxin while jogging in England, per the NYT report. The British government is suppressing explosive intelligence that Alexander Perepilichnyy, a financier who exposed a vast financial crime by Russian government officials, was likely assassinated on the direct orders of Vladimir Putin.
Perepilichnyy, who faced repeated threats after fleeing to Britain, was found dead outside his home in Surrey after returning from a mysterious trip to Paris in 2012.
Vasily Aleksanyan died on 2 October 2011. #Russian courts jailed him on false charges, detained him pre-trial for 3 years, and denied treatment for cancer, TB and HIV as he refused to give false testimony against his #Yukos colleagues, including head of Yukos, Mikhail Khodorkovsky who was put in a cage inside a Russian courtroom and sent to prison for corporate malfeasance. Khodorkovsky was pardoned and released after approx. 10yrs. and moved to London. But his incarceration succeeded in convincing oligarchs one-by-one to include the Kremlin in a cut of their profits making Putin the “world’s wealthiest man.” (“Pay-to-play.”)
Boris Nemstov, murdered in central Moscow, Feb. 27, 2015 on bridge within blocks of Kremlin. Was physicist and liberal politician opposed to the government of Vladimir Putin.
Mikhail Lesin: former aide to Putin (of blunt force to head) Nov. 2015. Lesin was Putin’s adviser and founder of Russia Today TV channel, who died mysteriously in Washington D.C..
November 7, 2016 (one day before election day): Connie Watton, maid of Stephen Schwarzman – a Trump AND Kremlin friend – is pushed in front of a subway. (source) The woman who pushed her is assigned defense attorney Mathew Mari, known for his legal work for the Bonanno crime family.
Sergei Krivov, purportedly a Consular Duty Commander at the Russian Consulate in NYC, which would have put him in charge of preventing sabotage and espionage. Died the morning of the US Election day, November 8, 2016. Initial reports were that he fell from the roof and had blunt force injuries to the head but he was secreted away to Russia without a coroner’s report. Official obit was heart attack.
Sergei Mikhailov: FSB Colonel responsible for cyberwars and cyberattacks (Dec. 2016) arrested by FSB in an FSB meeting with a bag over his head and taken away.
Mikhailov’s deputy Dmitry Dokuchayev was arrested and accused of treason for passing info to CIA. (Dec. 2016)
Also Ruslan Stoyanov manager of Russian cybersecurity company, Kaspersky Lab, was arrested and charged with treason. Dec. 2016
All three of the above Sergei Mikhailov, his deputy, Dmitry Dokuchaev and Ruslan Stoyanov disappeared and have never been heard from again. A forth unnamed person was also taken away.
Yves Chandelon, auditor general of NATO found with “suicide note” but not from any gun that he owned.” His own gun was found in the glove compartment. Dec. 16th. 2016
Petr Polshikov, Dec. 19, 2016 Russia’s chief advisor to Latin America dept. of Russian Foreign Ministry. Murdered with a bullet wound to head. (Shot in Moscow three days after Yves Chandelon was murdered.) Polshikov’s murder came just hours after assassination, in an art gallery, of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey.
Andrei Karlov was inside an Ankara, Turkey art gallery and shot/assassinated by a member of Ankara’s riot police on Dec. 19, 2016
Andrey Malanin head of the Counselor Dept. of the Russian Embassy in Greece was found dead on his bedroom floor in his embassy- owned apt. in Greece of apparent “natural causes.” Jan. 9th 2017
Oleg Erovinkin, former general in the KGB, on Dec. 26th, 2017 found murdered in the back of his Lexus. Was also former Chief of Staff to Igor Sechin, Chairman on Rosneft, Russian state-owned oil company who, incidentally, is mentioned in the Steele dossier. Erovinkin was suspected of helping Christopher Steele write the dossier.
Alexander Kadakin, Russian ambassador to India died after a brief illness. Jan. 27, 2017
Vladimir Anikeev, journalist death reported “sometime in late Jan. 2017”
Vitaly Churkin: Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations died suddenly in his office at Russia’s “UN mission in New York City on Feb. 20, 2017. Had diplomatic immunity so NYC medical examiner would not reveal the cause of death.
Alex Oronov, a 69-year-old naturalized American citizen who ran an agricultural business in his native Ukraine, died on March 2, 2017 of unexplained circumstances , according to a Facebook post by Ukranian politician Andrii Artemenko. Mr Oronov is reported to have set up a secret meeting between Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen – to whom he had family ties (he was the father-in-law of Cohen’s brother)- and Russian officials where a “peace plan” is said to have been hatched to give Russian President Vladimir Putin control of the Crimea.
On March 21, 2017 it was reported that Nikolai Gorokhov, the lawyer representing murdered Russian political activist Sergei Magnitsky, was hospitalized after falling four floors from his apartment in Moscow. His spokesman, William Browder, said he was “thrown” out of his building, while Russian media alleges he fell off his balcony while trying to lift a jacuzzi into his apartment. Gorokhov was due to testify in New York City on May 15th in USA v. Prevezon, the largest tax fraud case in Russian history centering around a Cyprus-based real estate company, Prevezon. The lawyer who was slated to represent the United States in that trial was recently fired US attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara. The attorney representing Prevezon was Natalia Veselnitskaya the same lawyer who met with Don Trump, Jr., Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner on June 6, 2016 about “adoptions”
Migayas Shirinskiy, Russian Ambassador to Sudan died in Khartoum on Wednesday August 23, 2017 while swimming in the pool at his residence of an “acute heart attack.”
Denis Voronenkov, 45, Thursday, August 24, 2017 murdered outside Kiev hotel. Spoke out against Putin and moved to Ukraine in October 2016. Testified in trial against ex-Ukrainian Viktor Yanukovych (considered to be a puppet politician for Putin and whom Paul Manafort represented on behalf of Russia.)
Konstantin Sinitsyn, Russian opposition activist was found dead in the entranceway of his St. Petersburg apartment. This was reported on Feb.2, 2018 but the incident apparently occurred on Jan. 21, 2018. (“Police suggest robbery as motive.”)
Nikolai Glushkov: finance director of Aeroflot (testifying in London that Aeroflot is front for Russian security services) found dead in London in March 2018. No details.
Three journalists — Kirill Radchenko, Alexander Rastorguyev and Orkhan Dzhemal — went to Central African Republic in July 2018 to investigate the activities of Russian private military contractors. Their intention was to find out how the contractors were involved in exploiting the CAR’s mineral wealth.
The trio were shot dead after the vehicle in which they were traveling was attacked on a remote road in the volatile country. Their fate has cast a spotlight on a growing Russian presence in Africa, involving the Kremlin, private companies with ties to to President Vladimir Putin and large shipments of weapons.
Bruno Charles de Kooman fell out of the window of the “House on the Embankment” on Serafimovich Street in the center of Moscow and died August 29, 2018. Was senior executive of Novolipetsk Steel Plant (NLMK).
Russian Deputy Attorney General Saak Albertovich Karapetyan linked to Natalia Veselnitskaya and her 2016 meeting with Trump campaign officials at Trump Tower was killed in a helicopter crash, October 4, 2018 according to The Moscow Times. Karapetyan, 58, was intimately familiar with some of the most notorious operations carried out under the orders of Vladimir Putin. He worked closely with Veselnitskaya as well as running some of Moscow’s most high-profile efforts to thwart international investigations into Russia’s alleged crimes. A later report from opposition inside Russia states that the helicopter pilot was shot twice in the back and that there were bullet holes in the propeller.
Young Russian Journalist Dies After Falling From Window May. 14, 2019
Wonderzine editor Margarita Virova, age 25, a promising journalist for an online feminist magazine died after falling from an eighth-floor apartment window in a “tragic accident that does not appear suspicious.”
July 11, 2019: Another “Fallen from the window” death: a female judge on the municipal court in Volgograd was found dead outside her apartment bldg. in the center of the city. She was reported to have fallen from the window of her apt. on the 15th floor on Thursday, July 11, 2019
This happened after last month Mikhail K. Muzraev, head of the regional branch of Russia’s version of the F.B.I. (The Investigative Committee) in Volgograd, formerly known as Stalingrad, was forced from his car by heavily armed men from the F.S.B. and flown to Moscow and jailed the same day. He’d been part of the Siloviki, a vast network of security, intelligence and military officers who have cooperated in persecuting the Kremlin’s critics.
The charge was that he’d been involved in an assassination attempt (that took place three years ago)against the regional governor, Andrei Bocharov appointed by Putin in 2014.
German prosecutors are considering whether there was a political motive behind the killing on Friday, August 23, 2019 of 40-year-old Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, allegedly by a Russian citizen who shot the victim twice in the head as he walked through a park. The Kremlin said on Wednesday that the murder of an ethnic Chechen exile in Berlin last week had nothing to do with the Russian state or its official agencies.
German authorities have arrested a Russian suspect on suspicion of killing the Georgian national over his alleged involvement in the second Chechen war in what is being reported as a contract killing by foreign intelligence.
Chechen blogger/critic of Kadyrov Imran Aliyev was found dead in his hotel room in France February 3, 2020. He was stabbed and found by hotel staff. This is the 2nd assassination of a Chechen in Europe in months. A Chechen critic Zelimkhan Khangoshvili was assassinated in Berlin which resulted in the expulsion of two Russians.
Young Russian Journalist Dies After Falling From Window May. 14, 2019 Wonderzine editor Margarita Virova, age 25, a promising journalist for an online feminist magazine died after falling from an eighth-floor apartment window in a “tragic accident that does not appear suspicious.”
July 11, 2019: Another “Fallen from the window” death: a female judge on the municipal court in Volgograd was found dead outside her apartment bldg. in the center of the city. She was reported to have fallen from the window of her apt. on the 15th floor on Thursday, July 11, 2019
This happened after last month Mikhail K. Muzraev, head of the regional branch of Russia’s version of the F.B.I. (The Investigative Committee) in Volgograd, formerly known as Stalingrad, was forced from his car by heavily armed men from the F.S.B. and flown to Moscow and jailed the same day. He’d been part of the Sloviki, a vast network of security, intelligence and military officers who have cooperated in persecuting the Kremlin’s critics.
The charge was that he’d been involved in an assignation attempt (that took place three years ago)against the regional governor, Andrei Bocharov appointed by Putin in 2014
December 21, 2020.

An outspoken blogger who routinely attacked Russia and Chechnya has been found dead in a French hotel with his throat slit and 100 stab wounds — and police suspect a “political motivation,” according to reports. Chechen blogger Imran Aliev, 44, was found late last month (January, 2020) in a hotel bloodbath in Lille that reflected “extreme savagery,” sources told Agence France-Presse. His throat had also been slit.
A top doctor at the Russian hospital where opposition leader Alexey Navalny was treated immediately after his poisoning last summer has died, the hospital said on February 5, 2021.
Sergey Maximishin, who was the deputy chief physician of the Omsk emergency hospital, “suddenly” died at the age of 55, according to a statement released by the hospital.
Meanwhile: On 4 March 2018, a former Russian spy and his daughter were found seriously ill on a bench in Salisbury. They had been poisoned by nerve agent, in an attack “almost certainly” approved by the Russian state.The attack on Sergei Skripal, 66, and his 33-year-old daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury, left them hospitalized for weeks.
Police linked the attack to another poisoning in June in which Dawn Sturgess and her partner Charlie Rowley were exposed to Novichok in nearby Amesbury, after handling a contaminated perfume dispenser. Ms Sturgess died in hospital in July.
No doubt in my book they were murdered by Putin. At least until proven otherwise. Putin has had folks murdered before and he will have others murdered in the near future. Putin is nothing more than a monster like thug.
I haven’t heard of so many unexplained murder suicides since the Clintons were in the White House.
What connection if any did Vasily Melnikov have with Putin? Was he a disaffected supporter, a critic of Putin and of the Ukrainian war. Without that information it is hard to judge possible Kremlin involvement in his death.
Was his family murdered because they were witnesses and could identify the perpetrators or were they killed as some sort of warning to someone? Whatever the motive it was brutal.
People who knew Melnikov and his family seem to find it unthinkable that he would have killed his wife and young sons before killing himself, even if he were depressed.
He looks a pleasant enough young guy from his photograph, very much the young businessman in his too tight pinstripe suit, shirt and tie. However there must have been a ruthless streak for him to be a self-made billionaire and he must have had some dubious connections to be so successful. That marks him out as a target, politically or to rivals.
What makes it very suspicious is that his death is part of a series of sudden deaths of oligarchs, variously put down to accident or suicide. Most of them after criticising or failing to offer support to Putin.
Vasily Melnikov was a fairly good looking guy, but his appearance does not suggest a billionaire. His suit looks cheap and ill-fitting. It is wrinkled, creased and possibly too tight. It may be pinstriped but it is not sharp. His tie is nondescript. Nothing about his clothing shows great taste or a desire to show status through dress.Yet this is the photo of a business leader supposedly an oligarch. It might be expected to impress but instead shows a regular jock, more a salesman than a chief executive. How big a company was Medstrom and how influential was he?
Vasily may have had business worries but were they major enough for him to stab his wife and little boys in a brutal fashion before killing himself? Did business rivals engineer his death?
The other deaths are all of critics of Putin or senior figures in the energy companies whose support was vital for the war in Ukraine. Melnikov does not fit into the pattern.
He may not look like an oligarch but neither does he look like someone who would murder his family so cruelly.
There is something very uptight about Vasily Melnikov, the way he sits, the way he entwines his hands in a protective gesture, the way he clutches his cheap ballpoint, the anxious expression. He looks uncomfortable in his suit and in himself. He was a loner. It is more than likely he suffered from issues with his mental health, exacerbated by the failure of his company when faced with sanctions. He could have been suicidal or painted as suicidal to hide a murder. If he killed his family his mental state must have been worse than anyone thought. Presumably his wife didn’t see him as a danger to her sons or herself. He seems to have been devoted to his family. If his depression was used to cover up cold blooded murders of his family and himself this was a cruel final blow to the man and his reputation.