A father was controversially locked up after forcing the man who abused his young daughter to dig his own grave in a Russian forest.
Vyacheslav Matrosov took justice into his own hands in August 2020 after he discovered horrific footage of his six-year-old being coerced by his former friend Oleg Sviridov. The 38-year-old confronted Sviridov after finding graphic videos on his phone, which also captured audio of his daughter’s desperate pleas.
Matrosov’s wife Natalya previously told how she had found the pair fighting in her family home in the village of Pribrezhnoye and described her husband as ‘hysterical’.
“I had never seen him like that,” she previously told The Sun. “It took him a long time to come to his senses to explain to me.
“With his trembling hands, he took out Oleg’s phone and showed me a video.
“You cannot imagine what I experienced when I saw it. I felt sick, I was dizzy, and nauseous.”
Natalya said she could ‘not believe her eyes’, while her spouse ‘started crying’.
She added: “He kept repeating: ‘He is my best friend, I trusted him with our children, I trusted him as myself’.”
Matrosov later led Sviridov into remote area of woodland in Russia, where he then reportedly forced his former pal to dig his own grave. According to The Sun, the dad then stabbed Sviridov, but other reports claim that Matrosov convinced the 32-year-old to take his own life.
Several days later, Sviridov’s body was found in the makeshift grave.
Matrosov ultimately came clean about the incident to cops a few weeks later, and the former rocket engine factory worker was initially facing murder charges and the prospect of spending up to 15 years in jail.
However, investigators ruled that Sviridov’s fatal injuries were ‘self-inflicted’ and Matrosov was instead prosecuted for ‘inciting a person to suicide or attempted suicide by threats or abuse’. This reportedly carries a maximum prison sentence of six years, although non-custodial sentences are also often imposed in these kind of cases.
In 2022, Matrosov was ordered to spend 18 months behind bars after he was found guilty by the Krasnoglinsky Court in Samara of inciting Sviridov to take his own life.
That dad regained his freedom after spending a year in prison and celebrated his return to civilisation by sharing a snap with his wife Natalya alongside the caption: “Home. Love very much.”
Locals in the village of Pribrezhnoye hailed Matrosov as a hero and even helped raised funds for his legal fees. As well as this, a petition demanding that he be acquitted of any crime garnered a whopping 2,500 signatures.
The case attracted attention around the world and prominent figures, including Russian TV star and former presidential candidate Ksenia Sobchak, also shared their support for Matrosov.
“All parents are standing up for the pedophile’s killer,” she said at the time, according to The Express.
