MOSCOW, June 25 (RIA Novosti) – Two teenagers were detained in eastern Moscow on Tuesday on suspicion of having decapitated a local homeless man after taking a sudden dislike to him, the local Investigative Committee said in a statement.
A beheaded body was found near a local residential building with a trail of blood leading to a nearby apartment, the Russian capital’s Investigative Committee said in a statement on its website.
Inside the blood-stained apartment, police found an ax and a saw that they believe were used in the beheading, the statement said.
Two teenagers, who have not been named, were detained in the apartment as murder suspects, the statement said, adding that three other teenagers are thought to have been present during the incident, but not involved in the murder.
The tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda reported that the two suspects had been drinking and attacked the homeless man with knives in a fit of alcohol-induced rage, citing one of the three teenagers.
One alleged attacker then hacked off the man’s head and mutilated it, including by scalping it, the newspaper reported. The duo used it as a football until it rolled into a trash can, which is where they left it when they went home to sleep it off, the newspaper reported.
The two suspects, who have not yet been charged, could face up to 15 years in prison if convicted of murder, investigators said.
The search continues for the victim’s head, which was taken away by a garbage truck in the morning, preventing the man’s identification.
Later in the day, an Investigative Committee spokesman denied that the deceased’s head had been used as a football, but confirmed that the corpse had been decapitated and scalped, and added that the investigation was ongoing, the Metronews.ru website reported.
