MOSCOW, September 21 (RIA Novosti) – Police on an island in Russia’s Far East are looking for a man suspected of driving his ex-wife out to a forest, beating her, shooting at her and trying to blow her up, a police spokesperson said Saturday.
On Friday, a woman aged about 30 in the town of Kurilsk on the island of Iturup complained to the police that her ex-husband, aged about 33, had threatened her with a pistol and grenade and forced her into his car, police said.
“In the forest, he beat her up, fired at her from an unidentified pistol and threw a grenade at her when she attempted to escape,” the police spokesperson told RIA Novosti on Saturday.
No one was injured as a result of the explosion, and the woman managed to escape, the spokesperson added.
Traffic police officers identified the man’s Toyota near the entrance to Kurilsk, but failed to detain the man after he attempted to ram their truck. When the officers opened fire on him, he abandoned his car and fled into the forest, police said.
“During an examination of the scene of the incident and the interior of the Toyota car, shrapnel and the ring and pin from a grenade were recovered,” the spokesperson said.
The man had previously been investigated for drug dealing, police said.
The island of Iturup in Russia’s eastern Sakhalin Region is one of the disputed Kuril Islands, which are under Russian control but are also claimed by Japan.