The court has sentenced Viacheslav Zinchenko in the case over the premeditated murder of linguist Iryna Farion. After the open hearing, the case materials became public, and Deputy Head of the National Police Andrii Niebytov published on his Facebook page 10 facts relating to the convicted man.
According to Nyebytov, the National Police carried out hundreds of investigative and operational measures, 92 forensic examinations and more than 1,500 witness interviews. He listed a number of facts relating to the convicted man.
Law enforcement established that the young man communicated in Russian extremist Telegram groups and used a search engine to study Farion’s place of residence. In addition, he downloaded material on terrorism, covert tradecraft, weapons and ways of concealing information, and took an interest in how detonators work.
While in Lviv, the suspect walked the exact route of the future crime from his rented accommodation, regularly changed addresses and later destroyed a bag containing evidence. According to Nyebytov, the convicted man also looked for a gunsmith to convert a pistol to fire live ammunition, and ordered a collimator sight and a sound moderator on OLX. The clothing for the crime — a T-shirt, a bucket hat and white cycling glasses — the young man bought from online shops and personally sent by post from Dnipro to Lviv.
“A witness sees the young man at around 19:20. In the heat — long sleeves and loose trousers, and in his hands — an object resembling a pistol. The witness hears a shot, after which the man runs towards the archway. Another witness at the same time sees the young man and the escape after the shot. We see the same on CCTV. According to the results of the ballistic examination, the shot was fired from a distance of about two metres. Apart from the young man at that moment, according to witnesses, there was no one near Iryna Farion. The suspect used methods of concealment, but the expert conclusion is unequivocal: the man in the photos taken by Iryna Farion’s neighbour and the detainee are one and the same person,” Nyebytov wrote.
He said the defendant was seen on a bench and an armchair near the entrance to Farion’s building while he was watching the linguist. “Having examined every centimetre of the bench and the armchair, forensic specialists found biological traces which, according to expert conclusions, contained scent traces and the young man’s DNA — ‘who could not have done this’. But he did,” the official concluded.
Investigators also found notes and scheduled Telegram messages in which the young man called himself “the orderly of this society”, wrote about having no remorse, and explained to his parents that he was concealing his actions supposedly out of concern for their safety.
What is known about the murder of Iryna Farion?
- Iryna Farion was shot on 19 July 2024 near her home in Lviv. The woman was taken to hospital, but died in hospital a few hours later. On 21 July, law enforcement published photographs of a man wanted in the case.
- Police detained 18-year-old Viacheslav Zinchenko, a student at the Dnipro State University of Internal Affairs. According to media reports, he followed the page of a blogger who criticised Farion and promoted conspiratorial and neo-Nazi views.
- Zinchenko arrived in Lviv by train. On his phone, law enforcement found an “instruction from the CIA and the KGB”, as well as correspondence criticising the “right wing” in Ukraine. Before the murder, according to the investigation, the man changed clothes and tried to disguise himself.
- On 25 July, Zinchenko was detained in Dnipro. He denied involvement in the murder. The court ordered him held in custody without the right to post bail.
- The investigation considered several possible motives for the murder, including Farion’s civic and political activities, as well as personal animosity. Law enforcement also did not rule out a possible “Russian trail” in the case.