Wagner Group fighter convicted of double murder receives Order of Courage

Konstantin Kiselyov, who had been imprisoned for a double murder and later recruited to fight in Ukraine as part of the Wagner Group [a Russian private military company - ed.], has been awarded the Order of Courage in the Russian Federation.

Source: Vazhnye Istorii (Important Stories), an independent Russian investigative reporting media outlet, with reference to sources

Details: Vazhnye Istorii reported that Kiselyov signed a contract with the Wagner Group in October 2022 after Yevgeny Prigozhin [a Russian oligarch, close confidant of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the founder of the Wagener Group - ed.] visited the prison where Kiselyov was held.

Kiselyov was later decorated and appointed a unit commander for being the only person from his unit to survive an artillery attack.

Vazhnye Istorii reported that Kiselyov was convicted of murder and "causing death by negligence" in September 2017.

In November 2016, he visited his acquaintance while drunk and attacked her friend for not getting the door immediately.

When his acquaintance attempted to defend her friend, Kiselyov repeatedly hit her on the head with a wooden bat; he then grabbed a knife and stabbed her in the chest, head, and other parts of her body at least 29 times. The woman died from her injuries.

Kiselyov then "inadvertently" strangled the woman who witnessed the attack.

He was sentenced to nine and a half years in a strict-regime colony.

Previously: Russian Telegram channels have posted a video showing the execution of Yevgeny Nuzhin, a former inmate of Ryazan Penal Colony No. 3 and a member of the Wagner Group who surrendered to the Armed Forces of Ukraine after being sent to fight in Ukraine. His head was smashed in with a sledgehammer. The recruitment of prisoners from penal colonies in Siberia and Russia’s Far East has only intensified since the emergence of the video.

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