Two Russian soldiers have been handed life sentences by a Russian court for the murder of a nine-member family in a Ukrainian region they had control over.
On November 8, TASS reported that the Southern Military District court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced Russian soldiers Anton Sopov and Stanislav Rau to life in prison for a mass murder driven by political, ideological, racial, ethnic, or religious hatred. The trial, which took place behind closed doors, revealed that on October 28, 2023, the two soldiers broke into the Kapkanets family’s home in Volnovakha, a city under Russian control in Donetsk Oblast since the early days of the conflict. Armed with silenced firearms, Sopov and Rau killed all nine family members, including two children. The soldiers were arrested two days later.
TASS reported that the killing of the Kapkanets family may have been triggered by a “family dispute,” while Russia’s Kommersant newspaper suggested the motive was an argument over vodka. Both soldiers, Anton Sopov and Stanislav Rau, have denied the charge of committing the crime out of “national hatred” and plan to appeal their life sentences. Initially, they confessed to the murders during the trial in July but later sought to retract their admissions.
The incident stirred outrage in Ukraine, with officials accusing the soldiers of executing the family while they slept, allegedly because they refused to surrender their home to Russian forces. Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner, condemned the attack, claiming that the Kapkanets family was killed while celebrating a birthday.US media outlets reported that Rau, 28, and Sopov, 21, were former members of the Wagner private military group before enlisting in the Russian army. They had received military honors just months before the murders.This case marks an unusual instance of Russian military personnel being convicted of crimes committed in Ukraine. Moscow has consistently denied targeting civilians, dismissing accusations of massacres, such as the one in Bucha in April 2022, as fabricated.
