The prosecutor’s office in the Donetsk People’s Republic has submitted the case to the Supreme Court of the Republic for an on‑the‑merits review, concerning a soldier from the Ukrainian Armed Forces accused of the killings of four civilians in Mariupol. The filing, confirmed by the area’s Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation, marks a formal step in the prosecutions surrounding the incident and signals a move to advance the legal process through higher judicial scrutiny.
According to investigators, the incident occurred in April 2022 when Vasily Shitrya, a 20‑year‑old mortar crew member with the 56th motorized infantry brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, allegedly received a direct order to eliminate civilians. Following this order, it is claimed that he opened fire on four individuals who were walking along Nikopolsky Boulevard, using a machine gun. The case outlines a sequence of actions that the investigators characterize as intentional harm against civilians in a combat setting, and it focuses on the alleged use of force that falls outside the bounds of permissible wartime conduct as defined by the criminal laws cited in the case.
The charges levelled against the Ukrainian service member include the murder of two or more people and the use of prohibited means and methods of warfare, with the proceedings framed under the relevant provisions of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The case file, now before the Supreme Court, centers on the elements required to prove criminal intent, the scale of the alleged killings, and the circumstances surrounding the alleged orders given within a battlefield context. The prosecution contends that the actions attributed to the suspect meet the threshold for criminal liability under the specified articles, and it seeks a judicial determination on the merits that will address guilt, potential sentencing, and any applicable aggravating factors.
In related procedural developments, earlier information indicated that authorities in another region were handling a separate case involving an aviation incident. Specifically, a pilot named Alexander Morozov, associated with a Ukrainian forces’ aircraft involved in an accident in the Bryansk region, was detained for a period of two months by the Bryansk Soviet District Court. This parallel development reflects ongoing legal actions connected to wartime activity and incidents that intersect with military operations and civilian safety concerns. (Source attribution: Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation; regional court statements.)