The sale of adulterated alcohol, just some rubles than legal drinks in Russia. The Research Committee has raised the number of deaths these days in the Leningrad region, bordering Finland and Estonia. “According to expert reports, the cause of the death of residents was the presence of lethal levels of metyl alcohol in the blood,” explained the spokeswoman for the Russian police, Irina Volk through a statement.
The autopsies found methanol in the bodies of the victims, a compound whose consumption, unlike ethyl alcohol, is very dangerous for the nervous system and sight. Its production is somewhat cheaper than the original vodka, whose current minimum sale price has been set this year by the Kremlin in 349 rubles for a half -liter bottle, about 3.6 euros. However, its sale persists in a country where poverty has been aggravated by the
The authorities have opened a criminal case under the crime “to cause death to two or more people.” The Government of the Leningrad region has announced the arrest of eight people and the police have seized about 1,000 liters of methanol. The investigation of the security forces tries to find out how the product came to the province.
The tragedy has occurred a few kilometers from the European Union. At least 19 people have died intoxicated in the Slantsy district, separated from Estonia by the Narva River. The rest of the victims have been located in the neighboring cities of Kingisepp and Volosovski.
One of the detainees, a 54 -year -old man resident in Slantsy, kept several barrels in his garage. Two others arrested for the sale of methanol in the same city, Nikolai Boytsov, 78, and Olga Stepanova, 60, have been admitted to a preventive detention center for at least two months.
According to the investigation, Boytsov bought the alcohol from Stepanova, a speech therapist of a local nursery, to sell it later by between 100 and 150 rubles the liter, around one euro.
Boytsov had already been accused before selling homemade alcohol. As the police have leaked to the Russian media, he was sanctioned five years ago with a fine of 2,000 rubles, about 20 euros, in a trial in which he did not appear.
Although the risks of illegal alcohol consumption are known in Russia, this tragedy adds to other massive poisoning that occurred in the country in recent years. In 2023 at least 47 people died and 106 more were affected in several regions of Siberia due to the consumption of beverage of the brand Mr. Sider containing metilical alcohol and butyrate esters; And this last summer another 13 people died in the Kubán shirt for ingesting Chacha, a liquor of Georgian origin sold in a local market. Before the war, another massive poisoning left in the Orembourg region in 2021.
