Gyumri tragedy: Premyakov was treated in Russian mental clinic

The Russian army private charged over last month’s tragic murder in Gyumri turns out to have spent over a month in a mental clinic in the Russian town of Chita (where he served before being enlisted to the 102nd military base in Armenia’s second largest city).

According to Lifenews, doctors observed serious disorders in Valery Premyakov’s behavior. Employees of the Russian General Military Investigation Department are now said to be conducting a probe to find out how the mentally-impaired soldier was offered to continue service in a Russian military base in Armenia.

Citing its sources, the Russian website reports that Premyakov was drafted to the military on May 15, 2014 and served in Chita until December 3. The decision to send him to Gyumri was reportedly made at the end of last year.  The fact that the soldier was treated at the local military hospital’s mental health department shortly after being enlisted and stayed there until late June was concealed.

Servicemen are now suspected of negligence which could have led up to a tragedy. Investigators have instituted a criminal proceeding against Alexander Loginovsky,  head of the military registration and enlistment office of the town Baley, and Yevgeny Sotskov, the commander of the military unit where Premyakov served.

After completing his treatment, Premyakov is said to have returned to the military unit where he reportedly served as a driver-mechanic. But he regularly visited psychiatrists who the website says found him fit for service. After receiving his transfer request from Gyumri, employees of the Chita military base reportedly forgot to mention in Premyakov’s documents that he had been under treatment.

The brutal murder left six of the seven-member family of Avetisyans killed in their house on January 12. The only survivor, the six-month-old Seryozha Avetisyan who was hospitalized hours after the incident, died in a Yerevan clinic a week later. 

Premyakov, who was initially thought to be the main suspect, was caught the same night while trying to cross the Armenia-Turkey border. He was immediately handed over to Russian law-enforcers.