By IANS,RIA Novosti,
Moscow :Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Tuesday dismissed the police chief of Moscow, Colonel General Vladimir Pronin, following a shooting involving an off-duty officer in a supermarket earlier this week.
Medvedev earlier sacked Major General Viktor Ageyev, who headed the police department in Moscow’s southern administrative district, where one of his senior officers, Tsaritsino district police chief Denis Yevsyukov, shot three people dead Monday.
Following a family quarrel, Yevsyukov, 32, took a taxi to a supermarket in southern Moscow shortly after midnight Monday, where he shot the driver dead, before walking into the store and killing two more people. Six people were wounded in the attack.
Pronin, who personally visited the scene of the crime and spoke to Yevsyukov hours after the killing spree, told Russian media that the killer had until then been considered a good officer with strong potential, having served 14 years in the force without complaints from colleagues.
After questioning him, Pronin said: “His eyes were like saucers – he was not aware of anything and remembered nothing of what had happened – he just cried.”
Russian Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev said Tuesday in an interview with Russia’s Vesti news channel that the ministry would provide support and assistance to all the victims and their families and would conduct inspections in Moscow police departments.