A veteran’s violent end Officer who led Russia’s Mariupol air assault, then became Stavropol’s deputy mayor, dies in suspicious blast
The first deputy mayor of Stavropol was killed in an explosion on Wednesday night. Zaur Gurtsiev, 34, joined his hometown’s city government after participating in the Kremlin’s “Time of Heroes” program, which the Putin administration launched to promote war veterans to public office. In 2019, Gurtsiev headed the combat command center of Russia’s Air Force and Air Defense Forces. In early 2022, he led the air component of Russia’s capture of Mariupol in eastern Ukraine and won multiple medals and distinctions for his service in the capture of Avdiivka, another city in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. Meduza reviews what we know about his death.
On Thursday, Stavropol Governor Vladimir Vladimirov confirmed Gurtsiev’s death “as a result of a nighttime incident,” noting that it might have been a terrorist attack “involving Nazis from Ukraine.” Stavropol Mayor Ivan Ulyanchenko also verified that two men died in a “boom” near a residential building at 85/19 Chekhov Street.
State investigators later identified the two victims: First Deputy Mayor Zaur Gurtsiev and a 29-year-old man. Their bodies showed “injuries characteristic of an explosive blast impact.” Officials have opened a criminal case on charges of murder and illegal storage of explosive devices, and the agency is considering the possibility that the blast was a terrorist attack. Investigators believe the explosion was carried out using a homemade device.
Sources told the Telegram channels Mash and Shot that the cause was presumably a grenade explosion. Footage from a security camera that captured the incident shows two men meeting near a parking lot. In the video, the explosion occurs when a man wearing a shoulder bag approaches the other man.
According to the Telegram channel Baza, the explosive device was on Zaur Gurtsiev’s younger companion, a man named Nikita Penkov, who may have been “used unknowingly” by another party. Baza learned that Penkov was renting an apartment at the building on Chekhov Street. The blast reportedly killed him instantly, while Gurtsiev remained alive for some time afterward. “Penkov might not have known that the device he was carrying would eventually detonate. It could have been activated remotely,” a source told the Telegram channel. Police found no bomb-making materials when they searched Penkov’s home.
Journalists at the news outlet Agentstvo found Nikita Penkov’s social media accounts and studied his personal information in leaked database records, learning that he worked as a police officer in 2023 in a special unit for the Stavropol Internal Affairs Department, guarding and escorting suspects and defendants. Reporters were unable to find data on his more recent employment.
There are unverified reports that Gurtsiev and Penkov were meeting after connecting on a dating app for gay men. VChK-OGPU, a prominent anonymous Telegram channel known for leaking sensitive information concerning Russia’s security services, reported on Thursday that state investigators have obtained sexually explicit correspondence between the two men. The blast occurred when Gurtsiev and Penkov allegedly met for the first time in person.
Preliminary data show that the explosive device was hidden in Penkov's shoulder bag. VChK-OGPU reports that he may have been hired by unknown persons to collect compromising material on Gurtsiev and was supplied with “video-transmitting equipment” that was actually a remote-triggered bomb.