A girlfriend suffered horrific injuries after her legs and arms were nailed to a wooden plank in a horror “crucifixion” by her boyfriend before he set her on fire.
Russian Oksana Kuzmenko, 40, told the court how her lover staged a crucifixion before dousing her body in petrol and setting her on fire after she ended their relationship.
A recruitment manager suffered life-changing injuries after she “lit up like a candle”, leaving her appearance completely altered after being brutally tortured by her boyfriend.
Oleg Shchegolikhin, 33, a welder, was jailed for 12 years in a penal colony with a strict Russian court regime for attempted murder with “extreme cruelty” – but volunteered to fight for Vladimir Putin in his war against Ukraineand so he is unlikely to spend much time in prison.
The victim bravely testified in court against the cruel Shchegolikhin, who threatened to kill her at the car workshop where he worked in Yekaterinburg, eastern Russia.
Recalling the chilling ordeal that took place in October, Kuzmenko said: “He took off my shoes, took my left foot and hammered a nail into it.
“And he took something like a corkscrew in my right leg and twisted this sharp object into my right leg,” she continued.
While Shchegolikhin was carrying out his hideous ‘crucifixion’, he threatened to kill his girlfriend, who lay lifeless nailed to a wooden board.
“He took out a cigarette and a lighter and poured gasoline so I lit up like a candle,” she said.
The welder watched his girlfriend burn alive as he smoked a cigarette before grabbing a fire extinguisher and extinguishing the flames.
But it was too late and serious damage had been done.
After Kuzmenko was freed from the flames, Shchegolikhin peeled the burned skin off his girlfriend’s right hand, leaving her with scars she would live with for the rest of her life.
He then ordered her to take him to the city of Asbestos, but she was afraid that he would kill her and hide her body in the forest on the way.
A brave and injured Kuzmenko then decided to deliberately crash her car into another vehicle – a move that likely saved her life as Shchegolikhin abandoned her and fled the scene when the police arrived.
Kuzmenko explained to officers the horrific ordeal she suffered, which she told the court was followed by an hour-long beating by her boyfriend.
Officers discovered the woman in a ‘horrendous state’, the court heard, and she was later diagnosed severe burns of the upper limbs, upper respiratory tract, neck, face and buttocks.
She had deep nail and “corkscrew” wounds to her limbs and was in a “serious” condition in hospital.
Shchegolikhin hid his past as a convicted felon with prior convictions for kidnapping, theft, battery and drunken driving, Kuzmenko told the court.
His lawyer, Olga Polishchuk, claimed after the trial that he would appeal because he “never intended to kill” her when he nailed her to a board and set her on fire.
She said: ‘In questioning and in court he always said, ‘I loved her’.
Shchegolikhin is appealing his conviction for attempted murder, but has since applied for a scheme that would allow him to be pardoned by Putin after spending six months at war.
“He’s going to war,” she said.
“He already wrote a statement to the Russian army in October.
“If he takes part in the war, he could fix it,” she added.