Police in Saint Petersburg have found a farewell note from a 40-year-old mathematics teacher suspected of murdering an elderly woman and a two-year-old child.
Officers forced entry into the suspect's apartment near the crime scene in the city's Krasnoselsky District during a search operation, but the man was not inside.
Investigators recovered the message inside the empty flat, addressed to the man's parents living in the nearby town of Gatchina. In the note, the suspect said goodbye to his relatives and listed the specific bank accounts holding his personal savings.
Saint Petersburg news outlet Fontanka reported that the document was the second note left behind by the fugitive to be located by operational detectives.
Discovery on Komissara Grushko Street
The double murder was uncovered on the previous evening inside an apartment on Komissara Grushko Street. A local woman returned home to discover that her elderly mother had been beaten to death.
She also found the lifeless body of a two-year-old child concealed inside a refrigerator in the flat.
The woman's male partner was still present in the residence when she entered. He attempted to launch an attack against her, but she managed to break free and fled from the apartment covered in blood to raise the alarm and call for assistance.
Search for the mathematics teacher
Investigators subsequently confirmed that the 40-year-old suspect worked as a school mathematics teacher. His partner and her mother, who died in the attack, were also employed as schoolteachers.
The crime occurred in the Krasnoselsky District, an administrative division of Saint Petersburg situated in the south-western part of the city along the Gulf of Finland. The street where the victims were found, Komissara Grushko Street, lies within this residential district.
Gatchina, where the suspect addressed his farewell note to his parents, is the largest town in Leningrad Oblast and serves as a regional administrative centre roughly 45 kilometres south of Saint Petersburg.
Fontanka, a digital news outlet based in Saint Petersburg that covers local law enforcement and regional affairs, reported that operational detectives breached the door of the teacher's flat during their search. Police are continuing their efforts to track down the missing suspect.
