As it became known to Kommersant, the capital’s Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia (GSU TFR) as soon as possible uncovered the brutal murder of Andrei Botikov, an authoritative virologist, a participant in the creation of the Sputnik V vaccine, committed on March 1. According to the investigation, he quarreled with the invited male model because of the “number and type of services provided,” and in the ensuing conflict, the guest, who was distinguished by very impressive dimensions, strangled the slender scientist. The press service of the National Research Center (NRC) of Epidemiology and Microbiology named after Gamaleya, where Mr. Botikov worked, told Kommersant that she did not comment on the circumstances of his death.
According to the investigation, 48-year-old virologist Botikov noted the onset of spring in a rather unusual company. On the evening of March 1, he invited 29-year-old Alexei Zmanovsky, known in certain circles as a model, to his apartment on Rogov Street in Moscow.
According to the GSU of the ICR, from about 10:20 pm to 11:50 pm, a very bulky guest, who, according to his resume, has the 52nd clothing size, is 180 cm tall, has brown eyes and a low voice, rendered “intimate services to the host “.
What exactly the men did is unknown, however, the scientist was ultimately dissatisfied with the “type and quantity” of the services rendered to him, as he stated to the model.
On the basis of the conflict that has arisen, according to the Main Investigative Committee of the ICR, the model had a “criminal intent to kill”.
Aleksey Zmanovsky, according to investigators, “foreseeing the possibility of socially dangerous consequences of his actions and even wishing them to occur,” approached the virologist from behind, grabbed his neck with his left hand and pressed his forearm on Mr. Botikov’s throat until he stopped “serving signs of life”.
After that, Aleksey Zmanovsky fled, but already in the evening of the next day, employees of the Khoroshevsky inter-district department of the Main Investigative Committee of the ICR, who opened a criminal case on the fact of a domestic murder (part 1 of article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), established the address of the model from advertising on specialized sites and detained the probable criminal. He, as follows from the official statement of the department, has already been charged, and during interrogation the man admitted his guilt.
Aleksei Zmanovsky, according to investigators, is not the first time he has committed violent crimes. On the evening of March 3, at the request of the Main Investigative Directorate of the ICR, he was arrested by the Khoroshevsky Court of Moscow.
The deceased Andrei Botikov, according to his colleagues, lived a bright and eventful scientific life. He became the author of about a dozen patented discoveries in the field of virology, including, for example, a device for express analysis of the presence of a given object in a complex biological environment and a diagnostic test system for detecting avian influenza virus. The scientist discovered a strain of hybrid cultured mouse cells mus. musculus – 4f11, studied cyclohexaneoxycarbonyl dipeptide and its antiviral activity against hepatitis C virus.
Finally, during the coronavirus pandemic, Mr. Botikov, working under the direct supervision of Academician Alexander Gintsburg, became one of the developers of the Sputnik V (Gam-COVID-Vak) vaccine, well-known in Russia and abroad.
The press service of the Gamaleya National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology, however, did not want to talk about the scientific achievements of the colleagues. According to the official representative of the SIC, now only the investigation or the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation has the right to talk about Andrei Botikov.
