page_title: Murder of Pentecostals in Slaviansk
section_title: Chronicle of the events
hierarchical_section_title: Murder of Pentecostals in Slaviansk / Chronicle of the events
caption_attribution_description: English: Masked armed men in Sloviansk, Donetsk oblast, Ukraine, during the Sloviansk standoff. The author of this photo, Aleksandr Sirota, visited his parents in the city on Easter holidays.
context_page_description: Murder of Pentecostals in Slaviansk is the crime committed in June 2014 in the city of Slaviansk, Donetsk Oblast, in Ukraine during which four members of Pentecostal church, Transfiguration of The Lord, were taken and killed by militants of the Russian Orthodox Army. Occurring during a period of religious persecution that began in April 2014, the crime caused a great public outcry.
context_section_description: On June 8, 2014, during a Pentecost church service, militants of the Russian Orthodox Army took four members of the church to an unknown destination. The men who were taken are:
  Volodymyr Olexandrovych Velychko (Ukrainian: Володимир Олександрович Величко) (born in 1973) — who was a married father of 8 children.
  Viktor Ivanovych Bradarskiy (Ukrainian: Віктор Іванович Брадарский) (born in 1974) — who was a married father of 3 children.
  Ruvim Olexandrovych Pavenko (Ukrainian: Рувим Олександрович Павенко) (born in 1984) — son of a pastor.
  Albert Olexandrovych Pavenko (Ukrainian: Альберт Олександрович Павенко) (born in 1990) — a married son of a pastor.
  Presumably, they had planned to seize the senior pastor, who was not at the church at the time. The rebels seized four cars belonging to the men. The detainees were charged by the militants with "crime against the DRP", which was expressed in support of the Ukrainian army.
  It was determined that they were detained in the basement of the city fire department. According to the testimony of Slavyansk's deputy prosecutor, who managed to escape from captivity by the DRP, he had heard cries of the detainees who had been tortured during interrogation.
  At 3 am on June 9, the four arrested were ordered to get into car and were driven toward the mountain Karachoun. followed by two cars with rebels. About 4:00 am on June 9 the car with detainees had been shot by rebels. It is believed that to hide the extent to which the brothers were tortured, the car was burned. Advisor of the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Anton Gerashchenko assumed that the attackers were trying to make it seem that death of the passengers was caused by mortar fire of the Ukrainian military.
  According to Freedon Vekua (Ukrainian: Фрідон Векуа) who was deputy mayor of Slavyansk on Humanitarian Affairs at that time, on the morning of June 9 information about the death of the four people was announced at closed meeting of the heads of the DRP. According to Anton Gerashchenko, the rebels' leader Igor Strelkov condemned the murder and the men who performed the crimes were reprimanded.
  Victor Bradarskiy's widow Natalia said that on June 10 she had been told by the city police department that her husband was among the men taken by the rebels, and she was allowed to provide food and medicine for her husband. According to her, rebels stated through representatives that the detainees were serving sentences, digging trenches near the village of Semenovka (a suburb of Kramatorsk) and would be released soon. In early July, there were reports by relatives of detainees that the four men were previously released.
  Member of Human Rights Watch Yulia Gorbunova (Ukrainian: Юлія Горбунова) said locals claimed that the bodies of unidentified people were taken to the morgue, where the remained until 11 June, after which they were buried in mass grave.
  According to Anton Gerashchenko, the burned car remained on the sidelines, and was later identified as belonging to B. Bradarskiy by the engine number. The rest of the cars of the killed men were seized by rebels and driven from Slavyansk during the withdrawal of DRP's forces.
  On July 7, after Slavyansk completely passed under the control of Ukrainian soldiers, the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov and his deputy Vasyl Pascal (Ukrainian: Василь Паскаль) who arrived in the city. Natalia Bradarskaya asked them to help her to find the missing.
  On July 14, Anton Gerashchenko said that exhumation of bodies from the mass grave was conducted, and that the bodies had signs of tortures and abuses. Among the found 14 bodies, were the bodies of Pavenko brothers and V. Bradarsky, identified by remnants of their clothing. The severely charred body of Velichko was identified later by DNA profiling. On July 20, after identification procedures were completed, the bodies were reburied at the site of their discovery - near a children's hospital.
caption: Rebels on a street of Slavyansk
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