vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #621 / Crime watch / Reading article...

A court in the town of Amursk, Khabarovsky region, has sentenced to a seven-year imprisonment a man who broke into an apartment of a pensioner and took from her 40 rubles ($1.7) threatening her with a toy gun, the region’s Prosecutor’s Office said.

The investigation revealed that Alexander Volgin, 31, was heading to a residential house apartment where home-brew alcohol was sold. Wearing a black cap with eye holes and holding a knife and a toy gun, Volgin knocked on the door. An elderly woman opened the door and Volgin rushed into the entrance hall. Soon realizing that he got into the wrong flat, Volgin demanded money from his victim. The woman gave her purse with 40 rubles - everything she had at the moment.

When Volgin was leaving the house he was suddenly caught by his jacket’s collar by another woman who left her apartment on hearing the woman’s cries for help. The woman disarmed the robber taking away his knife and toy gun, and firmly held him by his jacket’s collar until the police arrived.

Volgin had a previous criminal record and was unemployed, the police statement said. The court sentenced him to seven years in a strict regime colony for an armed robbery.