The son of the deputy mayor of Kharkiv was brutally killed in Vienna last week in what investigators believe was a financially motivated attack.
The 21-year-old, who had been living in the Austrian capital, was found dead in a burning Mercedes in the city’s Donaustadt district. Two Ukrainian nationals, aged 19 and 45, have since been arrested in Ukraine on the basis of international warrants issued by Austria.
They are not expected to be extradited to Austria and will instead face prosecution in their homeland, Colonel Gerhard Winkler, the head of the Vienna State Criminal Police Office, told a press conference on Tuesday.
The victim, identified as Danil Kuzmin, was reported missing by his family on Wednesday night. According to Vienna police cited by Kronen Zeitung, he was ambushed in the underground parking garage of the luxury Sofitel hotel, overpowered by several men, beaten, and then placed on the back seat of a car and set on fire. Surveillance footage captured parts of the attack.
His father, Kharkiv deputy mayor Serhii Kuzmin, evacuated him and his family from Ukraine at the start of the Russian invasion.
Ukrainian journalist Yurii Nikolov, reporting on the incident, wrote, “21-year-old Danil Kuzmin, the son of the deputy mayor of Kharkiv, was found dead and burned in his Mercedes in Vienna. Someone cleaned out his crypto wallets. Whether it was debts or someone shaking down a rich kid — I don’t know.”
Col. Winkler revealed that a political motive had been ruled out. “It is presumably about a large sum of money,” he said. Investigators reported that a substantial amount of money had been withdrawn from the victim’s cryptocurrency wallet after the assault, and one suspect was found carrying a large quantity of U.S. dollars when detained.
Winkler said the victim sustained extensive injuries before the fire. “His body was 80 percent burned,” he noted. Evidence indicates that an accelerant was used; a melted gasoline canister was recovered from the back seat. This, along with video footage from a Vienna gas station, helped lead investigators to the suspects, who had fled to Ukraine shortly after the killing.
Investigations remain ongoing.
A spokesperson for Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov refused to comment, saying the case is “a personal matter” for Kuzmin. “This concerns him personally. I will not answer these questions at all. It is a human tragedy.”
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