'He was a gentle soul.' Where is Dmitry Korovin now

Instead of luxury brands — trying on clothes on cardboard at the nearest market, instead of expensive cars — shabby buses squeaking up to the stop, instead of breathtaking views of Moscow City or a hotel room in Saint-Tropez — a dreary courtyard of an apartment block long overdue for renovation. And instead of lively company — a lonely childhood with a grandmother on the outskirts of Lipetsk.

That is how life initially looked for Greta Wedler — a fair-haired girl with a doll-like face who dreamed of a luxurious life in Moscow, trips to Dubai, working as a psychologist, and a popular blog. In reality, all of that did happen. But the path to her dreams ran through prostitution, drug use, and problems with alcohol. And it all ended abruptly one winter day in a hotel room on Smolenskaya Street in the capital.

On 24 February 2021, she met for the last time with her ex-boyfriend, with whom she had been on and off since their school days in Lipetsk, where both were from. During yet another drunken quarrel, Dmitry Korovin tried to calm Greta Wedler down.

He hit the girl in the face — she fell onto the bed, he grabbed a pillow and pressed it to her face, shouting: “Calm down! Calm down! Calm down!” The girl went quiet and showed no further signs of life. The drunk Korovin did not notice and passed out on the floor. He woke up in the morning and found the body of his beloved already cold.

“I remember pressing the pillow on her face so she would stop spitting, screaming, and all that,” Korovin recalled during interrogation. “Just so she would stop yelling. At some point she went quiet. Literally a couple of minutes, and I went to sleep. I passed out. It turned into complete madness.”

Over the next few days, locked in the room, he drank incessantly, trying to decide what to do next. He did not want to surrender to the police immediately — he had many debts he had accumulated to fulfill all of Greta«s “wants,” and parents left penniless because of him. Unable to think of anything better, he bought a suitcase, black plastic bags, and reinforced tape at a nearby shopping center.

He put Greta in the suitcase, poured citric acid over her, and covered her with activated charcoal. Then he drove her to Lipetsk, their hometown, where he hid her in his parents« garage. No one was looking for the girl. A year passes.

One of Greta«s clients became suspicious when it seemed to him that someone else was communicating with him from the girl»s account. He filed a report with the police, and then they began searching for her. They traced Korovin, who immediately gave a confession. From his relatives« garage they pulled out the suitcase where Greta Wedler»s body had been lying all that time. During interrogations with the investigator, the young man said that on the girl«s birthday he had wanted to bury her like a human being.

In the spring of 2023, Dmitry Korovin was sentenced to 15 years in a strict-regime colony. In his final statement in court, he said he dreamed of true love and a family, as well as of being useful to society.

MSK1.RU correspondents visited Lipetsk, which Greta Wedler wanted to leave in the past and where she nevertheless returned after a beautiful life in Moscow. We tell you what is happening now in the village where the body of the fair-haired girl with the doll-like face was found.

“I screamed, I cried, but no one came to help”

Among the abandoned Lipetsk kiosks and dusty houses where Greta Wedler grew up and from which she desperately tried to escape, fewer than 500,000 people live. And their number continues to dwindle every year — more and more young people are leaving the city with its motley architecture, where historic buildings, Soviet modernism, and contemporary design coexist.

And the local elderly women joke that their apartment blocks, once noisy with children«s laughter and commotion, have turned into half-dead houses of pensioners.

“We haven«t heard anything about the Wedlers. What a strange surname. Are they Germans, or what?” asks a local resident perched on a peeling bench.

In her native Lipetsk, no one remembers the brutal crime or the girl«s name that made headlines across the country in 2021.

In this quiet city of gray panel blocks, six hours« drive from Moscow, elderly women sit by the shops selling daisies and chrysanthemums from their gardens. Aunties sprawled on tiny stools with underwear and socks laid out on cardboard boxes gloomily crack sunflower seeds. People bustle at bus stops waiting for the bus. And some unshaven man will inevitably ask for a light for his cigarette.

None of these urban scenes even remotely resemble Kutuzovsky Prospekt, where motorcades with black flashing lights race at speed. Nor are there shopping malls where well-groomed shoppers emerge in a cloud of expensive perfume carrying branded bags. This dreariness was not the only problem in Greta Wedler«s childhood — on top of everything else, the girl was born into a troubled family.

In her personal blog, Greta said she was raised by a despotic grandmother — her mother drank and would buy her off with money, paying little attention to her daughter. Nothing has been heard of her biological father for a long time. The girl was not allowed to socialize with peers because she was beaten at home and they feared she would tell someone. So little Greta would wander far from home and talk to cats and dogs.

“I screamed, I cried, but no one came to help, and in response I heard only threats,” Greta wrote.

Greta Wedler«s entire family was registered at a private house in the village of Novoye Dubovoye near Lipetsk. Locals say that this house, hidden behind overgrowth, has been abandoned for about 20 years, and the owners have not appeared for a long time. And it does look like it: a barely standing building with a rusty roof and a rotted iron fence, windows and doors boarded up.

“I understand who you«re talking about. The girl used to come. She just came, didn»t live here like we do,” a village resident throws up her hands. “They came in a Zhiguli «seven.» A blonde, such a thin thing. But that she talked to anyone — no. Maybe they bought the house, registered, and that was it.”

“Everybody here has died off”

An hour«s drive from the village of Novoye Dubovoye lies another village — Soshki. There, in a solid two-story house, Dmitry lived with his parents. It was there that investigators found the suitcase with the girl»s body. The Korovins« neighbors say that even before the tragedy the family barely spoke to anyone, and afterward they became completely withdrawn.

“I live in Gryazi, I just come here,” a neighbor of the Korovins says dismissively. “But I didn«t know him, and I didn»t know them. I come and go. There are few permanent residents here. His parents live here. They hardly talk to anyone. But his mother used to go give injections to Aunt Katya. But she«s already dead.”

Among the villagers there are those who have lived in Soshki for a long time — moved from the city, started a family, and stayed. But everyone says in unison that people used to be open, knew what was happening in each other«s homes, and celebrated weddings and funerals together. In recent years, everything has gone wrong. Some have heard about the Korovin family. They say they moved to Soshki from Lipetsk several years ago.

“Oh, girls, we just live as we live. They live their life, we live ours. I don«t go anywhere and don»t talk to anyone. I arrive — straight to the garden, then with the grandchildren. And the Korovins sort of closed off and weren«t really sociable with us. They say he»s at the special military operation. And other than that… Everybody here has died off,” wails Liudmila, a Soshki resident, with a guttural accent. “Only Tajiks are left, the Tajiks have bought up everything all around, soon we«ll be building a mosque. We were here when it all happened. We didn»t see anything. The main thing we saw was the ambulance. I ask: «What were you called for, at least?» The medics answer: «We don»t know ourselves.«”

“We built our houses together with the Korovins. They«ve lived here for about six years, they»re city people, actually. They haven«t moved anywhere,” the woman added.

Liudmila says that some time ago she tried to become friends with Dmitry Korovin«s mother, when his grandmother still lived in the house. Sometimes they would greet each other, but the conversation never went further.

“When it all happened, I thought her mother had died — so many ambulances arrived. And after that they sort of distanced themselves, closed off,” the neighbor recalls. “Once we were riding on the bus with his mother and we greeted each other. And another time I was standing at the bus stop, and they just drove by in a car. Life has become such these days that you don«t know who»s hiding next to you.”

“Between her knees lay some pills”

One of the Soshki residents who lives across the street from the Korovins was called by the local police officer to assist with a matter, saying help was needed. That day she had a friend visiting, who persuaded her to go see what the police officer wanted.

“The district officer invited us, said we needed to help with some matter. He didn«t say we had to be witnesses. I saw that she was packed in a suitcase. Such a small one, wrapped in film. It was opened in front of us,” mumbles Korovin»s neighbor incoherently, leaning on a rusty fence. “I stood and watched and said: «Wow! Would you look at that!» When they opened it, she didn«t smell. She wasn»t in pieces or anything — whole. She was folded up. Between her knees lay some pills. So there would be no smell, probably.”

According to the neighbors, Dmitry Korovin«s parents never greeted anyone, nor did they try to make friends. They recall that the young man once helped Grandma Katya set up her television, but otherwise he barely crossed paths with the neighbors.

“It was after 8 March. I go outside: cars are parked, police. I think: «What»s happened?« And a detective I know says: »Well, they found a corpse at your place.« Well, they found it and found it. Am I going to go there? I»m terrified of that,” a woman in a bright blue housecoat says disjointedly. “And then I«d just come back from milking the cow, and a neighbor says: »There«s oats, won»t you take them?« She says: »Well, at the house they call the merry one.« I answer: »I don«t even need the grass from there. Might find something else there.» They call it merry because that«s where they found that (the corpse. — Ed.).”

“They seemed like calm people, you know. You«d never think it. He was a gentle soul, a calm boy. I was told that after that the Korovins sold the house and left,” the neighbor added.

Behind the tall fence stands that same big brown house of Korovin«s relatives. The garage where Greta Wedler was found in 2022 turned out to be open. Boxes and various items sit on the shelves; barrels and various gardening implements lie on the floor. A woman sits on the steps in front of the house. As soon as she heard that journalists had arrived, she shouted: “Get out of here! No comments! I»ll call the police right now!”

Five years have passed since the murder of Greta Wedler. Dmitry Korovin was sentenced to 15 years in a strict-regime colony. But he did not serve out his term — he went to the special operation zone. In his final statement in court, he said he dreamed of true love and a family, as well as of being useful to society. Whether the wishes of the young man who did away with his school sweetheart will come true, no one knows.

Earlier, we reported how in Moscow an official dismembered his wife — Miss Kuzbass 2010. He corresponded from her phone for several months to cover up the murder.