An eight-year-old Russian girl who ran away from home following an argument with her parents was raped and killed after being picked up by a married couple in their car, Russian police have said.
More than 500 people volunteered to search for missing Vika Teplyakova after she was seen in for a final time in CCTV footage walking alone along a road.
Wearing a T-shirt and blue shorts, the girl was reportedly trying to reach her friends in the town where the family used to live.
She was missing three days before a 32-year-old woman told police she and her husband had given the child a lift.
The couple were identified as Igor and Kristina Dvornikov, and officers today released pictures of the detained husband and wife suspected of carrying out the horrific crimes.
The man told his wife he would ‘attack’ the girl and ‘the woman did nothing to stop it because she was too scared of him’, according to a police source.
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The girl was raped and strangled with a plastic bag. She died on Monday, the day she disappeared, said police.
The woman showed police where her body was hidden near a lake, said law enforcement.
Igor Dvornikov initially denied abducting, abusing and killing the girl, but later confessed, according to law enforcement.
Both the man and the woman have been detained as detectives launch a murder probe.
The girl had run away from her parents in Novoaleksandrovsk on Sakhalin island, a pacific island north of Japan.
One report said a man had given her a sum of money- £1.70 – and taken her to a supermarket before she was attacked.
