A multi-millionaire Russian businessman has been shot dead at his mansion, the latest elite with links to energy giant Gazprom to die in recent months, media reports said. Yuri Voronov, 61, head of a logistics company that held lucrative contracts with Gazprom in the Arctic, was found dead at his home in an ultra-wealthy suburb of St Petersburg around 2 p.m. on Monday, Daily Mail reported.
Voronov was found floating in the swimming pool with a gunshot wound to his head, a Grand Power pistol nearby, and several spent cases at the bottom of the pool. He is at least the sixth wealthy Russian businessman to die in mysterious circumstances since the start of the year, many of them with links to Gazprom, and two of whom died in the same St Petersburg suburb as Voronov, Daily Mail reported. The Russian Investigative Committee is probing Voronov’s death, which they are currently attributing to a “dispute with business partners”. His wife has reportedly told investigators that Voronov believed he was being swindled out of “a lot of money” by “dishonorable” contractors and partners. But a number of deaths at other mansions near St Petersburg have led to rumors of murders being staged to look like suicides. Alexander Tyulakov, 61, a senior Gazprom financial and security official, was found hanged at his home in the exclusive Leninsky development by a lover in February. Investigators said he had killed himself, but local reports said his body showed signs of a beating – suggesting the hanging was staged.
Three weeks earlier, in the same housing development, 60-year-old Leonid Shulman was found stabbed to death in his bathroom. Shulman was the head of transport at Gazprom In- vest, a branch of the energy giant that handles its investment projects. Billionaire Alexander Subbotin, 43, a former senior executive at energy giant Lukoil, was also found dead in May, Daily Mail reported.
