Nina Vasilyeva, a pensioner in Moscow, sold two apartments without ever receiving the full payment for either one, then died under mysterious circumstances a month before a court-ordered psychiatric examination that could have overturned both deals, according to KP.RU.
Vasilyeva, a former employee of a Moscow research institute, lived in a three-room apartment on Snayperskaya Street in the Veshnyaki district. Her daughter, Anastasia, rented a flat in the neighboring entrance so she could care for her mother.
Anastasia kept the apartment's paperwork, though her mother had keys to her rented flat. After a neighbor called her, Anastasia found that the folder holding the documents had disappeared. When she asked her mother about it, Vasilyeva said she now had a different apartment and that a man lived nearby with whom she felt like a woman again. A contact named Illarionov appeared most often in her mother's phone, though Vasilyeva never said who he was.
Two Deals in One Day
Both transactions, the sale of the three-room flat for 11 million rubles and the purchase of a one-room flat for 7 million rubles, were completed on the same day. The sale was certified by notary Alexander Fedorchenko, who drew up the contract so that the property was not secured by a lien until Vasilyeva received full payment. The second deal was arranged in simple written form at a public service center, where staff raised no concerns about the seller's age or about her carrying out two transactions in one day without informing relatives.
At the time, Vasilyeva was a registered disabled person with diabetes, epilepsy and facial nerve paralysis. She had survived COVID-19, a brain tumor and a craniotomy, and doctors had already recorded declining memory and cognitive function as far back as 2011.
Police Find No Cause for Concern
Anastasia filed a police report asking investigators to look into the realtor and others linked to the sale. Police told her they had questioned her mother, who said she had sold the property of her own free will and did not wish to have contact with her daughter. After that, Vasilyeva cut off all contact with Anastasia and her grandchildren, refusing to let her past the doorstep and turning away the food and medicine she brought.
Mira Moiseyeva, the lawyer representing Anastasia, believes Vasilyeva was under the control of outsiders who deliberately isolated her from her family.
A Second Sale, No Money
In June 2023, Vasilyeva called her daughter to say she had sold the one-room apartment too, but the buyers never paid her. Anastasia then filed a court petition to have her mother declared legally incapacitated. At the hearing, a judge asked Vasilyeva whether she was willing to undergo an inpatient examination, since an earlier outpatient assessment had found her condition unstable. Vasilyeva agreed.
Police opened a criminal fraud case against unidentified individuals and placed the apartment under seizure. The young man who had become its new owner left Russia soon afterward, while his father pressed Vasilyeva to move out quickly. Police advised her not to open the door to anyone while the investigation continued. The examination was due a month later, but Vasilyeva did not live to see it.
Body Found by Neighbors
Neighbors discovered Vasilyeva's body after noticing a strong smell from her apartment. Emergency workers found no sign the lock had been forced. The local police officer said he never entered the flat, and investigators found the door already open when they arrived; who had opened and closed it remains unknown.
The body lay in the kitchen surrounded by scattered rags, unusual for a woman relatives describe as always tidy. Her family suspects someone deliberately spread clothing around the body to absorb fluids as it decomposed, rather than let them seep through the floor.
Questions Over Cause of Death
Moiseyeva has not ruled out that the death could have been hastened by an excessive dose of insulin, which causes a sharp drop in blood glucose, a hypoglycemic coma and death accompanied by convulsions. Before the funeral, Anastasia was given her mother's body in a bag and asked not to open it. She decided to check for herself and says she saw a face disfigured by what looked like convulsions.
Investigators did not treat the death as a possible crime when they examined the apartment, and syringes, medication and other potential evidence were never seized. The cause of death has still not been officially established. Medical paperwork also states that the body examined at the morgue had blood type III, while Vasilyeva's recorded blood type was IV.
Millions Unaccounted For
Reviewing the finances of the sales, Anastasia found the three-room flat was sold for 11 million rubles, well below its market value of 14 to 15 million, while the one-room flat cost 7 million to buy. Where the missing roughly 4 million rubles went is unclear; Vasilyeva never received the money directly, apart from a single payment of 500,000 rubles that reached her bank card in September 2022 from a sender investigators have not identified.
Illarionov, the contact who appeared repeatedly in Vasilyeva's phone, presented himself as a realtor, even though her apartment had never been listed for sale. He found her himself, brought her flowers and sweets, and persuaded her to sell. The buyer turned out to be his daughter, and the property was resold three months later for 14 million rubles. The whereabouts of the 7 million rubles paid for the one-room flat also remain unexplained.
Family Suspects a Cover-Up
Relatives believe Vasilyeva may have been killed to stop her from undergoing the examination that could have unwound both sales. Moiseyeva points out that when payment for a property is incomplete, the seller is meant to be protected by a lien on the property until the balance is paid, yet neither apartment carried such a restriction when it passed to its buyer.
The lawyer argues that notaries Alexander Fedorchenko and Ashot Atoyan structured the deals in ways that left Vasilyeva at a clear disadvantage and cost her the property. She says it is now up to investigators to assess their conduct, since Moscow's Notary Chamber found no violations and no suspects have yet been named in the fraud case.
