The chief suspects in last week’s terrorist attack on the Crocus City Hall outside Moscow have testified that their orders came from a mystery man who told them to flee to Ukraine afterwards, the Russian Investigative Committee announced on Friday.
Security services detained the four suspected perpetrators near the Ukrainian border last Saturday. The attack claimed 144 lives and left over 200 people hospitalized.
In their initial testimonies and during their subsequent interrogations, the suspects said the attacks were prepared in coordination with “a man who introduced himself to them under a pseudonym,” the Investigative Committee said in a statement. He communicated with them by voice messages sent over Telegram, it added.
“On the instructions of the coordinator, after committing the crime, the terrorists drove in a car towards the Russian-Ukrainian border to subsequently cross it and arrive in Kiev to receive the promised reward,” the law enforcement agency said.