Kazan murder scene message, from Associated Press Television

Kazan, Russia, is a city of 1.2 million just under 400 miles east of Moscow. It is apparently home to a very well-educated, civic-minded class of criminals who can commit horrific murders and take time out to make a political statements with their victims’ blooc.

The bodies of two women, a 76-year-old and her 38-year-old daughter, were found in an apartment in Kazan days after they were brutally murdered. On the wall of the apartment, police “found” the words “FREE! PUSSY RiOT” “presumably” written in the victims’ blood, in English.

The pro-Putin press has been having a field day with the message. Officially, the police are saying that the message was probably an attempt to throw the police off track over the murders, which were committed with a knife.

Pussy Riot is the feminist punk band which staged a “protest prayer” against President Vladimir Putin in February at a Moscow cathedral and three members have been sentenced to two years in prison for the prank. Pro-Pussy Riot people are being blamed for vandalism at several churches across Russia and Ukraine, while pro-government and church-affiliated groups are telling the press that supporters of the band are capable of any crime, any sacrilege. A recent poll of 1,600 Russians found a three-way split between pro-Pussy Riot, anti-Pussy Riot and “don’t really care” factions in the country. The last available information on the band’s members, in addition to the three in prison, had two hiding somewhere outside of Russia and only two at large inside the country.

Though the police are saying that there is probably no real connection between the murder and the band, some pro-Putin Russians were not listening. Blogger Kristina Potupchik posted that the band’s fans “will not get away” and compared them to Charles Manson. A Russian Orthodox youth group leader named Dimitry Tsorionov told the press, “The infernal force that drives them (Pussy Riot fans) hates God, believers, and humankind in general. These people are capable of committing any crime, and nothing but force and law can stop them.”

The manner in which Vladimir Putin is holding on to power has deeply divided Russians, and the case of Pussy Riot is just a small, if highly visible, portion of that division.

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• “Free Pussy Riot” written in blood at Russian murder scene