Residents of Dnipro are outraged by an Interior Ministry cadet who smiled for a photo next to the body of a 14-year-old girl

A scandal is brewing in Dnipro over a cadet at Dnipro State University of Internal Affairs who was enlisted to help search for Anastasia Sitnikova, a 14-year-old girl who went missing.

Local Telegram channels are covering the story in detail.

Anastasia went missing on February 17; she was last online around 9:00 p.m. Her family reported her missing to the police on February 18. It turned out that the girl had disappeared in the Soborny district. She was searched for three days but was found dead in the abandoned Nautilus café near Shevchenko Park. Neither the teenager’s cell phone nor any personal belongings were found near the body.

According to acquaintances of Anastasia’s family, her body was not shown to relatives for nearly two weeks. To date, neither the results of the investigation nor the cause of the girl’s death have been officially released.

What outraged the relatives most was not these circumstances, but the behavior of a cadet from the University of Internal Affairs who participated in the search and took a photo of himself next to Anastasia’s body. In the photo, the young man is crouching next to the body, smiling cheerfully and making a V-sign with his fingers.

Local media outlets have reached out to the police for clarification and comment. They are also awaiting a response from the university where the smirking cadet is enrolled.

Teenagers often fall victim to crimes. For example, a year ago in Poland, a 15-year-old Ukrainian girl who had gone missing several months earlier was found dead.

And in 2024, in the Cherkasy region, the leader of a music ensemble raped and murdered an 11-year-old girl.