A pregnant 23-year-old Minnesota woman has been fatally stabbed with a kitchen knife by her abusive husband. According to charging documents, the sister of Lyuba Savenok watched in horror as Yevgeniy (Eugene) Savenok, 30, put her in a headlock and stabbed her in the throat in her Eden Prairie home on Saturday morning.
He then sped away from their house with their two other children, police said. The victim’s sister, who ran out to dial 911, saw her “lying inside on the floor with a knife protruding from her body,”
investigators said. Savenok turned himself in hours later at a hospital in St. Paul.
His wife, who police said he had assaulted last August, died from 12 stab wounds, according to her autopsy. The pair’s expected baby boy died from premature birth following an emergency cesarean section at a hospital.
Prosecutors filed two counts of first-degree murder charges against Savenok, and he was booked into Hennepin County jail on a $5 million bail. The murder followed a “turbulent domestic history” between Savenok and his wife, investigators said.
Luba Savenok received an order of protection against him in the past after reporting his abusive behavior, and he was set to go to trial on domestic assault charges in an Aug. 21 incident.
Savenok admitted he had killed his wife and fled with the two kids, throwing his cell phone out of the car to avoid tracking, investigators said. A neighbor named Johnnie Nguyen told WCCO-TV Savenok was “just walking right out, very normal” before he drove away.
Luba Savenok was about to take custody of their 4-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter and her husband decided killing her would be “probably like my only way out,” investigators said he told them in an interview. Savenok is scheduled to appear in court Wednesday afternoon.
