Here are some of the main takeaways of the investigation.
A Paratrooper Unit Emerges as the Culprit
While various military units were present in Bucha — and the death toll across the city reached over 400 — The Times identified the 234th Regiment, a paratrooper unit based in the city of Pskov in western Russia, as the main culprit in the Yablunska Street killings. Airborne units like this are considered some of the best trained and equipped in the Russian military. Evidence of the 234th’s involvement includes military equipment, uniform badges, radio chatter and packing slips on munition crates. Military experts from Janes and the Institute for the Study of War provided insights about Russian armored vehicles and their markings as well as tactical operations seen in the visual evidence.
Phone Records as Digital Fingerprints
Residents in Bucha said that when Russian soldiers interrogated them, they often seized their phones. Suspecting the soldiers may also have taken the phones of victims, our reporters obtained from Ukrainian authorities a database of all calls and messages placed from the Bucha region to Russia during March. As we interviewed victims’ relatives, we collected their phone numbers and checked if they were in the database. A chilling pattern emerged: soldiers routinely used the phones of victims to call home to Russia, often only hours after they were killed.
By analyzing the phone numbers dialed by Russian soldiers and uncovering social media profiles associated with their family members, The Times confirmed the identity of two dozen paratroopers as members of the 234th Regiment. In many cases, we interviewed their relatives and spoke to some of the soldiers themselves, two of whom confirmed they were in the 234th and served in Bucha. We cross-referenced our findings with personal data sourced from leaked and official Russian databases provided by the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit group focused on global security.
Mothers, Fathers, Children: Ordinary Citizens as Victims
The Times identified — for the first time — three dozen people who were killed along Yablunska Street in March. We reviewed death certificates for most of these victims, and the predominant cause of death was gunshot wounds.
The victims were residents of Bucha or neighboring towns, from all ages and professions. Among the victims killed by Russian paratroopers were 52-year-old Tamila Mishchenko and her 14-year-old daughter, Anna, on March 5. They were among four women fleeing Bucha when Russian soldiers fired on their blue minivan.
Nearly all the victims we identified on Yablunska Street were civilians or Ukrainian P.O.W.s. Killing them could be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court and deemed war crimes under international humanitarian law. Because of their systematic and widespread nature, the killings in Bucha could also amount to crimes against humanity. Russia has not joined the I.C.C. and is unlikely to cooperate on any potential future cases that involve Russian soldiers.
The Killings Were Not Random Acts of Violence
The victims on Yablunska Street did not die in the crossfire between Russian and Ukrainian forces, nor were they mistakenly shot in the fog of war. Our investigation shows that Russian troops intentionally killed them, apparently as part of a systematic “clearing” operation to secure the path to the capital. Dozens of civilians were shot dead. In other cases, men suspected of links to the Ukrainian military were rounded up and executed.
Dereliction in the Chain of Command
Lt. Col. Artyom Gorodilov, the regiment commander at the helm of the 234th, oversaw operations of the paratrooper unit in Bucha. Times investigators obtained documents that confirmed the call sign he used when communicating over the radio with his troops. Security cameras along Yablunska Street captured some of this radio chatter, establishing that Lt. Col. Gorodilov was in command, and two soldiers in the 234th who served in Bucha confirmed in interviews that he was there.
After Russian troops retreated from the Kyiv region, Lt. Col. Gorodilov received a promotion to colonel in April from the then-head of the airborne forces, Col. Gen. Andrey Serdyukov. The ceremony was held days after the shocking images from Bucha emerged.
Neither General Serdyukov nor Colonel Gorodilov’s immediate superior at the time, Maj. Gen. Sergey Chubarykin, has publicly announced any investigations into the carnage in the town despite the global outrage over the images. As superior officers, they ultimately answer for the actions of the forces under their command. By neither stopping nor investigating the atrocities in Bucha, they could ultimately bear responsibility for them.
The Russian Ministry of Defense, the Russian Embassy in Washington and Colonel Gorodilov did not respond to requests for comment.
Reporting was contributed by Evan Hill, Ishaan Jhaveri and Julian Barnes.
Translations and research by Aleksandra Koroleva, Oksana Nesterenko and Milana Mazaeva.
