Residents of Ternopil region town mourn victims of Sacramento murders
by Maryna Makhnonos
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly
SHUMSK, Ukraine - Almost all 5,000 residents of this little town of one- and two-story brick houses, hometown of murder suspect Nikolay Soltys, went out on September 9 in the heavy rain to pay their last respects to two Ukrainian immigrants to the United States, victims of family slayings that occurred in Sacramento last month.
Lyubov Soltys and her 3-year-old son, Sergei, were among six people killed on August 20, allegedly by her husband, Nikolay, also a Ukrainian immigrant to the United States. Mrs. Soltys was three months pregnant when she was killed.
Their white coffins arrived at Kyiv's Boryspil airport on September 8. They were put in wooden boxes equipped with handles. Mrs. Soltys' father, Ihor Nakonechnyi, and her brothers fought back tears while measuring the boxes before putting them into a small minivan. They left the airport silently and quickly.
About 3,000 people attended the several-hour-long funeral in Shumsk, passing in a slow and solemn procession through the town to the Baptist church attended by Mrs. Soltys' family.
"I don't know how we will ever be able to forget him (Mr. Soltys)," Mr. Nakonechnyi said after the burial. "It cannot be compared to anything - the dearest we had is taken."
Believers of various Christian congregations crowded the church, and most of them burst into tears and wailed as a local priest delivered the eulogy.
"He (Mr. Soltys) was an unruly person, there were many problems since childhood: in the family, in school and in church," said the Rev. Borys Kovalchuk. "To bring such grief, trauma ... such a scar will never heal."
Mr. Soltys, 27, is accused of slashing his wife's throat at their North Highlands home in Sacramento, then killing his aunt, Galina Kukharskaya, 74, and uncle, Petr Kukharskiy, 75, at their Rancho Cordova home. He also is suspected of killing their two 9-year-old grandchildren, Tatyana Kukharskaya and Dimitriy Kukharskiy, who lived next door. Authorities said Mr. Soltys fled with his son, who was found dead in a cardboard box a day later.
Police searched for Mr. Soltys for 10 days, and he topped the FBI's 10 Most Wanted List until he was found sitting under a table in his mother's backyard on August 30.
He allegedly confessed to killing his relatives, saying they were "poisoning" him. If translated from Mr. Soltys' native Ukrainian, the reference could mean that Mr. Soltys believed his relatives were trying to poison his reputation, or otherwise some sort of psychological pressure.
The language issue posed some difficulty for police in their search for Mr. Soltys, as most witnesses in his neighborhood cannot express themselves well in English.
Mr. Soltys was charged on September 5 with seven counts of first-degree murder - including one count for the unborn child.
His aunt, uncle and cousins were buried in Sacramento, while his wife's parents decided to bring their daughter's body and that of their grandson to their hometown, Shumsk, located in the Ternopil region in western Ukraine.
The first reports about the killings rattled this cozy town. The residents shared news of the tragedy and tried to recall the type of person Mr. Soltys was.
His teacher of Ukrainian, Polina Horbonis, had said that he didn't seem to differ in any meaningful way from other children, but he did exude "a certain sadness, or indifference, or even evil in his eyes."
Ms. Horbonis said that Mr. Soltys immigrated to the United States with his family as Baptists, adding that many people from Shumsk had left Ukraine for the United States through religious links.
Shumsk residents were visibly overwhelmed by grief during the Soltys funeral.
Mr. Nakonechnyi could barely comment, but he thanked the U.S. government and all Americans who donated significant funds to help transport his daughter's and grandson's bodies to Ukraine.
"There are no words to express our gratitude; we could not imagine that we would receive such an expression of sympathy in America, where almost nobody knows us," Mr. Nakonechnyi said.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, September 16, 2001, No. 37, Vol. LXIX
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