Lieutenant Colonel Konstantin Frolov. Photo: russia_desant / Instagram

Russia’s Investigative Committee has completed its investigation into charges against a number of servicemen for passing off injuries they had inflicted on each other as war wounds, state-affiliated business daily Kommersant reported on Wednesday.

The investigation established that 35 members of the 83rd Separate Guards Air Assault Brigade had been involved in a scam whereby they shot each other to inflict non-fatal wounds. The servicemen were paid over 200 million rubles (€2.1 million) from state programmes for the injuries suffered, while also being awarded orders and medals for valour.

The head of the 83rd brigade’s special operations group, Konstantin Frolov, who went by the call sign Executioner, was arrested in June 2024, according to Kommersant. He had inflicted four gunshot wounds on himself. Frolov pleaded guilty and testified against his colleagues, including his commander, Colonel Artyom Gorodilov, who was promptly arrested. Both men asked to be sent to fight in Ukraine to evade charges, but their request was turned down.

News reports on the “combat exploits” of Frolov and other servicemen from the brigade have now proved to be fake. Independent media outlet Agentstvo found one such news report on Russia’s Channel One, a state propaganda mouthpiece. The report showed Frolov had fought on “as befits an officer’s honour” despite his wounds, and asserted that he had also adopted a girl he had rescued from shelling. Similar fake news stories were subsequently published by the Russian Defence Ministry and multiple media outlets.

Frolov is the son of Oleg Frolov, the former deputy head of Russia’s space agency Roscosmos, who is also now being tried for fraud relating to state contracts, according to Agentstvo.