The Sevastopol garrison military court sentenced Captain Igor Pashkov of the air defense unit to three years in a penal colony for negligence that led to the death of three people. He mistakenly shot down a Mi-8 helicopter, reported «Kommersant».
According to the publication, on the morning of October 18, 2023, Pashkov received a report during combat duty about the detection of a low-flying, low-speed aerial target. Pashkov confused the call sign numbers and mistakenly informed his superiors that it was necessary to destroy an unidentified target in another location. The officer did not believe the subsequent clarifications he received, which stated that the target was a helicopter flying with its lights on, and a check showed that there were «no friendly aircraft» at the target's location. As a result, two minutes later, a missile from the anti-aircraft missile system shot down the Mi-8 helicopter, which crashed into the Black Sea, killing three crew members.
The Investigative Committee initiated a criminal case for violating the rules of combat duty in combat conditions, which resulted in severe consequences. In May 2024, Pashkov voluntarily confessed, admitting that he made a mistake.
On appeal, the court reduced Pashkov's sentence from three years to two years and 10 months and denied the Ministry of Defense's claim to recover the full cost of the downed helicopter — 204 million rubles. Ultimately, the officer was ordered to pay five million rubles to the Ministry of Defense for the helicopter and one million rubles each as compensation to the widows of the pilots.