In February 2014 a prosecutor in Uzbekistan confirmed that a court had sentenced two Uzbek citizens to life in prison for robbing, raping and killing 11 women, seven in Uzbekistan and four in neighboring Kazakhstan, between 2011 and 2012. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, reporting on February 26, 2014, named the men as Abduseit Ormanov and Polat Pardaliev. The killings had alarmed Uzbekistan when they happened, the broadcaster said, but no official information about them was made public until that week.
Four of the women were killed in Kazakhstan, in the region around Shymkent, and the story was told most fully there. Reports there name Ormanov's accomplice as Polatbay Berdaliyev. MK Kazakhstan reported in 2018 that Berdaliyev was sentenced to life in Kazakhstan and Ormanov to life in Tashkent.
According to MK Kazakhstan, Ormanov and Berdaliyev had known each other since their school years. Both came from Uzbekistan. Berdaliyev had served six years for robbery, most of it in Shymkent, and had married while in prison. He traveled to Kazakhstan from time to time, the paper said, telling his family that he was going there to work.
Little is known about Ormanov himself. His date of birth, his family and his work before his arrest have not been reported.
Between December 2011 and March 2012, four women were killed in the South Kazakhstan region, which was renamed the Turkestan region in 2018. Kazakh police said in 2018 that the women were of different ages and that jewelry and money were taken from them.
MK Kazakhstan described each of the four women. Yekaterina Tishkunova, 29, came to Shymkent by train from Astana in December 2011 and never reached home. The paper reported that Ormanov took part with Berdaliyev in her killing, and that her suitcase, laptop, gold earrings and a small sum of money were taken.
About two months later Aliya Dauletbayeva, 25, of Saryagash, disappeared on her way to the regional center. About three weeks after that, a 50-year-old woman from a village in the region, who had also arrived from Astana, was killed; the paper did not name her. She was strangled, and jewelry worth 120,000 tenge, a mobile phone and 35,000 tenge in cash were taken. The last of the four, Tamara Asherova, disappeared on the eve of March 8 while hurrying home.
Investigators had little to work with. Ruslan Abdraimov, of the prosecutor's office, told MK Kazakhstan that the women differed in age and ethnicity and that the one thing linking the cases was a black Mercedes that witnesses had seen. Police questioned railway station staff and taxi drivers, took fingerprints and went through criminal records without result. Patrols stopped dark cars with Kazakh plates but did not check cars with Uzbek plates, a choice the paper said no one could explain.
Colonel Saken Kozhamuratov, who from 2011 to 2014 led the crimes-against-persons unit of the regional criminal police, described the hunt in 2018. The killings, he said, had left Shymkent "literally stirred up." A special group of experienced detectives and investigators was formed inside the criminal police, and officers from Kazakhstan's Interior Ministry came to help. Suspecting that the killers were traveling offenders hiding in a neighboring country, the group sent international requests to Russia, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan under the Minsk Convention.
The answer came from the Interior Ministry of Uzbekistan. Seven women had been killed there in the same way. The two countries' investigators combined the 11 cases into a single investigation.
MK Kazakhstan reported that Berdaliyev was identified as a suspect while he was in Astana with his fiancee, and that investigators expected him to travel to Shymkent and then to Tashkent. Records of his border crossings matched the dates of the killings. He was detained in May 2012. Shortly before that, Uzbek police had arrested Ormanov, the paper said.
In the account the Turkestan regional police gave in 2018, the first man detained was a citizen of Uzbekistan born in 1986, with earlier convictions for robbery and theft, who was held in Almaty. He confessed, said he had acted with an accomplice and admitted taking jewelry and money. The second man was detained in Tashkent with the help of Uzbek police. Police said it took more than four months to find the men and nearly three months to complete the investigation.
According to MK Kazakhstan, police found a headscarf belonging to one of the women at Berdaliyev's parents' home; he had given it to his mother. His fiancee was wearing jewelry taken from the victims. Berdaliyev told investigators that he killed the women because he feared they would go to the police.
At his trial in Kazakhstan, Berdaliyev said he had confessed under physical and psychological pressure from the police. The court rejected the claim, citing strong evidence, and sentenced him to life imprisonment, the most severe penalty in Kazakhstan. Relatives of the victims had wanted the death penalty, MK Kazakhstan reported.
In Uzbekistan, Ormanov was sentenced to life in a strict-regime colony, the paper said. When Azizbek Nazarov confirmed the sentences in February 2014, he did not say when the judgment had been handed down. News sites in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia had been citing him since February 24. Nazarov said that Pardaliev had first been arrested and sentenced in Kazakhstan and then extradited to Uzbekistan, according to RFE/RL. Both men were found guilty of robbing, raping and killing the seven women in Uzbekistan and the four in Kazakhstan.
The names of the seven women killed in Uzbekistan have not been reported, and neither have the name of the Uzbek court or the date of its judgment. The second man's name appears in different forms: Polat Pardaliev in the 2014 report from Uzbekistan and Polatbay Berdaliyev in the Kazakh accounts. The spelling of Ormanov's first name in other alphabets also varies.
2011 to 2012: seven women are killed in Uzbekistan and four in the South Kazakhstan region.
December 2011: Yekaterina Tishkunova, 29, is killed after arriving in Shymkent by train.
About two months later: Aliya Dauletbayeva, 25, of Saryagash, is killed; about three weeks after that, a 50-year-old woman.
Eve of March 8: Tamara Asherova, the last of the four women in South Kazakhstan, is killed; police give March 2012 as the end of the series there.
During the investigation: Kazakh police send requests to Russia, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan; Uzbekistan reports seven similar killings and the cases are merged.
Shortly before May 2012: Ormanov is arrested by Uzbek police.
May 2012: Berdaliyev is detained.
Date unknown: Berdaliyev is sentenced to life in Kazakhstan and, according to Uzbek prosecutors, extradited to Uzbekistan.
Date unknown: Ormanov is sentenced to life in Uzbekistan.
February 24 to 26, 2014: prosecutor Azizbek Nazarov confirms the life sentences.
October 2018: Turkestan regional police publish an account of how the case was solved.