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Authorities have found clothing and other items at the suspected gunman’s property that were allegedly used in the murder of Parakar Mayor Volodya Grigoryan and an off-duty police officer.
The Investigative Committee said in a press release that investigators recovered a mask, gloves, shoes, a jacket, and a night vision device from a building owned by the suspect. The suspect had attempted to burn these items.
The murder weapon, an assault rifle, has not yet been found.
“During the preliminary investigation of the criminal case, numerous evidentiary and procedural actions are being carried out to clarify the full circumstances of the incident, including efforts to locate the assault rifle used in the commission of the crime,” the Investigative Committee said.
The mayor of Parakar, a small town outside Yerevan, was shot dead along with his friend, an off-duty police officer, outside a house near Merdzavan, a nearby community. The shooting occurred around midnight on Tuesday and also left another person wounded.
CCTV footage from the scene shows Mayor Grigoryan and two men standing outside a house near a highway in Merdzavan when a masked gunman opens fire with an automatic weapon, killing Grigoryan and off-duty police officer Karen Abrahamyan of the Ararat Regional Police Department. The shooter is then seen approaching the unresponsive mayor and striking him with the weapon. The killing prompted a massive manhunt for the suspect.
Authorities announced an arrest on Friday.
An unconfirmed report suggests the shooting may be linked to a blood feud stemming from another shootout in the town earlier this year.
According to that report, the arrested suspect is the brother of a man who was shot dead earlier this year in Parakar — a man who was also the cousin of the town’s former mayor, Mher Akhtoyan.