clothes to make it seem that Darina was still alive. Darina had been living with a foster family for at least two years and was only given back to her biological parents three months before her death. Police said the parents, who have three other children, ‘confessed’ to the attempt to cover-up Darina’s death and admitted she had been thrown into the stove. The girl’s remains have not been found.
Darina’s mother has also been arrested on suspicion of being an accessory to murder. The unnamed mother told police that after shoving the child, her husband had tried to give the girl ‘artificial respiration’ but she did not respond. He then lit a fire in the stove and ‘carried her charred remains to the river’, where they still have not been located. Man sets himself on fire and is engulfed with flames on White House lawn Police spokesperson Alexander Radchenko said: ‘We are doing our best to verify the information and establish all the circumstances.’
There is a separate row over the case because police complained that local social activists had successfully campaigned for the girl to be returned to her natural family from a ‘loving’ foster home. The foster mother Natalya Kobernik had sought to overturn the ruling, arguing that Darina would not be properly cared for – but she was told Makarchuk was a ‘reliable and normal’ parent. The girl’s body was allegedly burned. She accused the authorities of placing the child in a family where she was at risk of abuse. Makarchuk now faces up to 15 years in jail if he is convicted of murder. His other children have now been taken into care.
