Two residents of the Rostov region have been convicted in connection with a terrorist attack.

Ruslan Kolomoets and Nikolai Boychenko were sentenced to lengthy prison terms in the case of the arson of a transformer substation on the railway line between Bataysk and Azov.

As reported by the "Caucasian Knot," in the southern regions of Russia, since the beginning of the military operation in Ukraine, there have been repeated arson attacks on railway and mobile phone equipment. Investigators are classifying these incidents as acts of sabotage and terrorism. Thus, in February, a court sentenced Nikolai Golubov, a resident of the Rostov region, to 11 years in prison for arson on the railroad, and in early March, it became known about the arrest of a student from Novocherkassk University, suspected of setting two electrical substations on fire.

The Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced two young men from the Rostov region, charged with terrorism in connection with the arson of a transformer vault, Mediazona* reported, citing a court representative.

The convicted are 22-year-old Ruslan Kolomiets and 19-year-old Nikolai Boychenko. Both were charged with committing a terrorist act by a group of persons (Part 2 of Article 205 of the Russian Criminal Code, which carries a prison sentence of twelve to twenty years). Kolomoiets was also charged with engaging in terrorist activity (Part 1.1 of Article 205.1 of the Russian Criminal Code, which carries a prison sentence of eight to fifteen years) and involving a minor in a criminal group that committed a particularly serious crime (Part 4 of Article 150 of the Russian Criminal Code, which carries a prison sentence of five to ten years), since Boychenko was a minor at the time of his arrest in August 2024.

According to the prosecution, on the night of July 31, 2024, the young men set fire to a transformer substation on the Bataysk-Azov railway line on the instructions of a client, who later transferred 20,000 rubles to their e-wallet for the completed task.

The court sentenced Ruslan Kolomoets to 15 years in a maximum-security penal colony, with the first four years to be served in prison. He was also stripped of his rank of "junior sergeant of the internal service." On his social media page, Kolomoets indicated that he served in the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the publication notes. Nikolai Boychenko was sentenced to six years in a general-regime penal colony.

Kolomoets and Boychenko were added to the Rosfinmonitoring register of terrorists and extremists on the same day, August 22, 2024, according to a Telegram bot tracking updates to the list. According to records, both convicts are natives of the city of Azov in the Rostov region. The case was heard in court beginning in June 2025, and the verdict was handed down on March 4.

Caucasian Knot has not yet received any comments from the defendants or their lawyers regarding the prosecution's case or plans to appeal the verdict.

The plot, according to which "unidentified individuals" force teenagers or young adults to film arson and then send them to the "customer," is found in a number of similar criminal cases. Similar wording suggests that investigators have found a simple way to prove the crimes, as Roman Melnichenko, a candidate of legal sciences, previously noted.

* are included in the Russian register of foreign agents.

** The activities of Meta (owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) are banned in Russia.