Two Armenians died during a shooting in a car service center located in Shlisselburg town of Russia’s Leningrad Oblast. Three others suffered gunshot wounds.

The investigation revealed that the incident took place on 31 January 2016, the shots having been fired at about 8:00 pm. Before this, a black Mercedes with “criminal” license plate numbers including the figures 444 approached the car service center.  Five people of Caucasian appearance got out of the car.

“The visitors fired at those present at the center. One was killed instantly,” a witness said. The people in the center were also armed. They shot back from non-lethal weapons. Consequently, one of the instigators of the shooting remained lying on the concrete.   

While the police were combing the crime scene, the dark Mercedes brought a young man with a head wound to a district hospital. His friends absconded as soon as the patient was put on a wheelchair and taken to the intensive care unit.

Another man with a gunshot wound was taken to the accident & emergency department (A&E).  The identities of those killed were ascertained by then: All the victims turned out to be Armenians.

“One of the killed is Hrayr Vardanyan, born in 1956, who had a residence permit in Russia. The other is the resident of Pushkin, Armen Khurshudyan, born in 1971. As it was found out, they both had ties with business, and were on different sides of the conflict,” the law enforcement authorities said.

Vakhtang Sargsyan, 26, still remains in the intensive care unit, but no threat poses to his life. Another 50-year-old man with a gunshot wound to his head, and who had an Armenian surname, sought medical assistance in Alexandrovsky Hospital in St. Petersburg.

About ten people are supposed to have taken part in the shooting.

All the victims of the shooting have been impounded by the police, NEWSru.com reports.