Grandmother strangles and stabs her grandchildren to death ‘because they were possessed by demons’

An investigator who was not named said both the adults “saw demons in the children”.

After the attack, Muradyan called for help from a neighbour’s son, a doctor.

The doctor said that when he arrived the boy was already dead and the girl was wheezing. He called an ambulance and the police, but the girl later died in hospital.

The grandmother was ruled to be “sane” and was sentenced by a Russian court to 16 years in jail. According to Mirror, the judge found that the grandmother’s lover – named only as Yury – was unaware of his actions during the murder due to a “temporary mental disorder” brought on by “alcoholism”. This condition “deprived him of the ability to recognise the danger of his actions and to control them”, said a court statement.

The grandmother’s lover was sentenced to compulsory psychiatric treatment.

The children’s “distraught” parents Natalia and Alexander split up after the murder of their son and daughter in January last year, said reports.