Russian soldier's wife who urged her husband to rape Ukrainian women is convicted in Ukraine

Olga Bykovskaya, a Russian citizen who urged her husband, a Russian soldier, to rape Ukrainian women, has been convicted in absentia of violating the laws and customs of war and sentenced to five years in prison by the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv.

Source: Skhemy, a Radio Liberty project

Details: The judgment, the text of which has been seen by Skhemy, was handed down by the court on 24 March 2025.

In April 2022, the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) released audio of an intercepted conversation between a Russian soldier and his wife. The woman gave her husband permission to rape Ukrainian women as long as he "uses protection".

Journalists from the Ukrainian and Russian services of Radio Liberty identified the couple as Olga and Roman Bykovsky, who live in Feodosia, occupied Crimea.

The Russian woman was served with a notice of suspicion of violating the laws and customs of war and put on the international wanted list. Ukrainian law enforcement officers completed the investigation and filed an indictment against Olga Bykovskaya (née Pinyasova) with the court in December 2022.

The court has now sentenced her to five years' imprisonment starting from the date of her arrest. Bykovskaya is currently on the international wanted list. She is also required to compensate the Ukrainian state for more than UAH 15,000 (approx. US$362) in legal costs, including a forensic linguistic, semantic and textual examination and an examination of the sound recording of the Bykovskys' voices.

The court also considered the video version of the Skhemy investigation and the conversations between the journalists and the Bykovskys which formed the basis of the criminal proceedings.

The verdict will become effective upon the expiry of the time limit for filing an appeal. The investigation was conducted by the SSU’s Main Investigation Department under the supervision of the Prosecutor General's Office.

Paratrooper Roman Bykovsky took part in Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He and his wife are from Russia’s Oryol Oblast.

In a conversation with Radio Liberty journalists, Bykovsky claimed that the voice in the SSU recording was not his. However, his voice is the same as the one in the law enforcement officers’ recordings. Olga Bykovskaya's voice is also a perfect match for the voice in the audio recording publicised by the SSU.

Olga told the journalists that her husband was in Sevastopol receiving hospital treatment after being wounded. She said she did not know exactly where he was.

After that, Bykovskaya cut the conversation short and declined subsequent calls. Neither Roman Bykovsky nor his wife responded to messages on social media.

After the conversation, Olga deleted her account on Vkontakte, a popular Russian social media site.

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