Russian Major General Killed in Ukraine

A Russian general, whose brigade has been accused of torturing and killing a Texan fighter for the Kremlin, Russell Bentley, has died in Ukraine, according to several reports.

Major General Pavel Klimenko commanded the Fifth Separate Motor Rifle Brigade in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic.

Klimenko, 47, has been reported dead by several Russian military bloggers, including Vazhnye Istorii (Important Stories), a Russian investigative journalism platform, which said Klimenko’s sisters had confirmed his death on social media.

According to U.S.-funded media outlet Radio Free Europe, he died on Thursday. One of his sisters also confirmed the death to ASTRA, an independent Russia-Ukraine war reporting Telegram channel.

It is not clear how Klimenko died. Newsweek has contacted the Russian Defense Ministry for comment.

Klimenko, who was originally from Stavropol, Russia, served in annexed Crimea before the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022—he was promoted to major general in May this year.

Klimenko is believed to have been one of the commanders who allegedly set up what ASTRA has previously called a “concentration camp” on top of an abandoned Petrovskaya mine in Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine.

It was there that Bentley is believed to have been tortured and eventually killed in April. According to ASTRA’s investigation, it is also where Russian soldiers were tortured into giving up their salaries and payments for injuries, with some intentionally wounded to claim these funds.

Bentley, 64, died as a result of electric current torture, a friend of Bentley’s wife, Lyudmila Bentley, said in September.

An investigation by the Russian Investigative Committee into the circumstances of his death found that he was allegedly tortured and killed at the Petrovskaya mine by members of the Fifth Brigade, reported Astra Press, an independent Russian media outlet.

The Russian Investigative Committee accused Vitaly Vansyatsky, Vladislav Agaltsev, Vladimir Bazhin and Andrei Iordanov, members of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, of torturing and killing Bentley as a group through negligence, an action reportedly beyond their authority, Rg.Ru reported in September.

It was alleged that Vansyatsky and Agaltsev blew up Bentley’s remains in a VAZ 2115 car using a TNT block, and Bazhin, another service member from the military unit, reportedly moved his remains to another location

Bentley wrote blogs and recorded vlogs of the war for his YouTube channel. He joined the Russian forces in 2014, as Newsweek previously reported. “The Donbas Cowboy,” as Bentley called himself, was an arborist in Austin, Texas, before joining the Russian troops. He later married a Russian woman and acquired Russian citizenship.

Bentley told Newsweek in 2022: “If I told all the times that I came within seconds or inches of death, first of all, we’d be here all night, and second of all, you wouldn’t even believe me.”

“I can tell you that I’m the luckiest dude that I’ve ever known. I believe in guardian angels because of how lucky I’ve been here,” he added.

Vazhnye Istorii has reported that Klimenko’s death brings the number of Russian general casualties to 13, though Russian authorities have only confirmed eight.