A 45-year-old woman in New York is accused of attempting to kill her doppelganger with poisoned cheesecake. Why’d she do it? It was all in an effort to steal her identity!
Russian Woman Accused of Poisoning Lookalike Woman
Russian-born Viktoria Nasyrova, 45, simply smiled and shrugged off the accusations as she appeared at the Queen’s Supreme Court in connection with an attempted murder. Nasyrova stands accused of poisoning another woman with a tainted slice of cheesecake as part of an identity theft plot.
The calculated plot involved targeting her lookalike friend, Olga Tsvyk. Nasyrova went to Tsvyk’s home in Queens, claiming she needed her services as an eyelash technician. Tsvyk thought it was just going to be a quick touch-up lash appointment. Nasyrova had other plans.
Nasyrova arrived with cheesecake to share with her friend – and it was laced with poison. Prosecutors say the cheesecake was tainted with phenazepam, a Russian tranquilizer.
Tsvyk began feeling ill about twenty minutes after eating the cheesecake.
“I started to look to lie down on the bed,” Tsvyk told the jury. “I started to look for a pillow. I was realizing that I was losing consciousness and I said to her, ‘Vika, I’m feeling really bad.’ I started feeling very nauseous. I wanted to vomit. I started to vomit right by my bed onto the floor.”
Nasyrova took this time to steal Tsvyk’s cash, passport, and employment authorization card that showed proof of her legal status in the U.S. She then took the time to stage the scene to make it look like Tsvyk had attempted to take her own life.
“Everything was done in this case very carefully and very methodically by this defendant,” Assistant District Attorney Konstantinos Litourgis told the jury. “Not only did she poison Olga in order to impersonate her… she also staged her bedroom to make it look like suicide.”
If convicted, she could face up to 25 years of prison time.
Viktoria Nasyrova’s Sordid Past
This isn’t the first time Nasyrova has done something like this, either. Nasyrova fled Russia several years back to avoid a criminal investigation. She is wanted in Russia in the brutal 2014 murder of her 54-year-old neighbor. A private detective hired by that woman’s daughter finally tracked Nasyrova down, which may have sparked her attempted identity theft plot.
On top of that, NYPD wanted her for alleged “seduction robberies.” She would meet men through dating sites and then drug them so that she could rob them.
