Kazakh stalker sentenced to life in prison for killing student
A court in Shymkent, Kazakhstan, has sentenced 28-year-old Sherkhan Aimakhan to life in prison for the murder of 21-year-old Nuray Serikbay. The court found him guilty of forced marriage, stalking, and murder with extreme cruelty.
Sherkhan Aimakhan, 28, was sentenced to life in prison in the city of Shymkent, Kazakhstan, for the murder of 21-year-old student Nuray Serikbay. According to the decision of the criminal court, Aimakhan was found guilty under three articles of the Criminal Code of Kazakhstan: Article 125-1 ("Forced marriage"), Article 115-1 ("Stalking") and Article 99, Part 2, Clause 5 ("Extremely cruel murder").
According to the court's verdict, Aimakhan must pay 25 million tenge (about $54,000) in moral damage and 5 million tenge (about $11,000) in material damage to the victims.
Nuray Serikbay was killed on the evening of January 11, 2024 near her home in Shymkent. The suspect, Sherkhan Aimakhan, was arrested two days later, about 10 kilometers from the city.
According to media reports, Aimakhan had previously proposed to Nuray, but she refused. After that, he kidnapped the girl. Nuray's relatives returned her home and contacted the police, but no criminal case was initiated on their application. Relatives claim that Aimakhan had been stalking Nuray for a long time.
According to the investigation, on the day of the murder, Aimakhan stabbed the girl 35 times, and Nuray died at the scene.
This murder caused a huge public outcry. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev ordered an investigation into the actions of the Shymkent police. As a result, the head of the city police department and his first deputy were dismissed from their posts, and an investigation was launched against a number of police officers for neglect of duty.
In February, the investigation reclassified the charge to the crime of "murder with extreme cruelty." A forensic psychiatric examination conducted on April 30 found Aimakhan sane.
Aimakhan pleaded not guilty. During the trial, he claimed that Nuray stabbed him first on the day of the tragedy, and then, due to his state of affect, he could not remember the subsequent events. However, judge Samiddin Temiraliyev noted that there were contradictions between this version and the defendant's testimony during the preliminary investigation.