With tears in her dark-black eyes  Anahit, a 17 year-old girl who’s matured in the span of a mere few days from  pain and suffering, is trying to recall how she lost her mother two weeks ago.

"I was asleep, but I woke up at 4am because my mother was screaming. My sister Arpine was still asleep. I hurried to the dinning-room to find the door locked and Valodya hitting my mom. Mom was shouting for me to open the door. I ran to the kitchen, picked-up a spoon and opened the door easily. I entered the room and saw him hitting my mom with a vase," Anahit recounts. "I tried to take mom away, but he again started hitting her. Then he brought mom to the kitchen by dragging her on the floor. That’s when he began to stab her with the knife. We were calling for help and pleading for him to stop. But he wouldn’t listen to us.  He was killing our mom   in front of our eyes."

The step-father, 51 year-old Valodya Muradyan, killed his wife, 35 year-old Dianna Nahapetyan, in the presence of her daughters on December 4.

One of the sisters, 14 years-old Arpine, hasn’t spoken at all after the incident. Dianna’s mother 58 year-old Valya Nahapetyan says the girls are stressed-out, having witnessed the violence against their mother.

Unsuccessfully trying to save their mother, the sisters run out of the house and try to find help by knocking the neighbors’ doors.  But no one answers. Barefoot, the children go to the police station.  When the girls were trying to get out of the house, the step-father manages to cut Anahit's leg with the knife.

''Luckily, the girls managed to get out, or else he would have killed them as well. What could I"- told Dianna's mother.

The murderer managed to lock the house door and escape before the police came. The next day he showed up at the Shengavit police station and confessed he had killed his wife. The Criminal Investigation Department of the Ararat Provincial Police launched a murder criminal case.

Dianna's family house is in the Armash village of Ararat.  The girls moved there to live.

Dianna's mother Valya said she had three girls, the youngest of which died at the age of 14 from stroke. The other sister is married and lives in the US. Dianna married for the first time at the age of 17. The first husband was also from Armash. During ten years of married life she had two daughters. Later she got divorced.

In 2006, Dianna met Valodya Muradyan, who had left his family in the US and returned to Armenia. He was a relative of Dianna's sister's husband. Dianna’s mother says they didn't approve of her relationship with Valodya but they couldn’t force her out of it.

Valya Nahapetyan with the portrait of Dianna

"I struggled a lot to split them up. I even sent her to Sochi to live with my brother, but Valodya found her there as well. Before that, they lived in Hrazdan. He was always in some kind of strange deals. He borrowed money from some people and they took and kept him in Vardenis. Dianna found money and brought him back,",- recounts Valya Nahapetyan, Dianna’s mother.

Valya says that her daughter’s relationship with Valodya proved to be fatal for Dianna as she paid with her life.

Dianna, with her husband, daughters and mother lived in Abkhazia for awhile.   Valodya bought and sold cars there.   He was under the “protection” of one of local authorities. When that protection dried up, some unknown people took the cars from him.

"He took $60,000 from different people promising to bring back cars for them. They hardly managed to escape from Abkhazia to Russia, or else he would be killed. Then he left for Mexico to cross over the border into the US, but he was sent back on the same plane because he lacked an entrance visa,"- says Valya. “It took his mother some time to get his papers in order and take him to the US.''

Even from halfway around the world, Valodya kept pestering Dianna with telephone calls and promises of love.

"He called and told her that he was coming. Dianna told him to at least buy a house for them to live in when he arrived. He sent the money and Dianna bought an old house in Ararat. I have to give him that much. She suffered a lot renovating the place.  He came and they started to live together. He had brought cars with him and was busy selling them,"- the mother recalls.

But the fights between the spouses continued; they were quarreling every day.

"He wouldn’t let my mother live peacefully as he was jealous. Even if somebody looked at her in the street he’d start quarreling. My mom was young and very beautiful. He would check her cell phone, calling her bad names. Two days before the incident my mom threw him out of the house. He returned one day,"- says Anahit. “That day, they again quarreled but he got down on his knees and apologized to y mother.   My mom was the understanding type.... I have made a video with my i-pad showing how he pushed and insulted her. I always told her to be careful, since he might hurt her.  I don't think he loved her. Would he kill her, if he loved her?

Neighbors describe Dianna as a proud person would didn’t socialize that much. They say she always dressed fashionably modern and drove a foreign car.

''She was a beautiful woman but they generally kept to themselves. They were always quarreling,"- the neighbors say.

Valya Nahapetyan learnt about her daughter’s death in the US. She says she had talked to her two days before the tragic incident

''I kept telling him to leave her, to get a divorce if it was impossible to live together.  It's 21st century after all. I told him that I’d take care of my grandchildren. The he goes on Shant TV and brazenly states that he loved Dianna. I told the investigator that, in a fit of anger, it’s   possible to slap your beloved wife. But he stabbed her 25 times with a knife. Then he stabbed her in the throat to make sure she was dead.  He knowingly tortured her to death. My children seem to have gone crazy,"- says a teary-eyed Valya.

Mother is suffocating from the anguish of her daughter’s cruel death.

Anahit says, ''They applied make-up to mother's face, but it was still black. She was so beautiful, but at that time she looked 15 years older.

Valya Nahapetyan, Dianna’s mother, will act as her legal successor. She is going to hire a lawyer. The Rapid Response Unit will support Valya in the case.  Valya says she will sue Shant TV for covering the murder in such a one-sided fashion.  

"They had no moral right to broadcast such material. Fine Dianna has died and gone. She won’t see any of this, but what about these children? They are interviewing the murderer, the neighbors, but what about me? Why won't they ask me?'', - tells Valya Nahapetyan.

P.S. If you have witnessed a case of domestic violence please alert the Rapid Response Unit at http://rru.swv.am/.

Gayane Mkrtchyan

SWV Rapid Response Unit

Top Photo: Dianna's mom, Valya Nahapetyan, and daughter Anahit