Viktoriya Nasyrova

Summary

Podcast Summary: Snapped: Women Who Murder – Viktoriya Nasyrova

Host: Oxygen
Episode Date: June 21, 2026

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Episode Overview

This gripping episode of "Snapped: Women Who Murder" delves into the truly bizarre and chilling case of Viktoriya Nasyrova, a Russian immigrant turned fugitive whose crimes span continents—culminating in her attempted murder of a Queens lash technician in order to steal her identity. With stranger-than-fiction twists, the episode peels back layers of deception, attempted homicide, identity theft, a cross-continental manhunt, and a shocking courtroom drama that transfixed New York City and drew global media attention.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Case Begins: Olga’s Near-Fatal Ordeal

• Mysterious Attack (01:15–05:40):

  • In August 2016, Olga Svick is found barely conscious in her Queens apartment—comatose, in lingerie, scattered pills, and the room’s heat cranked to 80+ degrees.
  • Quote: “There were pills laying around. She staged the scene to make it look like it was a suicide.” – Herman Weisberg [01:46]
  • Medical tests reveal no toxins; police initially suspect a suicide attempt.

• Olga’s Background and Recovery (07:17–10:20):

  • Olga, an immigrant from Ukraine, describes seeking a new life in NYC amid the conflict at home.
  • She recalls returning from the hospital, still impaired, unable to remember key details.
  • Valuables, passport, and work authorization are missing, reported by her sister Irina.

2. A Web of Victims Emerges

• Revelations and Connection (13:03–23:43):

  • Olga recovers fragments of memory: the last visitor was her client, “Victoria,” who insisted on a house call and brought cheesecake.
  • Shortly after eating the cheesecake, Olga becomes violently ill.
  • A friend links Olga to another possible victim, Ruben Borukov, who was similarly drugged by a woman named “Anna.”

• Ruben’s Story (23:58–29:35):

  • Ruben describes meeting “Anna” on a dating app, being poisoned after eating food she prepared, and waking up in the hospital with valuables missing.
  • Surveillance shows Anna/“Victoria” robbing his store after dropping off his unconscious body.
  • Medical symptoms in both victims are identical: disorientation, memory loss, yet no toxins detected in hospital tests.

3. The Pattern: A Serial ‘Russian Roofie’ Predator

• Widening Investigation (29:53–37:16):

  • Detectives realize multiple men have reported being drugged and robbed in similar circumstances, often after meeting a woman via dating apps—varying her name and cover story.
  • A “dominatrix” angle emerges: “One of the things that she offered was to come and perform for them sort of BDSM activities...” – Police Officer [33:45].

• Breakthrough: Viktoriya Nasyrova Identified (35:13–38:05):

  • Detectives trace the suspect’s real identity: Viktoriya Nasyrova.
  • She is a Russian national on a visa, with an Interpol ‘red notice’ for murder—wanted for killing Alla Alexenko in Russia.

4. From Russia with Murder: The Case of Alla Alexenko

• Nadia Ford’s Hunt for Truth (38:25–47:04):

  • Alla’s daughter, Nadia, details her mother’s friendship with Viktoriya in Russia and her suspicious disappearance after selling property for $50,000.
  • Stunning detective work: Nadia traces traffic cameras and phone data, leading to the discovery of her mother’s burned remains—identified via dental records.

• Escape and Extradition Challenges (47:04–50:49):

  • Viktoriya escapes Russia, aided by connections within law enforcement, and resurfaces in Brooklyn, living under variants of her real name.

5. The Search in New York

• Private Investigators Step In (52:02–56:22):
  • PI Herman Weisberg uses “digital breadcrumbs,” social media, and sharp observation (identifying a car model from sunglass reflections) to help locate Viktoriya.
  • Surveillance tracks her and, coordinated with NYPD, leads to her arrest in March 2016.

6. Evidence, Motive, and Trial Preparations

• Building the Case (59:23–62:22):

  • Multiple victims identify Viktoriya in police lineups.

  • Evidence discovered in her boyfriend’s apartment includes Olga’s stolen jewelry, Ukrainian passport, and documents—indicating an intent to assume Olga’s identity.

  • Quote: “They’re not 100% twins, but they can be mistaken for each other. I believe she was trying to change her identity to be Olga to hide who she actually was.” – NYPD Investigator [62:22]

• The ‘Cheesecake Murder’ Plot (63:10–64:02):

  • Police believe Viktoriya meant to kill Olga, stage a suicide, and use her papers to evade Russian charges.

7. The Media Circus and Viktoriya’s Defense

• Headline Sensation (64:32–69:08):

  • The case draws tabloid frenzy: exotic poisons, stolen identity, dominatrix exploits, and an international fugitive.

  • Viktoriya claims innocence, framing herself as a victim of Russian conspiracies.

  • Quote: “She’s a pathological liar, you know, she always makes some new fairy tale.” – Olga Svick [68:57]

8. Forensics Win the Day: The ‘Russian Roofie’

• Phenazepam Discovery (71:02–73:17):

  • Homeland Security testing on the cheesecake container reveals phenazepam—a rare, Russian benzodiazepine (dubbed “Russian roofie” locally), which matches all victims’ symptoms and explains why standard tox screens were negative.
  • Viktoriya’s DNA is a match for the cheesecake container.

• Quote: “Victoria’s mouth was swabbed, and there was a comparison done between the results of that mouth swab and the results of the DNA on the cheesecake.” – NYPD Detective [73:38]

9. Legal Complications and Sentencing

• Trials and Tribulations (75:03–81:13):

  • Many of the male victims decline to testify, causing lesser robbery charges to be downgraded; Viktoriya receives minimal jail time for those counts.
  • The attempted murder case of Olga moves forward but is delayed for years due to COVID.
  • In 2023, the sensational trial begins; Olga and Ruben testify.

• Verdict and Outburst (81:13–81:49):

  • Viktoriya is convicted on multiple counts including attempted murder and sentenced to 21 years. She explodes in court, cursing the judge.

10. Impact and Reflection

• Closure and Lingering Pain (82:20–end):
  • While Olga and Nadia find some closure, Nadia awaits justice for her mother’s murder in Russia; extradition proceedings loom for Viktoriya once her U.S. sentence concludes.
  • Olga reflects on her trauma and healing:
    • Quote: “I forgive her for just for myself... I want to live my life and enjoy without thinking of her.” [83:36]

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Memorable Moments & Notable Quotes

• On the crime scene:
  “You have this beautiful woman just basically comatose in lingerie. It almost looks like if you picture what a soap opera scene would look like...” – Police Officer [05:19]

• On Viktoriya’s strategy:
  “She needed to do all of this so that she could never go back to Russia.” – NYPD Detective [80:41]

• On the verdict:
  “Victoria Nasarova was convicted of attempted murder in second degree... The jury took only an hour and a half.” – NYPD Detective [81:18]

• On the bizarre nature of the case:
  “It’s as bizarre a case as you’ll ever see. It’ll be unlikely that we’ll ever see another murder or attempted murder with a piece of cheesecake.” – NYPD Detective [81:55]

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Important Timestamps

• [01:15–05:40] – Olga’s attack and initial investigation
• [13:03–23:43] – Olga connects with another victim, Ruben
• [35:13–38:05] – Identifying Viktoriya, Interpol warrant revealed
• [38:25–47:04] – Alla Alexenko’s murder and Nadia’s investigation
• [52:02–56:22] – PI Weisberg’s sleuthing and tracking Viktoriya
• [59:23–62:22] – Evidence of stolen identity and preparation for prosecution
• [71:02–73:17] – Discovery of phenazepam in the cheesecake
• [77:41–81:13] – The 2023 trial and verdict
• [82:20–83:36] – Aftermath and reflections

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Tone & Language

The episode maintains a fast-paced, suspenseful, and at times incredulous tone, matching both the tabloid appeal and horrifying reality of the crimes. Direct, often emotionally charged quotations from victims, law enforcement, and private investigators keep the narrative raw, while expert commentary grounds the wildest details in hard forensic and legal realities.

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For Further Listening

This is a must-listen for true crime fans drawn to intricate international cases, forensic sleuthing, and stories where the truth is stranger than fiction. The episode offers a rare look at how global fugitives can blend into immigrant enclaves—and how dogged survivors and cross-disciplinary sleuthing can bring them to justice.

Transcript

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[Narrator]

It takes a lot to surprise the seasoned police of the NYPD, but in 2016, a perplexing case leaves New York City detectives and the city itself in utter shock.

[Police Officer]

The media coverage for this case was off the charts. People were obsessed.

[NYPD Detective]

It's as bizarre a case as you'll ever see.

[Police Officer]

You have this beautiful woman just basically comatose in lingerie.

[Herman Weisberg]

There were pills laying around. She staged the scene to make it look like it was a suicide.

[Narrator]

As police delve in, the evidence quickly leads to more mysteries than answers.

[Police Officer]

The last thing she remembered was someone brought her pieces of cheesecake.

[Narrator]

And investigators uncover a disturbing pattern.

[Ruben Borukov]

She prepared fish and I took two bites. That's all I remember.

[NYPD Detective]

The tox screen comes back as negative. It doesn't pick up on any toxin.

[Narrator]

But a new challenge surfaces when investigators flood find their suspect, a notorious international seductress who's been targeting victims in at least two countries.

[Police Officer]

It wasn't just a poisoning. It was a stolen identity. There was a dominatrix aspect.

[NYPD Detective]

We found out that the person who committed this crime was wanted for murder

[Private Investigator]

and at that point she got some fake documents and tried to blackmail her

[Narrator]

into working for them to locate their killer. Multiple investigations unite.

[NYPD Investigator]

She was trying to change her identity to hide who she actually was.

[Private Investigator]

She said the Russian government tried to

[NYPD Detective]

blackmail her she needed to do all of this so that she could never go back to Russia.

[Narrator]

New York City is home to immigrants from every corner of the world, including several large Russian speaking communities.

[Private Investigator]

Russian community in Brooklyn, I mean, it's very large and very varied. The majority of the people that live there are just regular people. You know, they work, they do their best, have a good life, you know, live the American dream. Automatically there's this like, you know, kinship, I guess, because you're from the same place.

[Narrator]

On August 29, 2016, one of these neighborhoods becomes the scene of an unusual emergency.

[Police Officer]

911 gets a panicked phone call that there is an unconscious woman at her home in Queens.

[Narrator]

On the line, a panicked landlord explains he found his tenant, 35 year old Olga Svick, in dire condition.

[Police Officer]

First responders rush to the scene, assess the scene. Everything looks a little off.

[NYPD Detective]

She's found in her bedroom in really rough shape. She's not responsive. She's really not moving. She's pale white.

[Narrator]

The landlord tells paramedics after not seeing Olga for two days, he checked on her and found her completely out of it.

[Medical Examiner]

This was quite bad. Her landlord sees pills all over the room. The heat was up extensively.

[NYPD Detective]

They look around and they draw the only conclusion that this is probably a troubled woman. She killed herself.

[Medical Examiner]

Not a lot of people who commit suicide through pills, throw the pills all over the room. Doesn't make sense. The fact that the heat was on extremely high. It was some 80 some plus degrees in the room. That was odd too.

[Police Officer]

You have this beautiful woman just basically comatose in lingerie. It almost looks like if you picture what a soap opera scene would look like if you staged a dramatic end of life scene.

[Narrator]

First responders immediately rush Olga to the hospital. Thankfully, emergency room doctors are able to see, stabilize her.

[NYPD Investigator]

Olga was extremely lucky that she had somebody come down and check on her. She was extremely close to death and could have been dead within the next hour.

[NYPD Detective]

Olga displays weakness, fatigue, memory loss, disorientation. So they do a physical exam, try to figure out what's going on. One of the diagnostic tools that they use in the hospital is a urine screen. The test tries to figure out whether or not there's an amount of toxin within a particular range.

[Narrator]

The test should reveal what kind of pills are in Olga's system, but the results are unexpected.

[NYPD Detective]

Her tox screen comes back as negative. It doesn't pick up on any toxin.

[Police Officer]

When nothing was raised in these test results, that was really curious.

[Narrator]

When medical staff approach Olga with questions about what happened, she doesn't seem to remember anything, but insists this was no suicide attempt.

[Medical Examiner]

So the doctors at the hospital, when they do their review, they're thinking at the time, what's going on? We don't know anything about Olga. Is her story true? Does it make sense? The big question at that point is why? Number one, and where's my evidence?

[Olga Svick]

Olga, take one.

[Narrator]

Mark.

[Olga Svick]

My first name Olga, last name is Zvik, T, S, V Y K. I was born in Ukraine, in Vinnica. I used to work as a travel agent. So I used to travel a lot. And when in my country in 2014, we have a war starting. I decided to just change something in my life and I decided to try myself in United States.

[Narrator]

Olga sought out friends in New York City who helped her find a residence.

[NYPD Detective]

Olga was living in a single family home that was owned by a gentleman who lived on the ground floor.

[Olga Svick]

He live on the first floor. He's old, like 86 years old. And you were like my family. I call him my American uncle.

[Police Officer]

She lived in a sweet little neighborhood of Queens, got along and knew her neighbors really well.

[Narrator]

She also found a new career in cosmetology.

[Olga Svick]

I was excited to try something new. I started working as a blush technician. It was like my hobby before, but here it was my main job. It was a good situation for me to work around people who talks English and with the Russian community people. So yeah, it was really good.

[Police Officer]

She really made a life for herself out here. And it by all accounts seemed that things were going really well.

[Narrator]

Now, just two years into her American dream, Olga has narrowly survived a harrowing near death experience. Medical staff are trying to determine what happened to her. But with Olga still having no memory of it, doctors find themselves at a dead end.

[Police Officer]

The urinalysis and the blood tests come up empty. They don't have a lead to really go on.

[NYPD Detective]

What the hospital has is someone with an altered mental status who displays weakness, fatigue, memory loss, disorientation, but clinically and diagnostically doesn't show that anything has happened to them. So they provided Olga with fluids, they monitored her, and when her condition improved to a point, they discharged her.

[Olga Svick]

I remember when I got home from the hospital and also not all pictures, just some, some short moments.

[Narrator]

When friends check on Olga a few days later, their concerns grow.

[NYPD Detective]

She was well enough to be discharged, but she's not well yet. She can't really talk that well. She can't really walk that well. She's certainly not herself. Her friend had called Olga's sister Irina and notifies Irina that Olga's really not doing well,

[Olga Svick]

when my sister got call from my friend and she realized that something wrong with me, something not good, and she catch the first flight to New York.

[Narrator]

When irina arrives on August 30 and sees Olga's apartment, she's left with a sinking feeling.

[Olga Svick]

She find the pills around me, around my bed.

[NYPD Detective]

Irina looks in the few areas that she knows Olga keeps her valuables.

[Medical Examiner]

The passport, the working papers, money, jewelry. All these things are missing from her house. And she notices almost immediately.

[NYPD Detective]

Irina goes to the precinct and says to the police, somebody stolen my sister's property. So Irina is reporting a larceny.

[Narrator]

Police open an investigation and visit Olga's house the next day. Upon arrival, Olga's sister Irina fills officers in on Olga's str, stating that her sister's missing property is just the beginning of her concerns.

[Medical Examiner]

Her sister Irina told us there were pills all over the room. That was odd.

[Olga Svick]

They think I took a pill and tried to poison myself. But she knew me. She knows that. She knew that I'm never going to do that.

[Narrator]

Irina leads officers to speak with Olga, whose gradual recovery has helped her regain foggy memories.

[Olga Svick]

I remember first when my sister came into my room with the detectives. They asked me the question, and some of them I don't remember.

[Medical Examiner]

When Irina started talking to her, she was getting more and more information before

[Police Officer]

she got really ill. The last thing she remembered was someone coming over. A client of hers, Victoria.

[Olga Svick]

She came to me every two, three weeks. She come all the way from the Brooklyn to Queens.

[Police Officer]

Victoria tells Olga that she's going to Mexico in a few days or in a day, and she absolutely needs to have her lashes fixed. She knew that she wasn't working that day. Please, please, please, please could she come to her apartment to get this fixed? Olga says yes.

[Olga Svick]

It was Sunday. It was my day off. Usually I don't take my client at home. I didn't listen my intuition and I say, okay, just come and I'm going to do it for you.

[Police Officer]

She was the last person who saw her before she got really ill. At

[NYPD Detective]

this point, the police are starting to say we need to find Victoria.

[Narrator]

Coming up, Olga continues to recount her brush with death.

[Olga Svick]

She opened the box in front of me like this. I eat just for politeness.

[Medical Examiner]

This particular criminal, she's in the wind.

[Narrator]

As police struggle to piece together what happened, more victims surface.

[NYPD Detective]

He didn't even exactly know how he ended up in the hospital.

[Ruben Borukov]

I never thought about she's going to drug me.

[Medical Examiner]

We put that out to other squads so they know they're on the lookout for this person.

[Narrator]

With Olga's memories starting to surface, detectives have her walk them through what happened, Starting with more details about the last person she remembers seeing. Her client, Victoria.

[Olga Svick]

She was my client, I believe, more than six months. She was very open. She tells me that she had beauty salon in Moscow. So, like, she represents herself like she's successful businesswoman.

[Narrator]

Victoria had become such a regular that when she asked for an emergency touch up, Olga agreed.

[Police Officer]

As a thank you for doing this solid favor on your day off, Victoria brought her pieces of cheesecake from a very famous bakery in Brooklyn.

[Narrator]

Olga says Victoria's behavior seemed off.

[Olga Svick]

We come up to my room, and she said, you can't understand how tasty this cake. She opened the box in front of me like this, you know, and she pick one, and she ate. It was like, very fast. And she picked another one. And she left me just one piece. And I say, okay, okay. Maybe she's, like, hungry. I don't know. I eat not because I was hungry or something, you know, just for politeness.

[Narrator]

Within a few minutes, Olga began to feel sick.

[Olga Svick]

I just trying to find my bed to lying down. And I tell her, oh, my God, Victoria, something wrong?

[Police Officer]

You know, she started feeling weird, woozy, sick to her stomach, nauseous. She threw up off the side of the bed.

[Olga Svick]

And she tells me, oh, don't worry, I'm gonna clean everything. I just remember that she came to my room with the paper towels, so. And that's it.

[Narrator]

When Olga's sister Irina told her she'd been robbed, she suspected Victoria was the culprit.

[Olga Svick]

I don't have my passport. I don't have my work authorization. My money she left in my wallet. Just $17. That's it. I realized she even took my perfumes, you know?

[Narrator]

She also believes Victoria drugged her as an attempt to cover her tracks.

[Olga Svick]

Victoria, she is preparing, like, to look me like suicide, you know, like I poisoned myself.

[Medical Examiner]

It was thought that this was a staged crime scene because she's very adamant in the fact that she was drugged.

[Narrator]

Investigators discover one piece of evidence they hope could validate Olga's story.

[Police Officer]

Inside of the trash can at Olga's house, detectives find a container with the cheesecake crumbs still in it. Immediately, this container is bagged and tagged as evidence, and it is sent in for testing.

[Medical Examiner]

We have the wrapper, we have part of the cheesecake. We test it, and we get nothing.

[NYPD Detective]

That means there is no known band control substance that we can pick up in this box. There was also a DNA test that was run on it and the DNA came back initially as belonging to a female who's not Olga Zwick.

[Narrator]

Detectives assume the DNA belongs to Victoria, but without a last name, police can't even confirm Victoria is her real name.

[Police Officer]

The issue was Victoria and Olga was always met at the salon. This was the first time they met outside at her apartment. And Olga had no idea where she lived and cops couldn't find an address.

[NYPD Detective]

We have a phone number for her, but she doesn't answer it.

[Police Officer]

This person doesn't seem to exist.

[NYPD Detective]

That's not a lot to go on. So at that point it's simply being investigated as a larceny and it's an open larceny.

[Olga Svick]

I tell them everything what happened, but I feel like they just don't believe me. They don't trust. I think maybe they think I do drugs, maybe I overdosed something, you know.

[Narrator]

Olga and her sister try to put the ordeal behind them. But a few days later, Olga receives a message from an encrypted phone number.

[Olga Svick]

I saw the text message, it was Victoria. She asked me, olga, where are you? I can reach you. What happened is that. And I didn't answer.

[Narrator]

Moments later, her phone rings.

[Olga Svick]

She called me and I pick up the phone and she asked me, olga, what happened to you? I can reach you. I say, victoria, you stolen a lot of stuff from me. You poisoned me. And you know what her answer was? She tells me, okay, so go to police.

[Narrator]

To Olga, the message is clear.

[Olga Svick]

I was scared because I feel like she wants to get down. What she doesn't finish, I realized that she really wants to kill me.

[Narrator]

It's been one week since Olga Svick was released from the hospital due to a mysterious illness. She believes one of her clients, Victoria, is the one responsible. After confronting her possible attacker over the phone, Olga comes away shaken.

[Olga Svick]

So I was always like scared, always look around, you know, My friends, they always drive me to my house and they always waiting for me to watch how I get in door to the house.

[Narrator]

With the NYPD unable to pursue her case, Olga tries her best to move forward.

[NYPD Detective]

Olga stayed out of work for about a week or two weeks, maybe more, and she ultimately returned to work sometime in mid to late September.

[Olga Svick]

When I start working, it was very difficult for me. I start to take clients, like one per day, you know, One of her

[NYPD Detective]

regular customers asked her why she had been out. And when Olga said, I was sick and I didn't feel well, the customer asked some follow up questions.

[Olga Svick]

They say, I just don't want to talk about it. I, I tell just I get sick, you know, and they say, somebody's poisoned me.

[Narrator]

Her customer's reaction to the news is unexpected.

[NYPD Detective]

This customer said to Olga, I can't believe you're saying this to me, because I happen to know somebody who, over the summer, went out on a date with a woman, had dinner with her, ate food, became very sick, and went to the hospital.

[Olga Svick]

She tells me, maybe this is the same person. After work, she texts me, olga, can I give you a number? His name is Ruben.

[NYPD Detective]

Shortly thereafter, Olga calls Ruben. Olga relays her story to Ruben exactly how it happened, and says to him, the person that poisoned me was this woman, Victoria. Ruben says to her, I don't know any Victoria. The person that poisoned me was a woman named Anna.

[Olga Svick]

He sent me her picture, and it's her. Then I was, like, shocked.

[NYPD Detective]

So at that point, they both think that they were poisoned by the same person.

[Narrator]

Olga agrees to meet with Reuben to hear his story in detail.

[Ruben Borukov]

I'm here 43 years. Came here 1980 from Russia, and I lived in Russian neighborhood all this time.

[Narrator]

Rubin says he met the woman he calls Anna on a Russian dating app two months ago in June 2016.

[Ruben Borukov]

I was single at the time. You know, I was dating, checking girls out, and I met her, and she gave me her number. She said she came from Russia, like, long. Not. Not long ago. I started talking to her, and she was very smart woman. She said, do you like to eat? I like to cook. So I was like, of course. She said, Sunday, I'll buy some food and prepare to. And I was like, sure, why not?

[Police Officer]

The date was to be held at her apartment in Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn.

[Ruben Borukov]

Sunday, I went. I bought her flowers, I bought her wine, and I went to her home.

[Narrator]

Upon arrival, Reuben says he was surprised to find her apartment empty.

[Ruben Borukov]

I was like, where is the furniture? Carpet was rolled up.

[NYPD Detective]

I was shocked, like.

[Ruben Borukov]

And she said she had a roommate. She just moved out. I was like, okay. And she said, come, come. The table is ready. It was a mini table, and I had my own wine. She prepared fish. I took two bites. I drank wine. That's all I remember. I never thought about. She's gonna shrug me.

[Narrator]

Reuben says two days later, he woke up in a hospital room.

[NYPD Detective]

He didn't even exactly know how he ended up in the hospital. He's there for about a week. Tests are run, but they can't really figure out what's wrong with him. The medical record lists a number of his symptoms, like memory loss, fatigue, weakness, these type of things. The medical records between Ruben and Olga were almost identical.

[Ruben Borukov]

The doctors, they took my blood, and they're saying he's clean. He's clean. I don't understand. I just don't get it.

[NYPD Detective]

They give him fluids, they give him some food. They monitor him and find that he's okay to be discharged. But even at the discharge point, they don't know what happened to this person.

[Olga Svick]

I remember Ruben called me and told me the story. He really got sick. He almost got in coma. I got sick. Somebody poisoned me. He got poisoned too. Maybe this is the same person.

[Narrator]

Ruben learned he was taken to the hospital by his sister. She said a woman brought him to the dry cleaning store he owned and claimed he'd passed out on a date.

[Ruben Borukov]

And when she brought me back to my store, she was saying that, oh, he got drunk. He's this and that. She gave me my phone, but no money, of course. She took my watch. It's 800 something dollars watch. When I got my phone back, she erased everything. She erased all the texts. We did all. My phone was cleared for good measure.

[Police Officer]

When she dropped him off. Anna allegedly swiped 500 bucks from the cash register.

[Narrator]

The store's surveillance cameras caught the whole thing on tape.

[NYPD Detective]

His business had footage of Hannah in his office going through personal things, going through drawers and things like that. Ruben had no memory of this whatsoever.

[Ruben Borukov]

I saw me on the camera, but I don't remember nothing. Things like, wow, it was weird.

[Narrator]

Like, Olga. Rubin spent the next two days feeling disoriented. When he recovered, he found out Anna had stolen more than he realized.

[Police Officer]

His American Express Express charge card has something like $2,600 worth of new charges that he has no idea where they came from.

[Narrator]

After two weeks, recovering from the shock of it all, Rubin decided to take action and report the crime to Brooklyn police.

[Olga Svick]

He tells me that he went to the police precinct and they think she was where his girlfriend. And they broke up. And this way, you know, I left.

[Ruben Borukov]

I left. I was like, you know what? They don't want the information. It's okay. I tried to do my own investigation because I was mad that, you know, she got me. And then I thought about it and I was like, you know what? I'm alive. It's okay. And I let it go. Till Olga.

[Narrator]

Olga and Ruben feel the similarities are too strong to deny, and they hope the NYPD agrees.

[Olga Svick]

We went together to the police precinct, and they realized that it's really serious.

[Medical Examiner]

Two victims talked about it, met in this small community, and made this happen. Really interesting. Now you have a connection that you didn't have before.

[Narrator]

Coming up, investigators discover evidence of a crime spree.

[NYPD Investigator]

We start connecting different cases from different boroughs. We realized that we had numerous victims.

[Narrator]

And they uncover a suspect on the run.

[NYPD Detective]

She was a wanted fugitive in Russia.

[Private Investigator]

She got pictures in the car with her mother's body slumped over next to her in the passenger seat.

[Police Officer]

She is wanted for killing someone halfway across the world.

[Narrator]

In September 2016, after Olga Svick and Ruben Borukov present their stories to the nypd, both cases are revived.

[NYPD Detective]

We don't know any real pedigree information for this woman, Victoria. Don't know where she works, don't know where she lives.

[Medical Examiner]

She used all these different names. And we have an M.O. which is unusual. That poisoning thing, that's really odd. And also within a Russian community. So now we have possibly a Russian person committing these crime.

[Narrator]

Detectives also find it unusual that two nearly identical cases took place in different areas of the city.

[Medical Examiner]

It's rare that we get something in a different borough across the city. It's rare. But it's our job to be able to make those connections when we can. When something jumps out like a poisoning, we put that out to other squads so they know be on the lookout for this person.

[Narrator]

Investigators quickly discover several more crimes with similar MOs.

[NYPD Investigator]

We start looking at all like grand larcenies, connecting different cases from different boroughs, and we start making what we call a pattern. We realized that we had numerous victims from other areas. There was two cases, both of them were located in Coney island, both in the Ocean Parkway area. Two Russian individuals who both go home with a dark haired female.

[Narrator]

In both cases, the victims are male and they remember blacking out after eating or drinking.

[NYPD Detective]

One of the individuals met her on a dating site and arranged to go on a date with her to a coffee shop. He ordered coffee, she had wine. Within 15 or 20 minutes. Started to feel very, very sick. On the ride back, he's actually saying to her in the car, I'm not feeling well. She says to him, don't worry, let's pull over, I'll drive. They go back to his place. It's at or about that point where his memory completely cuts out. The following morning he wakes up in his bed and cash and jewelry is missing from his house.

[Narrator]

The victims stories are eerily similar, except one victim says the woman was named Mara. The other calls her Rachel.

[NYPD Detective]

Because they're communicating on these dating apps. There's really no information other than that in terms of tracking back this person. She may or may not have been using a fake name. No phone number, no address, no other kind of pedigree information.

[Narrator]

Whatever the woman's real name is, the men say her profile advertised more than just dating.

[Police Officer]

One of the things that, that she offered was to come and perform for them sort of BDSM activities that they wanted done.

[Private Investigator]

These men didn't want anybody to know about. You know, they weren't open about their BDSM preferences or whatever.

[Narrator]

Detectives know the clandestine nature of these trysts could be seen stopping more victims from reporting.

[Medical Examiner]

Maybe they won't come forward because of obvious reasons, embarrassment and things of that shame. So we don't know exactly how many victims there are.

[Narrator]

Luckily, the man who identified the suspect as Mara is able to give police the address of the apartment she took him to.

[NYPD Investigator]

He said he went to use the bathroom and when he came out of the restroom, he realized that his car keys and wallet were missing and so was Mara. His vehicle was also removed from the location.

[Narrator]

When detectives contact the owner of the apartment, she claims a friend asked her to let a woman stay there for a few days.

[NYPD Investigator]

She didn't know the individual, but did provide us at that time with a cell phone number. We did computer checks with that number.

[Narrator]

The computer check provides detectives with a full name and possible lead. Victoria Nasyrova. Investigators learn she is a 41 year old Russian woman in the United States on a visa.

[NYPD Investigator]

There was a prior incident that occurred in Manhattan where she was arrested for allegedly stealing the pettit. Lawsony is a minor crime. You get a desk appearance ticket, you get fingerprinted. If there's no warrants, local warrants for you, you will get released on a summons.

[Narrator]

Detectives run her name through their database and find that it is all associated with an international record.

[NYPD Investigator]

After running the name in our databases, they realized there is an Interpol warrant for her out of Russia and they provided us with a photo which was placed into a photo array.

[Narrator]

The local victims who are willing to talk confirm Victoria Nasirova is the woman investigating investigators are looking for.

[Medical Examiner]

Now you got a connection here and all of a sudden the case gets connected back to the Olga's case.

[NYPD Detective]

At this point we found out that the person who committed this crime in New York City was a wanted fugitive, was wanted for murder in Russia involving a woman named Alla Alexenko. The Russian government contacts Interpol, which is a global law enforcement enforcement agency. Interpol issues what is known as a red notice, which is essentially a worldwide wanted flyer of the highest category.

[Medical Examiner]

Now all of a sudden we have a whole different case. We have an international killer.

[NYPD Investigator]

We activated what is called an investigation card. It's almost like a warrant. If the police department comes in contact with her, she'd be detained and held for the investigation.

[Narrator]

While detectives are on the hunt for Victoria Nasyrova, the stakes rise when they learn she's already wanted in her home country of Russia for the 2014 murder of Ala Alexenko.

[Police Officer]

Olga's case has been connected to Victoria, and now it's wrapped up in this international fugitive who is wanted for killing someone halfway across the world.

[Narrator]

Not only is Victoria wanted for murder, but the victim's daughter, Nadia Ford, has been desperately searching for Victoria for two years. In 2016. In 2017, unaware of Victoria's more recent attacks, Nadia seeks help from a private investigator.

[NYPD Detective]

Nadia Ford is originally from Krasnodar, Russia. Born and raised there. I believe sometime in 2010 or 2011, she moved to the United States. She maintained a really good relationship with her mom, which is a woman named Ala Aleksenko.

[Private Investigator]

Nadia said that Victoria killed her mother. She's convinced Nadia was very instrumental in pushing the Russian authorities to investigate.

[Narrator]

The Russian government has been unable to gain traction on the case, so Nadia hired New York private investigator Herman Weisberg.

[Herman Weisberg]

Nadia was introduced to me by a common friend who was crying uncontrollably. I felt very bad for her. She explained that her mother was a victim of a homicide in Russia.

[Narrator]

Nadia tells Weisberg the Trouble began in 2013 when her mother, Alla, was befriended by a much younger woman living next door in Krasnodar, Russia.

[Herman Weisberg]

The new neighbor that had moved in turned out to be Victoria Nasyrova. As soon as the friendship had begun, I think Nadja was a little suspect of it.

[NYPD Detective]

Ala was older, seemingly from a blue collar family. Humble, sort of like somebody's grandma.

[Herman Weisberg]

Right.

[NYPD Detective]

Victoria, on the other hand, was always decked out in fur coats and wore a lot of makeup and jewelry. She had much more of a luxurious outlook. Sometimes loneliness, right, is the type of thing that can motivate somebody to make an unusual friend. And I think that part of the reason why Victoria was successful in gaining Ala's trust is because Ala lived alone, and Victoria was right there. She was able to put up a front that Ala was very receptive to. And because she was a good hearted lady, giving type of personality, a trusting type of personality, she decided to make this friendship work. So sometime in 2013, Nadia visits and gets to meet Victoria. They spend time together, they go out, they form a little bit of a bond. Victoria later tells Nadia, oh, I'm thinking about coming to New York at some point. In 2014, the following year, Alice says to her, well, you know, if you're going to go, could you give some things to Nadia? Personal items like clothing and things like that. So then time is passing, time is passing, time is passing. And Victoria is not going back to New York. And she still is holding on to those things. All is now chatting with Nadia. If she's not going to go to New York, she might as well give me the stuff back. Ala had actually hinted to Nadia that I'm going to confront Victoria about this because this is strange.

[Narrator]

Nadia tells Weisberg that's the the last conversation she ever had with her mother.

[NYPD Detective]

On October 4th or 5th of 2014, Ala goes radio silent.

[Herman Weisberg]

Nadja Ford was very much in touch with her mom daily basis. Regular routine phone calls. A day didn't go by where they didn't communicate.

[NYPD Detective]

An hour goes by, two hours go by, A full day goes by, and Nadia still can't get in contact with her mom. It was pretty strange to her.

[Medical Examiner]

Nadia actually calls Victoria as well. She has her number. Victoria says, I don't have a seat. She may have left with some friends. Maybe that's where she is. She turned her phone off. Nadia doesn't bite.

[NYPD Detective]

Nadia decides to look into the phone history of her mom's cell phone because she was the one that set up the phone for her to begin with. So she logs on online and is able to look at the call history on that phone. She recognizes the final phone number that have had any contact with her mom to be the phone number of Victoria Nasarova. This raises alarm bells because Victoria didn't say anything to her about calling her or contacting her over the phone.

[Herman Weisberg]

She made arrangements to get on a plane and head to Russia about as fast as anybody would have. And immediately she knows something's wrong. As soon as she gets to her

[NYPD Detective]

mom's apartment, the place has been ransacked. There are a lot of things missing. Documents, fur codes, perfumes.

[Narrator]

Nadia discovered something else was missing. The large amount of money her mother kept hidden in the apartment.

[NYPD Detective]

Just before her disappearance. Alla, with Nadia's help, had sold a piece of property in Russia and had gotten a nice sum for it somewhere, probably around $50,000. She realizes that cash is missing. That discovery confirms to her that something really is seriously going on.

[Police Officer]

Immediately, Nadia contacts Russian authorities to look into her mother's disappearance.

[NYPD Detective]

In Nadia's mind, her mom is a hostage. She's been kidnapped, she's been taken somewhere. Worst case scenario, she's dead. Nadia asks the police if they could Essentially set up like a sting operation. They provide some undercover personnel, and they arrange to follow Nadia to the apartment where she's going to confront Victoria.

[Narrator]

When Nadia Ford meets with private investigator Herman Weisberg in 2016, she details her investigations from the last year and a half. Nadia tells Herman that quickly following her mother's disappearance In October of 2014, she worked with Russian authorities to set up a sting operation to apprehend Victoria Nasyrova.

[NYPD Detective]

Nadia meets with Victoria outside of the apartment building. Seemingly, it's just the two of them. Police, however, are on site. Can't be seen, though. Nadia grabs her pretty aggressive, squeezes her and says, where's my mom? I know there's something going on with my mom. Victoria panics, sort of breaks away from the hold and starts screaming, your mom is fine. Your mom is fine. At this point, the police are starting to come out of their hiding place. Victoria does a 180 and books it, runs into the building to get away from Nadia and the police. They apprehend her, and they bring her back to the precinct.

[Medical Examiner]

Russian police start speaking with her. And of course, she knows I don't know what you're talking about. She does this whole thing. So at that point, they do a lie detector test, all right? And she fails it miserably.

[Narrator]

Unfortunately, with no concrete evidence tying Victoria to the robbery or Nadia's missing mother, they had to let her go.

[Medical Examiner]

I don't have enough. You have to let him go. That happens even over here. So you don't have enough, but you still work the case.

[Narrator]

While the case remains open for authorities, Nadia decides she would continue investigating on her own.

[NYPD Detective]

Nadia stays in Russia. She is like a dog with a bone, and she's not going to give up until she finds out what's going on with her mom.

[Narrator]

Nadia reasoned that if Victoria did kill her mother, Allah, she must have moved her body.

[Herman Weisberg]

She was able to go to traffic cameras and kind of plot the course of Victoria leaving her apartment, which is astounding. Police work for somebody that doesn't do this for a living.

[Narrator]

Nadia reviewed footage from the day Ala disappeared and found blurry video of a car leaving her mother's home.

[Private Investigator]

She got pictures of Victoria driving with. Driving south in the car with her mother's body slumped over next to her in the passenger seat.

[Medical Examiner]

She takes that to the police. They find out the plate the car was registered in Victoria.

[NYPD Detective]

The authorities track the GPS signal from Victoria Nesterova's cell phone at or about the time of Allah's disappearance. And what they find is that essentially her phone tracked a particular path that day, going from one city to another within Russia. She sort of does like, a loop where she goes to Arma. It's this area just outside Armavir, is there for a while, and then leaves.

[Narrator]

In April of 2015, seven months after Alla goes missing, investigators follow Victoria's trail of digital breadcrumbs and make a devastating discovery.

[NYPD Detective]

The Russian authorities, they ask themselves, why would she take this pit stop in sort of like this neck of the woods for this period of time on that particular day? So they're able to zone in on it. They get cadaver dogs, and after searching for an extensive period of time, they're able to find burnt remains of a human body.

[Police Officer]

They find the remains of a body. They were so far gone that they could only be identified through dental records. And that is how they realized that they had a murder on their hands and that it was the murder of Ala Alicenko.

[Medical Examiner]

Her body was in bad shape physically, but we don't know what happened to Allah.

[Narrator]

The evidence gave Russian police everything they needed to charge Victoria with murder. But there was another problem.

[NYPD Detective]

That Victoria Nasarova is nowhere to be found in the city that she was living or anywhere in Russia.

[Herman Weisberg]

Victoria had a relationship, apparently with somebody high up in the police department, and she was getting information, so she had escaped Russia

[Medical Examiner]

at that point. As we say in the business, she's in the wind. She flies out of the country.

[NYPD Detective]

The red notice was issued in July of 2015. This is about 10 months after Allah's disappearance.

[Narrator]

With the search for her mother having concluded in the worst possible outcome, Nadia returns to New York. However, Nadia says the mystery seems to have followed her home. Nadia tells Weisberg she has reason to believe Victoria escaped to the United States and is now hiding in New York.

[Herman Weisberg]

Nadia heard from some. Some of her acquaintances in Brooklyn that Victoria was in the area. She was also directed to find a Facebook account which was a variation of Victoria's first and last name. It was kind of hyphenated V na V I N A, which a lot of people at that time were doing with Facebook accounts to, you know, not use their full name.

[NYPD Detective]

Nadia, fortuitously comes across a photo of the person she knows to be Victoria Nasarova, and it's tagged at a location in Brooklyn. So now Nadia is afraid because in her mind, perhaps Victoria is in New York because she wants to do something to Nadia. Nadia is in a difficult predicament. She can't go to the NYPD and say, there's this woman who's here in New York, who I think did something to my mom in Russia. So Nadia hires Herman and asks him to look into this person.

[Herman Weisberg]

The more she talked, the more I felt if the nypd, if Interpol, if Russia, if nobody can catch this woman, I don't know why I'm sitting in this conference table, frankly, but I should help her by any means necessary.

[Narrator]

Coming up, the search for Victoria heats up.

[Herman Weisberg]

I have a tendency to look at what they're not showing me. I noticed that there was pretty unique stitching in the vehicle that she was in.

[Narrator]

And evidence continues to mount.

[Herman Weisberg]

I sent out my surveillance teams. I had them all split up.

[NYPD Investigator]

He told us, look, take them all. I don't want any of her stuff here.

[NYPD Detective]

They came across Olgzvik's Ukrainian passport.

[Narrator]

In March 2016, the NYPD continues its investigation into Victoria Nasyrova, a Russian criminal they believe poisoned Olga Svik and several men across the city. Meanwhile, private investigator Herman Weisberg begins one of his own.

[Herman Weisberg]

I decided to just take it on, and I became kind of obsessed with it because of how bad I felt for Ms. Ford.

[NYPD Detective]

Weisberg starts to piece together as much as he can as a private investigator to find Victoria. He has, obviously, some ability to research databases, so he knows that there's a red notice for her. He then tries to look into her footprint, her online footprint.

[Herman Weisberg]

There wasn't much there except for a Facebook account. But on Facebook, you know, it's very interesting to me that people are showing off. So when I look at anybody's Facebook page, I have a tendency to look at what they're not showing me. So I look past it, and I look into the backgrounds or I look at the other people in the shot. I noticed Victoria liked wearing those mirror aviator sunglasses, and I love that because I like looking in the reflection for the little things that Victoria didn't mean to put out there.

[Private Investigator]

He found one picture of her, a selfie, and there was a reflection in her aviators of a car. So he started to take a close look at this, the car.

[Herman Weisberg]

I noticed that there was pretty unique stitching in the vehicle that she took this selfie in. Also, the clock on the dashboard was a very unique shape. I had some confidence that the car would still be connected to her.

[Narrator]

Weisberg knows that in a city the size of New York, finding a single car can be like finding a needle in a haystack. He begins with zeroing in on the specific make and model.

[Herman Weisberg]

I chose to walk around a parking lot that had, I don't know, thousands

[Narrator]

of vehicles before the end of the first day, Herman's determination pays off. He spots a vehicle that matches the interior reflected in Victoria's sunglasses.

[Herman Weisberg]

When I stumbled upon what turned out to be a Chrysler 300, I looked at it for about 20 minutes with my mouth open saying, holy. I actually just came across this car because I had given up a hundred times in my mind.

[Narrator]

The car doesn't belong to Victoria, but at least now Weisberg knows what he's looking for.

[Herman Weisberg]

I still had to locate the vehicle in Brooklyn, but I was hoping that there were only a few in the areas that I had triangulated on Victoria's Facebook page. She had done what's called liking different establishments, different businesses. There was a Mexican restaurant, there was a pizza place, maybe a nail or hair salon, and they were all in close proximity to one another. I sent out my surveillance teams, had them all split up. Luckily for me, a Chrysler 300 with that interior package was relatively rare. Within six hours, my surveillance team found Victoria and her then boyfriend going out shopping and using that vehicle. We watched Victoria Nasirova and her boyfriend going to pick up a flat screen TV that they both had to carry back to their apartment building. And it was quite obvious their use of keys to get entry that that's where they both lived. It definitely gave me a lot of confidence that we were on the right people at the right place. It flashed through my brain like, this is the craziest thing ever. I don't know how me and my team just did this, but there it is. Boom, done. I mean, I got her.

[Narrator]

Now private investors investigator Herman Weisberg and his team need the NYPD to finish the job and apprehend Victoria. In the midst of their own investigation, detectives receive Weisberg's fortuitous tip.

[NYPD Investigator]

I got a phone call from a private investigator. He stated to me that he was hired by a family in Russia to attempt to locate Victoria, and he believed that he knew the location of her.

[Narrator]

Detectives let Weisberg know they've been searching for Victoria for seven months in response to a series of robberies and the attempted murder of Olga Svick.

[Herman Weisberg]

I wasn't even aware at that time of what had transpired with Olga. I mean, I had my hunches about her from the beginning that she's been up to no good for a long time here. I guess I was right about her. She don't care about anything but herself.

[Narrator]

On March 16, 2016, the NYPD and private investigator Herman Weisberg combine forces to zero in on Victoria Nasyrova and make an arrest.

[Herman Weisberg]

Within 48 hours. I was meeting them in front of that location in Brooklyn where she had resided.

[NYPD Detective]

She was living with someone named Vladimir, whose boyfriend at the time.

[NYPD Investigator]

They went up to her boyfriend's apartment, asked if Victoria was there, which he replied yes. They asked Victoria to step out, and they handcuffed her and brought her to the 60th Precinct.

[Narrator]

After a seven month long manhunt, Victoria is finally in custody.

[NYPD Investigator]

I asked her if she knew why she was apprehended and she denied everything. Of she had no idea what was going on.

[Herman Weisberg]

I saw Victoria get put in handcuffs and walked out the front door. I already had Nadja's phone number ready to call her. I said, we got her. Her reaction was like music. When you hear something like that, when you know, you could hear the joy in her voice.

[Narrator]

Now, the challenge for investigators is to connect her to the crimes she suspected of committing.

[NYPD Detective]

So the very first thing that the New York Police Department had to do is figure out was the person responsible for some or all of their open investigations. So they arrange with each detective who's handling each of the open investigations to conduct a lineup.

[NYPD Investigator]

We brought all the victims to the precinct. They were able to view each lineup separately, and they don't get to speak with each other.

[Olga Svick]

Police asked me if I see Victoria Nasirova in that room, and I say, yeah, I see her.

[Ruben Borukov]

Then they called me to Brooklyn to identify her. I went there and I saw her.

[NYPD Investigator]

Victoria was identified in all these separate cases that we had at that time. And then she was charged for grand larceny for three individuals.

[Olga Svick]

You know, I. I was in shock, and in the same time, I feel relieved.

[Narrator]

After notifying Interpol of Victoria's arrest, detectives begin building a case strong enough to convict her.

[NYPD Investigator]

After the arrest of Victoria, we went back to Victoria's boyfriend's house and we asked for consent to search his apartment. He was very shocked and almost depressed. He said they were having a little trouble and that she had moved out and was just recently moved back into the apartment in March.

[Narrator]

Victoria's boyfriend Vladimir, says the reason for their breakup was his dog, Joey.

[NYPD Detective]

Joey had died of very mysterious circumstances just weeks prior. Victoria, during the course of her relationship with Vladimir, made it known that she didn't really like the dog, in part because Vladimir was so close with this dog. Everywhere that Vladimir went, the dog went.

[NYPD Investigator]

One morning he woke up and the dog was no longer with him.

[Herman Weisberg]

There was talk about her poisoning her boyfriend's dog. It's not a far stretch for me to think of what happened

[Narrator]

when investigators tell Vladimir about the people Victoria allegedly poisoned. He agrees to help.

[NYPD Detective]

Vladimir gave the police the permission for them to search some personal bags that she had in his home.

[NYPD Investigator]

She had just moved back into his apartment. It was so recent that her bags were still packed. He told us, look, take them all. I don't want any of her stuff here.

[Narrator]

Victoria's luggage provides them with a treasure trove of evidence.

[NYPD Investigator]

As we're going bag by bag, we found Olga's jewelry that Olga described that was removed from her during her crime.

[NYPD Detective]

They also came across Olga's vic's employment authorization card and her Ukrainian passport.

[Narrator]

Tucked inside Olga's passport, officers find a recent photo of Victoria. And they're struck by how similar the two women look.

[NYPD Investigator]

They're not 100% twins, but they can be mistaken for each other. I believe she was trying to change her identity to be Olga to hide who she actually was. Maybe because of the Interpol warrant.

[Police Officer]

Prisons in Russia are pretty notorious for being grim and horrific places to serve out your time. And she did not want to face the murder charge for Ala Alasenko's death.

[Narrator]

But detectives know that to get away with it, Victoria needed Olga out of the picture permanently.

[Herman Weisberg]

You can't steal somebody's passport because they're gonna go and report the passport stolen. And Victoria's smart enough to know that. It's my belief that Victoria used the poison cheesecake to make it look like it was a suicide. She staged the scene with other pills laying around. She staged the scene by changing Olga's clothing into lingerie. So if the police or anybody had found her dead, they would have immediately thought suicide.

[Medical Examiner]

It's a perfect setup. You know, Olga was in her own home. No one was watching.

[NYPD Detective]

That's how brilliant Victoria Nasarova was in that she thought of almost every single detail to make this the perfect crime. What she didn't think about was the likelihood that Olga would survive.

[Narrator]

Coming up, an international killer becomes a New York tabloid star.

[Police Officer]

You don't get a case like this every day.

[Olga Svick]

She's a pathological liar, you know?

[Narrator]

And the story she tells is stranger than fiction.

[Private Investigator]

She told me herself she would meet men on BDSM websites.

[Narrator]

After her arrest, Victoria Nasyrova is held without bail in Rikers Island. She refuses to speak to investigators about her alleged crimes, but seems more than willing to tell her story to reporters.

[Police Officer]

The media coverage for this case was off the charts. People were above obsessed, particularly in New York, because you had all of these added elements. It wasn't just a poisoning. It was a stolen identity There was a dominatrix aspect. She was from another country.

[Private Investigator]

She was also beautiful.

[Police Officer]

You don't get a case like this every day.

[Narrator]

Over the next few months, Victoria gives the media all the headlines they could ask for.

[Private Investigator]

I met her several times at Rikers. Victoria is very charismatic, very talkative. No, she tells me she didn't do anything. She said she's been framed. She's innocent.

[Narrator]

Part of the allure comes from the tale Victoria spins about her past.

[Private Investigator]

She comes from southern Russia. She came of age in the 90s, the collapse of the Soviet Union. Out in the south. It was hellish, hellish life. People had nothing. You know, people didn't have food. You go to the store and there's nothing there. You know, you just survive.

[Narrator]

Victoria's stories include her being forced to join a Russian crime syndicate in her 30s.

[Private Investigator]

She told me that she was doing, like, off the books kind of cosmetology work. She couldn't get a mortgage, so she got some fake documents. At that point, the Russian government came and tried to blackmail her into working for them. She said what she would do is she would go and get, like, incriminating information against somebody and then she would help people. The Russian police, like, blackmail people for money. She said that she kept very meticulous records of all her assignments for this organization. It's all also shrouded in this sort of conspiracy and mystery.

[Narrator]

Victoria claims she tried to get out several times, but she knew too much for Russian Collision to let her go. So they framed her for murder instead.

[Private Investigator]

She said that point, they killed this Allah, the mother of Nadia, her neighbor, and they set it up to make it look like she did it, and they started an investigation against her. She keeps telling me different versions of the same story where she ended up in the US to try to get away from these people.

[Narrator]

While hiding out in the U.S. victoria admits she supported herself by working as a dominatrix.

[Private Investigator]

She told me herself she would meet men on BDSM websites and she would

[Police Officer]

say in interviews that she sort of fulfilled their needs and provided a service. She almost acted like she was doing kind of like a positive thing for these men.

[Narrator]

However, Victoria denies poisoning or robbing any of her clients. She also denies trying to kill Olga to steal her identity.

[Private Investigator]

She told me that Olga had sold her her Ukrainian passport because Victoria was too scared to use her Russian passport.

[Police Officer]

She talked openly about the day that she went over to Olga's house and telling the media that Olga was already feeling sick and she was unwell prior to her getting to the apartment. The reason she gave for why she was targeted for this crime as the potential perpetrator was that she was being framed by the Russians.

[Olga Svick]

She's a pathological liar, you know, she always makes some new fairy tale.

[Narrator]

For prosecutors, Victoria's press interviews are a preview of defense strategies she might try in court. And they're concerned that without evidence she poisoned Olga, those strategies might work.

[NYPD Detective]

To convict somebody, you need proof beyond a reasonable doubt. And there was this open question of what was it that poisoned Olga. The preliminary tests show that there's no controlled substance in the container.

[Narrator]

The same can be said for the NYPD's other cases against Victoria.

[NYPD Investigator]

It was a very strange situation that each victim explains the same symptoms. Reuben spent numerous days in the hospital being observed, and they didn't find anything with him. But there was something there that was making each of these individuals pretty much tranquilized for a day or two. The NYPD lab catalog was not big enough to determine the type of drug that was in that cheesecake. So the police department and the district attorney's office spoke, and they said, well, maybe we have to broaden our horizons. A federal agent can test it on their systems, which isn't just the United States narcotics. So I was very excited to hear they were able to break it down a little bit more, and the federal agent was actually able to identify what was used, and it could have killed every single one of these victims.

[Narrator]

One of the greatest challenges to the investigation into Victoria Nasirova has been proving attempted murder without a murder weapon. But the Department of Homeland Security has access to technology. The NYPD does not.

[NYPD Detective]

When the cheesecake container is tested by the Department of Homeland Security, it comes up positive for finance, which is something that the New York Police Department doesn't have in their bracket of controlled substance, because it's not a controlled substance in the United States. This is why that first test came up negative.

[Police Officer]

Phenazepam is a benzodiazepam, kind of a depressant that was developed in the Soviet Union, and they call it Russian roofie.

[NYPD Detective]

It has depressive effects on the human body. It's used primarily to treat seizures, epilepsies, and things like that, if taken in large doses, can cause the heart to slow down to a point where it arrests. And it stops.

[Narrator]

When investigators see the list of side effects for the drug, which include amnesia. They understand why the victims had a hard time remembering anything.

[NYPD Investigator]

When she was given these drugs. It would give her enough time to go through their apartments to find or locate any jewelry or certificates. Without them waking up or catching her.

[Narrator]

A detail of the crime scene in Olga's apartment suggests Victoria meant to do more than just knock her out.

[NYPD Detective]

Why would the first witnesses say that? In late August, when it's hot out, Olga's heater was turned on to the max and the windows were closed, and it was incredibly hot in the room.

[Police Officer]

Extreme heat intensifies the effects. So it stands to reason that the heat was ratcheted up as high as it could go in the heat of summer of the end of August, so that it could make the effects more intense and work faster.

[Medical Examiner]

Once we had that phenaspam, there's more light shining on Victoria that she tried to kill over.

[Narrator]

Detectives finally have a murder weapon, and they can also prove Victoria was the one who used it.

[NYPD Detective]

Victoria's mouth was swabbed, and there was a comparison done between the results of that mouth swab and the results of the DNA on the cheesecake.

[NYPD Investigator]

So with her DNA there, it locks her into her being the one who touched and was able to handle that container.

[NYPD Detective]

Once it was known that phenazepam was in the container, then that became the bow on top of the case to allow the police department and the Queen's DA's office not only to charge Victoria with larceny, but also charge Victoria with attempted murder because this was an attempt to kill somebody and steal their identity.

[Narrator]

During her arraignment, Victoria pleads not guilty to all of the charges against her. Prosecutors start preparing for trial. But despite the new evidence, they hit a roadblock.

[NYPD Investigator]

We came into a lot of trouble going into court with trying to get the male individuals to come and testify. We have to now put you on a stand, and you have to tell you a story in public to people that you don't know. Some of them decided that they no longer wanted to go forward and prosecute.

[NYPD Detective]

The Brooklyn cases were falling apart, and the Brooklyn VA's office wanted to get something for them.

[NYPD Investigator]

She was originally charged for grand larcenies. They were downgraded, and she pled guilty to petit loss and misdemeanors.

[Narrator]

For drugging and robbing three men in Brooklyn, Victoria is sentenced to just 90 days in jail time. She's already served while awaiting trial.

[NYPD Detective]

We have no legal authority to charge the Russia investigation. So now the only case that remained was Olga's attempted murder case in Queens.

[Narrator]

But due to the COVID pandemic, the trial for attempted murder is delayed several years. In the meantime, Victoria notches a major legal victory against the city of New York.

[Police Officer]

She didn't have an easy time. When she was at Rikers waiting to go to trial, she was assaulted inside of the prison and ended up suffering a bunch of different injuries to her body.

[Narrator]

A local news station obtains graphic footage of the attack on Victoria and airs it on the evening news.

[Police Officer]

She ended up suing, claiming that the guards were negligent in stopping the attack and they were negligent in protecting her.

[Private Investigator]

So she ended up suing Rikers for 5 million. She got 325,000, the money that Victoria

[Herman Weisberg]

was awarded from what happened to her in jail. That turns everybody's stomach that I've spoken to, including mine.

[Narrator]

After Victoria spends six years behind bars in 2023, a trial date is finally set for the attempted murder of Olga Spick.

[Olga Svick]

We start preparing and more closer to the date for the trial, I got more scared. I realized that I have to see that person who wants to kill me. I don't want her to be out, outside, around people. I was very scared.

[Narrator]

On January 30, 2023, opening arguments are made in one of the most highly anticipated trials in the country.

[Private Investigator]

This seems pretty wild, you know, a sexy, like, vixen trying to kill somebody by feeding them poison cheesecake, meeting, like, guys online, robbing them. Bdsm. It's got everything right.

[Narrator]

But when Victoria enters the court, she no longer resembles the seductress whose photos have tantalized tabloid readers for years.

[Olga Svick]

I just look at the woman. She changed, you know, she got more weight, and she was like a regular woman.

[Narrator]

Several of Victoria's alleged victims are called to testify, including Olga.

[Olga Svick]

Then Dino started asking me a question. I was worried about everything, you know, about the process, because I. I never do that before.

[NYPD Detective]

Olga came off as a very convincing witness. She came off as credible. She came off as sincere, as did Reuben as well.

[Ruben Borukov]

I did testify, as I said, everything true. Like, she could have killed me. She heard, like, she hurt a lot of people. She did a bad thing, and if nobody stops her, she would have been keep doing it.

[Police Officer]

The trial lasted for about a week and a half. It was really emotional. And to see these survivors, I think, really tugged at the heartstrings of the jury.

[NYPD Detective]

From the very beginning, we looked at this as Victoria Nasarova attempted to kill Olga Svich. But you can't stop the story there. Your jury's going to say, well, why? Why would she need a new identity? We said to the jury, there's something very serious going on. There was a red notice that was put out for this woman, and she fled Russia, we'd simply alert them to the fact that there was something very serious going on in Russia. We never said anything about a murder, whether she did something wrong or didn't do something wrong. She knows that she's wanted, and she knows, quite frankly, that she's wanted by a government that doesn't afford her the same constitutional protections that we have here. So now her time is running out in the United States. The valid visa that she had entered the country with was due to expire on September 4th of 2016. She needed to do all of this so that she could never go back to Russia.

[Narrator]

The defense insists the state's evidence against Victoria is almost entirely circumstantial.

[NYPD Detective]

We had the results of the DNA on the cheesecake, but the defense is looking at the fact that there are no third party witnesses. The only person that's saying that Victoria Nasarova was there is Olga Zvik. So there are no eyewitnesses, there's no surveillance tape. But I think that ultimately the jury saw past those arguments.

[Narrator]

The jury takes only an hour and a half to reach a verdict.

[NYPD Detective]

Victoria Nasarova was convicted of attempted murder in second degree, attempted assault in the first degree, assault in the second degree, unlawful imprisonment, and petty larceny.

[Police Officer]

She was sentenced to 21 years behind bars with credit for time served so she can be out in roughly 15 years. When she was sentenced, Victoria had a full out outburst in the middle of court and cursed out the judge.

[Olga Svick]

What a gem.

[Police Officer]

This woman is a menace to society.

[NYPD Detective]

It's as bizarre a case as you'll ever seem. It'll be unlikely that we'll ever see another murder or attempted murder with a piece of cheesecake.

[Narrator]

Victoria is paying for her crimes in the United States, but justice for another crime still awaits overseas.

[Herman Weisberg]

I sat next to Nadja when the sentence was given by Judge holder about the 21 years. I think she saw that as a win. But there'll never be a win until Victoria pays the price for taking her mom's life.

[NYPD Detective]

Presumably after Victoria's sentence, the federal government will work out some arrangement with Russian authorities to extradite her directly to Russia. And if that gets case is still pending, she should be prosecuted for the murder of Al Alexenko.

[Herman Weisberg]

From what I've come to know about Nadia Ford's mom, she was a very giving person. She seemed like she was one of those people that people describe as everybody's mom. And I guess she had a little bit more than Victoria had. And Victoria turned out wanting that. Whatever she had for herself, this is a person that is dangerous. This is a person that doesn't belong outside of jail.

[Olga Svick]

I could not sleep for months. I would spend hours crying myself

[NYPD Investigator]

thinking

[Olga Svick]

about what happened to me. In the beginning, I just hate her. But after time I start questioning myself and I start more studying about psychology. And I forgive her. Like really forgive her. I not say that she's a good person, she is dangerous, she in the right place. I forgive her for just for myself. Because I want to live my life and enjoy without thinking of her.