The air in Kemerovo was thick with the usual soot and toil when a most ghastly occurrence shattered the peace of a common tenement. Imagine, if you will, two young lasses, mere schoolchildren, engaged in a bit of innocent mischief. They had cast morsels of food from a balcony to their companions below, but alas! A stray crumb landed upon the windowsill of a neighbour dwelling beneath—a woman possessed by a spirit of unbridled wrath.

This dame did not seek a civil parley. No, she sought vengeance. With the cunning of a street-thief, she first wrested the keys from the small hand of a young brother to force her way into the children's sanctuary. Once the threshold was breached, the woman unleashed a fury that would make a dockside brawler shudder. In her hand, she gripped not a cane or a switch, but a pair of heavy iron pliers.

She fell upon the poor mites like a whirlwind. There were no adults present to shield the innocents from this storm of violence. When the dust settled, the carnage was evident: one poor child lay with a shattered nose, and another bore a jagged gash across her brow, weeping in terror. The parents, rightfully aghast, flew straight to the authorities to demand justice.

I have heard from the constabulary that the law is now stirring. The detectives of the Investigative Committee have already charged the woman with the violation of a domicile. As for the brutal battery—the blood and the broken bone—the magistrates are currently deciding if a further charge of intentional harm shall be laid upon her head.

Such is the state of the world when a simple mishap leads to a scene of such savagery; it puts one in mind of the dark alleys where the law is the only thing standing between the decent folk and the utter madness of the mob.