Azov Films announced the death of Vladik Shibanov in a car accident
three weeks ago. Further details and photos are on the site vladik.org
and on azovfilms.com.
I was suspicious from the beginning that this was a hoax. I was first
made suspicious by the way too fluent English on the vladik.org site.
The writer claims to have known Vladik and knows details of his life
and death, as if he lives in Crimea. The English is that of a native
English speaker, very well written. Russian is spoken in Crimea, some
Ukranian, almost no one speaks English there. I doubt that anyone
living in Alushta in Crimea is capable of writing such English.
The name Azov Films suggests that they are based in Russia or the
Ukraine. They are not--they’re based in Toronto Canada. They
distribute films made all over the world to an English speaking
audience. I suspect the way too good English is being written by
someone in Toronto, not by anyone from Crimea. Azov Films continued
selling Vladik’s films after his death. Not even a small decent
interval to allow this young man’s family to grieve. I smell a hoax,
designed to sell more movies. If Vladik were dead, they’d give his
family and friends some time to mourn out respect.
Vladik was “born into a humbled home” but worked and bought himself a
2008 Mitsubishi Outlander with his own money. That’s tough to believe.
A new Mitsubishi Outlander in the US sells for over $30,000, the 2008
model Vlad is pictured with goes for around $25,000. I’m sure Vladik
made some money from his film career. I’m sure he didn’t earn anywhere
near this much. I suspect that a lot of the boys in these movies were
paid with pizza and ice cream. This car is way beyond the means of a
teenager in Crimea in the Ukraine. It’s beyond the means of teenagers
in America and Europe unless their wealthy parents buy it for them.
What convinced me of the hoax was the photos posted on the
Azovfilms.com website. Look at the photo of the crash scene and read
the description of the crash. Vladik was traveling near 100 mph on a
wet road with bad tires and spun out of control. The photo of the
crash scene shows a concrete post (completely undamaged) and a bent
guardrail on the INSIDE of a curved road. This is impossible. A car
spinning out of control on a curve is pulled to the OUTSIDE of a curve
by centrifugal force. This force greatly increases as velocity
increases. In the accident described Vladik’s car should have gone off
the outside of the curve. The concrete post, struck by a fairly good
size car at nearly 100mph, should show some damage. There is none. The
crash scene is fake.
Then look at the picture of the car after the “crash.” It’s the same
Mitsubishi Outland Vladik is pictured standing next to--there’s the
same sign in the rear window. The car has plastic draped over and
around it. The rear door and passenger side doors have been left
slightly ajar. There is absolutely no sign of any real damage to the
car. If this car had really been in an accident at very high speed,
killing the driver instantly, you’d see obvious damage: most or all of
the windows shattered, most or all of the tires blown out or missing,
the frame bent, the roof crushed. You see none of this. The rear
window is intact. Both passenger side tires are intact, and the car is
sitting level, meaning the driver’s side tires are also intact. The
frame is not bent, the roof not crushed.
What really tops it off is the dramatic, tragic description of Vladik’s
passenger lying trapped in the car, enduring physical pain and the pain
of seeing Vladik’s body lying next to his, as paramedics worked for
nearly an hour to cut them out of the car using the Jaws of Life.
You’ve got to be kidding. I was a paramedic for over ten years. The
Jaws of Life are needed almost exclusively for one situation: a car
has flipped over onto its roof at very high speed or has rolled over
multiple times. This crushes the roof down into the passenger
compartment, making it impossible to open the doors and impossible to
extract the victims through the windows. Look at photo of the car
after the “crash.” No crushed roof. Passenger side intact, rear
window intact. Anyone inside this car could easily have been extracted
in a few minutes through the passenger side, through the rear, or
through the windshield.
No one died in this car. No one needed to be cut out using the Jaws of
Life. I don’t think this car has even been in an accident at all.
Hoax.
Maybe Vladik did actually die. He did not die in the car crash that’s
described and pictured on these websites. If Vladik is dead, perhaps
Azov Films should honestly tell people what happened to him. It’s
obvious a lot of people cared very much for this young man.
My hunch is that Vladik is alive and well in Crimea. He may not even
know that he’s dead. I doubt he can read English well enough to read
all the beautiful things that have been written about him the past
three weeks. He’s probably riding his mountain bike right now
completely unaware that he’s been dead for three weeks.
If Vladik participated in the hoax, it’s probably just for the money or
for a joke, or both. Vladik had a great sense of humor in his movies.
If someone approached him and asked if he’d like to die a tragic death
in a car accident to help sell a few more movies and make a little more
money, he probably laughed and then called all his friends on the phone
to tell them that he’s dead.
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