Two Men Given 48 Years For Severed Head Murder

Vitas Plytnykas and Aleksandras Skirda were given jail terms of 28 and 20 years respectively for the murder of Jolanta Bledaite.

A former Russian soldier and his accomplice were jailed for life on Friday for murdering a Lithuanian woman whose severed head was found by children on a Scottish beach.

Vitas Plytnykas, 41, and Aleksandras Skirda, 20, were given jail terms of 28 and 20 years respectively for the murder of Jolanta Bledaite in Angus, Scotland, the Press Association reported.

The pair bound, gagged and suffocated their 35-year-old victim at the flat she shared with Skirda in Brechin, Angus, in March last year, after forcing her to give them access to her savings.

The High Court in Edinburgh heard that the pair cut up her mutilated remains and dumped them in the sea.

They were traced after two young girls found her head in a plastic bag in the harbour at Arbroath, about 15 miles away.

Her severed hands were also found on the foreshore and police divers later found a suitcase nearby containing her body.