48 Hours on ID is investigating the murder of Anna Repkina by her fiance, Will Hargrove, who shot her dead and abandoned her body in a remote area near Alsea, Oregon.
On 17 April 2017, the body of 27-year-old Anna Repkina was found by a caretaker on the side of a remote logging road. She had been killed by a single gunshot blast to the head.
The police got an early break in the case; there was a receipt amongst a pile of trash beside Repkina’s body, which showed a debit card number linked to someone named Kevin Thomas. Thomas proved to be cooperative with the cops; he was not the killer, but he was friends with a man called Will Hargrove, and he had recently lent his pal a shotgun.
The police turned their focus towards Hargrove, and they began to uncover a complicated love triangle involving Repkina, Hargrove, and another woman called Michelle Chavez.
Repkina had been a native of Moscow, Russia, who had decided to try her luck at finding love online. She met Hargrove and they quickly hit it off and formed an intense relationship, so much so that she agreed to move to Oregon, and the pair became engaged.
But there was a big problem. Hargrove was already romantically involved with another woman, Michelle Chavez. Chavez was already married, but she became furious when she heard about her lover’s engagement to Repkina.
Chavez told Hargrove that she would end her marriage and promised to be with him instead. She even gave him her wedding ring to prove she was serious.
Watch the Latest on our YouTube ChannelWill Hargrove killed Anna Repkina to end the love triangle
The police believe that Hargrove then, unbeknown to the women involved, made promises to stay with both Repkina and Chavez. At some point, he seems to have concluded that the best way out of this predicament was to kill his Russian fiancee.
After the murder, Hargrove seems to have had some regrets. He even researched time travel in the hope that he could go back in time to change things. He wrote on WhatsApp, “… best friend made a mistake. I want to go back to keep from losing the woman that should be my wife.”
However, he also helped himself to $800 from Repkina’s bank account, which he then spent on Star Wars-themed lego, cigars, and candy. He was captured doing this on surveillance footage. In one store, he spoke to the cashier about losing his girlfriend and began crying and hugging the store employee.
In the end, the police arrested Hargrove and charged him with first-degree murder. His defense lawyers argued that a jealous Chavez might have been the killer.
But the evidence against Hargrove was overwhelming. The cops found the murder weapon in his car, and his cellphone data indicated he’d been in the area where Repkina was killed. He was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison.
More from 48 Hours on ID
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The disappearance of Tara Grinstead from her home in Oscilla, Georgia, in 2005 shocked and mystified the community for 15 years. One day, the police received a tip-off that led them to Bo Dukes and Ryan Duke.
Jennifer Kesse disappeared one morning in 2006 as she traveled from her home in Orlando, Florida, to work. Her car was found in a nearby parking lot. The cops have surveillance footage of the suspected killer, but frustratingly, their face is obscured by a fence.
48 Hours on ID airs at 8/7c on Investigation Discovery.