Krasikov was convicted for the Aug. 23, 2019, killing of Zelimkhan "Tornike" Khangoshvili, a 40-year-old Georgian citizen who had fought Russian troops in Chechnya and later claimed asylum in Germany. Khangoshvili was gunned down from behind near Kleiner Tiergarten, a central Berlin park, with a silencer-fitted handgun. Witnesses saw the gunman throw a bike, a gun and a dark wig into the Spree River nearby. Police arrested him before he could escape on an electric scooter. At his sentencing to life in prison in 2021, German judges said Krasikov had acted on the orders of Russian authorities, who gave him a false identity, passport and the resources to carry out the killing. Krasikov reportedly served in a special forces unit that belonged to the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the top KGB successor agency.