Mother dangling crying daughter over balcony as punishment mistakenly drops her to her death

A mother has been arrested on suspicion of murder after she allegedly dropped her screaming daughter off a balcony and the girl died.

Anna Ruzankina, 23, dangled her three-year-old daughter Anastasia off the balcony as a punishment for crying, say police in Russia.

In harrowing video, Anastasia was heard begging her mother as she was dangled over the balcony.

The girl cried: “Mama, I am scared. I am scared, scared, scared…..I am scared.”

Shortly after, she fell 60ft to her death. 

The footage captures the final moment of her fall before she hits the ground. 

Ruzankina then retrieved the dead girl and CCTV footage then captures her holding her in the lift as she took her body back up to the family’s sixth-floor flat in Saratov, reports Life News. She shakes the lifeless child as if trying to revive her. 

Local media reports said the mother had been holding the screaming girl by her T-shirt over the balcony edge but her shirt tore and she fell.

The incident came after Ruzankina had been out to a nightclub and was drunk, reports claimed.

A male passer-by seen on the video said he heard “a child’s loud screams from an upper floor”.

He added: “And suddenly I heard a dull sound of falling. The screams stopped. 

“When I turned around, I saw a little girl covered in blood lying on the asphalt. I ran to call the emergency services. I was so shocked.”

Neighbours said the mother had claimed the child climbed over the balcony herself. 

“I told her she would fall,” the mother was heard saying to neighbours.

Ruzankina was detained on suspicion of murdering a minor and she faces up to 21 years in jail if convicted. 

Reacting to the incident, the Russian Investigative Committee said: “Ruzankina dropped her young daughter, born in 2018, from the balcony.

“Currently, the suspect has been detained.”