A Ukrainian schoolgirl is to be confronted on a deeply disturbing live primetime TV show this week with DNA evidence on whether she was made pregnant aged 11 by her stepfather or one of two brothers.
The child, Tanya Luchishin, has already faced a painful studio ordeal after she mistakenly claimed her five-week old daughter Diana had been fathered by an 18-year-old neighbour called Andriy, who had sex with her when he was 17.
The excruciating television programme subsequently revealed a DNA test which showed the baby was not his although he admitted to having slept with her, a crime which could see him jailed for between five and ten years.
Under interrogation in front of a TV audience, a tearful and distressed Tanya, now 12, later indicated she had been also forced to have sex around the time she conceived with someone else, a member of her own family.
Tanya Luchishin, of the town of Borislav in the Lviv region of Ukraine, says she was impregnated by her stepfather or one of her two brothers when she was just 11 years old
She has already faced a painful studio ordeal after she mistakenly claimed her five-week old daughter Diana had been fathered by an 18-year-old neighbour called Andriy, who had sex with her when he was 17
She will now be confronted on a deeply disturbing live primetime TV show this week with DNA evidence on whether she was made pregnant aged 11 by her stepfather Ivan Eremin, in his 30s, her brother Volodya, 15, and her half-brother Viktor, 17
‘I won’t talk because this person is in this studio,’ Tanya, from Borislav in the Lviv region, said as she clutched her baby and walked past the three ‘suspects’.
To expose the identity, the show – which appears at times like an inquisition – is now DNA testing her stepfather Ivan Eremin, in his 30s, her brother Volodya, 15, and her half-brother Viktor, 17, all of whom strenuously deny paternity.
Tanya will this week be confronted with the truth – which she has tried to hide because she is ‘afraid’ – on TV show ‘It Concerns Everybody’ when the result of the DNA test is revealed.
Quizzed on whether he is the father, which could lead to a long jail sentence, Eremin said: ‘No, absolutely not. I would not have come here if I had anything to do with the pregnancy of my step-daughter.’
He told the audience: ‘I am ready to undertake a DNA test and to prove that I am not the father of this child.
‘I am afraid of nothing. I don’t want to live when people are pointing their figures at me, at my wife. I never had any relations with Tanya, I could not even think about it. ‘
Volodya Luchishin (left), Tanya’s brother, said he knew who was suspected but didn’t ‘want to talk about it’. Half brother Viktor Dimiyon (right) said: ‘I am not guilty and I don’t know who is the father of her child’
Volodya had his arm bandaged after a playground fight over the matter, said he had been mocked by his classmates over the TV programme
Quizzed on whether he is the father, which could lead to a long jail sentence, Ivan Eremin also said he was not the father
Psychologists have expressed strong concern that the public ordeal is having on a ‘depressed’ Tanya and critics say she should be seen as a child victim of multiple rapes, one of them evidently incestuous, and not forced to become the star of a show seen as a new low in reality television.
Vlada Berezyanskaya, a psychologist who examined Tanya for the programme, said: ‘This girl… is simply afraid. She is depressed now.’
The child ‘loved her daughter’ and wanted to care for her, but was ‘scared of the speculation’ about the identity of the father.
‘Tanya is a child, she is guilty of nothing,’ she said, yet the psychologist did not seek to put a stop to the controversial show.
Tanya’s 31-year-old mother Anna Luchishin – who has six children – has been blamed for putting her vulnerable daughter through the trial by TV amid suspicion she is getting paid for exposing her family’s problems.
She is now helping Tanya raise the child, Diana, born weighing 5lbs 5oz by Caesarean on September 17, but on screen was seen encouraging her daughter to answer intimate questions when the girl plainly did not want to.
‘Please, tell them everything,’ said her mother.
Baby Diana was recently baptised in an Orthodox church when Ivan Eremin held the baby with his wife
Tanya is pictured meeting her siblings at the maternity hospital after giving birth in September
Tanya whispered back: ‘I can’t.’
In one troubling sequence, tears rolled down her face and she could not answer as she was quizzed about having sex with the neighbour: ‘And he began, to do what?’
She was asked if she ‘liked’ the neighbour who came to her house when no-one else was home to demand sex with the 11 year old.
She said strongly: ‘No.’
The presenter went on: ‘So nobody was at home and he knew it, right?’
‘Nobody’, she said.
The presenter again asked’ ‘What did he do?’
She could not answer. She was asked: ‘Did he beat you?’
‘No, he did not beat,’ she responded.
An audience member asked: ‘Did he push you?’
She said no and added that she did not realise she could become a mother.
She sighed with extreme discomfort when she was asked: ‘Did he explain his actions in any way?’
Tanya was asked: ‘Maybe you cried for help?’
She replied: ‘No, (I was) silent.’
Tanya’s 31-year-old mother Anna Luchishin (left) – who has six children – has been blamed for putting her vulnerable daughter through the trial by TV amid suspicion she is getting paid for exposing her family’s problems
Under the questioning she said he had returned for sex on two more occasions.
While police are now taking an interest in the revelations – which include prima facie evidence of crime – they have not sought to halt the show to protect the underage girl, and this week will see the third episode on the saga in which the family member who fathered the child is due to be named based on the DNA tests.
Presenter Andrey Danilevich, from Inter TV, claimed he was simply seeking to uncover the truth.
‘The girl, who got pregnant at the age of 11, is in any case is the victim of adult irresponsibility and manipulations,’ he said.
‘Now almost all the men in Borislav town who visited the Luchishin family are under suspicion, including the girl’s stepfather and brothers.
‘We all know how cruel the people’s tongues can be. It is important to find out who is the father of Tanya’s child in order to stop the speculation.’
Anna, Tanya’s mother, told viewers her daughter had initially named who she believed to be the father.
‘But our neighbour Andriy is not the father of my granddaughter Diana,’ she said. ‘I received a call from the laboratory in Lviv and they said it was not him.
‘Andriy’s father Oleg had paid for this DNA test in Lviv. I was shocked. I told Tanya about the test and asked her – so who was it then?
‘And she told me there was one more person. I asked her to tell me the truth. It happened in February when I was in hospital with my newborn daughter Viktoria. I don’t want to give the name. It is a person from our family. But it may not be him.’
Psychologists have expressed strong concern that the public ordeal is having on a ‘depressed’ Tanya and critics say she should be seen as a child victim of multiple rapes, one of them evidently incestuous, and not forced to become the star of a show seen as a new low in reality television.
Tanya has also given the same name to police.
Anna said: ‘I should not say this but I don’t know now if I can trust my daughter. She says one thing, then another thing, as if she doesn’t know herself.
‘She pointed at Andriy before and I attacked him. I don’t know what to do now. Maybe she is wrong again? Tanya is upset now, she does not want to say more.’
Tanya said she did not realise she was pregnant until a doctor noticed when she accompanied her mother to a check-up for her baby sister.
‘Tanya was sent to a scan and within a minute the doctor said: ‘You’re pregnant?’
‘I screamed – ‘how?’ Tanya began to say: ‘No, I can’t be pregnant.’ ‘And the next moment doctor asked her: ‘Who did you sleep with?’ ‘Tanya cried and said she never did it.’
‘When we left the scanner room, I began to cry, I felt so unwell. Tanya told me: ‘Mama, it was Andriy, our neighbour.’ From the hospital I went straight to the police.’
Tanya said that throughout her pregnancy, she didn’t have any symptoms.
She said: ‘I didn’t know that I was pregnant. I did not feel the baby moving.I never felt sick, I had no pains. I was going to PE lessons at school. There were no pains.
‘I felt contractions on 18 September, it was 35 weeks – so then my daughter was born.’
Tanya has proudly posted pictures of her baby on her social media, but has received some ‘dirty and negative comments’ in response
Children ombudsman Valeria Lutkovskaya accused the show of flouting Tanya’s human rights and appealed to Ukraine’s TV regulator to take legal measures against the channel
Anna admitted: ‘Now my husband Ivan and my son Volodya are under suspicion. I have spoken to Volodya. He said: ”Mum, don’t mock me.’ I spoke to my husband.
‘He was really upset, and he told me he wanted to do a DNA test, because he could not live like this. He wants to prove to the whole of Ukraine that it was not him.
‘When we came back home from the police that day, he got drunk. His mother called me in tears, saying everyone at her work blames him.’
A body language specialist also pointed the finger at him.
And neighbour Alexandra Virt claimed: ‘All of us could see that Tanya was pregnant.
‘We told her mother many times about it, I told her, other our women told her. She did not take any action. I even told Ivan: ‘Your Tanya is pregnant.’
‘He said: ‘What are you talking about? She had just had her period.’ I remember I said to my husband then: ‘How could the man know when Tanya had her period?”
Volodya Luchishin, Tanya’s brother, his arm bandaged after a playground fight over the matter, said he had been mocked by his classmates over the TV programme.
Lviv regional police say a criminal investigation has been opened relating to underage sex> Tanya is pictured above with her mother, Anna, and sister, Irina
He said: ‘When I came to school, other students said: ‘Oh, you’re a TV celebrity now, so you are the father?’. Or: ‘Your step-father is the father?’ So I had to fight. She is my sister, how could I sleep with her? I know who is suspected but I don’t want to talk about it.’
Half brother Viktor Dimiyon said: ‘I am not guilty and I don’t know who is the father of her child.’
Baby Diana was recently baptised in an Orthodox church when Ivan Eremin held the baby with his wife.
Reports say Tanya, from Borislav in Lviv region, ‘was allowed to wear lipstick’ for the occasion.
She has proudly posted pictures of her baby on her social media, but has received some ‘dirty and negative comments’ in response.
Children ombudsman Valeria Lutkovskaya accused the show of flouting Tanya’s human rights and appealed to Ukraine’s TV regulator to take legal measures against the channel.
Lviv regional police say a criminal investigation has been opened relating to underage sex.
Police say they have ordered separate DNA tests over the paternity and point out that the neighbour can face prosecution over his admission of sex with the girl when she was 11.