‘The Tetris Murders’ Docuseries Explores Mysterious Death Of Tetris Co-Developer And His Family

ID’s three-part docuseries, The Tetris Murders, investigates the 1998 brutal murder of Tetris co-developer Vladimir Pokhilko, his wife Elena Fedotova and their son, Peter, in their Palo Alto home. The series, which premieres today on ID and discovery+, explores what was originally labeled a murder-suicide, but upon further inspection showed evidence possibly pointing in another direction.

The original investigation was led by Palo Alto Police Detective CSI Sandra Brown, who, upon seeing the crime scene and evidence, felt that something didn’t line up. When she found out that the FBI had their own interest in the case, she became even more suspicious that there were darker elements to this case with potential ties to Russia.

Forbes spoke to Brown about why she wanted to be involved in The Tetris Murders. We also discussed why she felt taking a second look at it could be helpful and what she hopes viewers will get out of the docuseries.

Risa Sarachan: How did you get involved with the series?

Sandra Brown: A little over two years ago, I received a call from my former colleague in the Palo Alto Police Department, Scott Wong. We had both been lieutenants together. He asked me if I would be interested in revisiting the Pokhilko case that we had worked together in 1998. I was definitely nervous at first by the premise of participating, but then the more I thought about it, I knew I definitely wanted to be a part of this docuseries – I felt excited that someone, decades later, was interested in hearing how we all really felt about that case in 1998. It felt kind of like finally someone is going to listen to us. Finally, we are going to get to really talk about this.

Sarachan: After so many years, what did it feel like to be interviewed about your experience with this case?

Brown: Over the course of my decades in law enforcement, this really was one of those cases that stuck with me. I felt so strongly about what really happened to Vladimir Pokhilko and his family, and I was excited at the opportunity to revisit this, dig in, and try to confirm what I felt when I originally investigated this case in 1998. The second I sat down to shoot with producers, I knew I had made the right decision, because they handed me a case file, asked me to turn to the first page, and I remember asking, “Are we rolling?.” Because what I saw in that file – a subpoena issued by the San Francisco branch of the FBI focused on Russian racketeering, in this case, the day after we arrived on the scene – completely shocked me and reinforced why I felt taking a second look could really help us bring some important clarity as to what truly happened to Vladimir and his family.

Sarachan: You worked in law enforcement for many years. Is this the case that haunts you the most?

Brown: I worked in law enforcement for over thirty years, and this was a case I was involved with while working for the city of Palo Alto. While many of the cases that I worked over my career have stuck with me, this is one of those that definitely still stands out. When I walked into that crime scene and saw Vladimir Pokhilko’s body lying there, I just knew something wasn’t right – and I still feel that way over twenty years later. The way his body was positioned. The way the knife was gripped in his hand. Just so much about the overall scene felt off to me. And while it may have, at first glance, looked like a murder-suicide, my gut just told me it wasn’t. I was grateful for the opportunity to talk about this again because this case is about so much more than Vladimir – his wife, Yelena and his son Peter were killed that night too. I wanted to speak for them then, and I still want to speak for them now. Especially since I, as well as other members of the community, didn’t feel that Vladimir had done this.

People in the community knew them as a happy and loving family. So it felt really important to be able to go back to this case, and if I can put even a seed of doubt in people’s minds that this case wasn’t the murder-suicide it was determined to be in 1998, then I feel like I’ve completed my job.

Sarachan: What did you think, at the time, when you learned Vladimir Pokhilko was a co-developer of Tetris?

Brown: You know, that honestly wasn’t a big deal for me. I mean, I grew up playing Tetris, but when we learned that bit of information, it wasn’t like we all instantly thought that had any bearing on the crime or there was any huge conspiracy around Vladimir and the game. Obviously, it’s very interesting that he was a co-developer, but that wasn’t even the biggest reveal or most shocking piece of evidence. I mean, there was so much at that scene that was much more shocking and revealing of what the crime was. The burned documents in the grill. The complete lack of fingerprints at the scene and on the murder weapon. The fact that there were multiple murder weapons. The baffling suicide note at the scene. There was so much there, outside of the nugget, that we needed to dig into and focus on.

Sarachan: With the stunning new information that is revealed in the series, do you think there’s a chance this case might finally get solved?

Brown: Well, unfortunately, as of 1998, this case has been closed as a murder-suicide. There isn’t much we can change there. However, what I do hope this series does is cause people to re-think the gut reaction of calling this a murder-suicide. I hope this causes people to look more deeply at the evidence that gave me pause back then, and still gives me pause now. But even more important to me than that is that there is a family at the center of this case. It’s more than just Vladimir. It’s his wife Yelena and his son Peter too. And from everything we heard from the community they were part of, they were a loving family and Vladimir was incapable of something this brutal and horrific. So to be able to speak for that family and bring some form of closure to those who didn’t think he did it is really what I hope this series can achieve.

Sarachan: What do you hope viewers come away with?

Brown: There are a couple of things that I hope viewers come away with. The first, is that I hope viewers understand that there is so much more to this case than meets the eye and feel similar to how I did, that Vladimir didn’t do this to his family. Because as I’ve mentioned previously, I really wanted to speak for that family – especially Yelena and Peter – because they lived in that community. Some people knew them. They were a quiet family but still neighbors in that community. The other thing I hope viewers come away with is that we, as law enforcement officers carry every case with us. While there are many cases in my career that I still carry with me, we’re still talking about this one twenty-four years later for a reason.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

The Tetris Murders debuts on ID and discovery+ today.