2009, Mykola Melnychenko accused Volodymyr Lytvyn of ordering the murder of Gongadze in 2000, but offered no proof to back up the claim. A spokesperson for Lytvyn dismissed the claims as part of his presidential election campaign. The Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine plans to complete its investigation into the case of Oleksiy Pukach by the end of the summer of 2010. Ukrainian Prosecutor General Oleksandr Medvedko stated on 17 June 2010 that skull fragments found near Bila Tserkva in July 2009 were those of Gongadze. On 14 September 2010, Ukraine's Office of the Prosecutor General issued a statement stating that prosecutors had concluded that former Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko had ordered Pukach to carry out the murder, and stating that Pukach had confessed to the murder. According to Gongadze's widow, Myroslava Gongadze, "Kravchenko had had no grounds for such actions"; she believed that several people ordered the killing of the journalist. According to Heorhii Gongadze's mother, Olesya, the statement was an attempt by the Prosecutor-General's office to excuse itself for its inactivity. On 16 September 2010, Lytvyn asserted that the investigation into the murder of Gongadze confirmed his innocence in this crime. Pukach's trial, on allegations he strangled and beheaded Gongadze, began on 7 July 2011. It was closed to the public. On 30 August 2011, Pukach claimed that Kuchma was the one who ordered the murder. During the trial he also alleged that Lytvyn ordered the murder of Gongadze. In December 2011, the Pechersk District Court refused to accept witness testimony of Mykola Melnychenko as he has not been authorised to gather evidences for a committing crime, while conducting recordings in a cabinet of the President of Ukraine. On 29 January 2013, Pukach was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv. Oleksiy Pukach also was stripped of his rank "General of Militsiya". The court ruled Pukach had murdered the journalist on orders from Kravchenko, who was seeking a career promotion. On 9 July 2014, Myroslava Gongadze withdrew her appeal against the sentence of Pukach, as, according to her lawyer Valentyna Telychenko, "If the Court of Appeals will meet our appeal, it will be forced to simultaneously release Pukach from custody. We believe that Pukach is a killer and should serve his sentence". Telychenko blamed former First Deputy Prosecutor-General Renat Kuzmin for "speculating with the Gongadze case" that according to her led to "exhausting Pukach's