FORT WORTH, Texas _ After an extended stay at a state mental hospital, the estranged wife of former Cliburn winner Vadym Kholodenko is back in Tarrant County Jail after she was deemed competent to stand trial in the deaths of the couple's two young daughters.
Sofya Tsygankova was booked back into the Tarrant County Jail on May 25, records show.
Tsygankova, who turned 33 last month, is accused of smothering Michaela Kholodenko, 1, and Nika Kholodenko, 5, on March 17, 2016. She has pleaded not guilty to the capital murder charges.
On Oct. 31, state District Judge Ruben Gonzalez had ordered Tsygankova to a state mental health facility after a competency evaluation was completed by Dr. Barry Norman.
The state did not oppose the doctor's findings, which were sealed by the court, and a competency hearing was deemed not necessary by the court.
"Several doctors have evaluated her and have reached the conclusion that she is not competent for a trial (or) court proceedings at this time," her attorney, Joetta Keene, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram at the time.
On March 21, Gonzalez extended Tsygankova's stay at the North Texas State Hospital in Vernon by 60 days.
"The Court has been notified by the head of the facility that the Defendant is not yet competent but may be restored to competency within the foreseeable future," Gonzalez's order states.
On May 18, one day after a report was filed by the North Texas State Hospital, Gonzalez issued a bench warrant for Tsygankova's return. The report was sealed by the court.
No trial date has been set.
Kholodenko, the gold medalist in the 2013 Cliburn Piano Competition, was divorcing Tsygankova when his daughters were slain.
He had arrived at her Benbrook residence one morning to take the girls to school when he found Tsygankova covered in blood with cuts to her wrist and their children in bed, not moving, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.
Tsygankova had told police that she remembered cutting herself with a knife and taking pills because she "didn't want to live." She did not recall harming her children, the affidavit states.
"Did I do anything bad to my kids?" she reportedly asked investigators when interviewed hours after the bodies of her children were found.
The Tarrant County medical examiner's office ruled that the girl's died of "homicidal violence," likely by asphyxiation.
Tsygankova had a history with Mental Health and Mental Retardation services and had visited an MHMR facility in Fort Worth the day before her daughters were found dead, the affidavit states.
Police seized an empty prescription bottle from inside the home that indicated she had just filled a prescription for quetiapine, an antipsychotic drug used to treat such illnesses as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
In a recent interview with the Star-Telegram, Kholodenko said he had not talked to his estranged wife and shared how music helped him deal with the devastating loss of his daughters.
