The version of Yesenin’s murder arose almost simultaneously with the version of suicide.  According to the testimony of S. A. Yesenin’s niece, Svetlana Petrovna Yesenina, Vasily Nasedkin (husband of E. A. Yesenina) went to Leningrad on December 29, 1925, “when he returned from Leningrad, at home he said to Aunt Katya - Ekaterina Aleksandrovna Yesenina: “  Sergei was killed."  These are the exact words known from Aunt Katya.”  However, since the version of the murder could not be expressed in the media controlled by the Soviet government, it first appeared in the emigrant press a week after the death of the poet.  A note was published in the Riga newspaper “Slovo”:

“Rumors persist in Moscow that the poet Yesenin did not commit suicide, as the official version says, but was poisoned by security officers.  The suicide was simulated later.  <...> Investigator Semenovsky, who was leading the case towards the murder version of the poet, and not suicide, was removed from further investigation and replaced by another.  From circles close to the late poet, they report that Yesenin recently greatly annoyed the Soviet authorities with his caustic satires on the communist leadership, and these poems were illegally reproduced and secretly passed from hand to hand.”

"The death of S. A. Yesenin: a study of the version of suicide." St. Petersburg, 2023. Compiled by A. V. Krusanov.