Ksenia Sobchak, a Russian media personality and daughter of a man known as President Vladimir Putin's mentor, fled from Moscow on Tuesday night using an Israeli passport.
Sobchak, 40, is currently in Lithuania. A border security guard confirmed she entered the country using an Israeli passport.
According to reports, Sobchak was granted Israeli citizenship in April 2022 — two months after Russian forces first marched into Ukraine.
In September, Lithuania began requiring tourist visas from Russian nationals.
Russian detectives raided Sobchak's villa on the outskirts of Moscow on Wednesday as part of an investigation into an extortion case. The home raid shook the political and upper classes in Russia.
At the heart of the affair is Kirill Sukhanov – a high-ranking official in Sobchak's communications company – who was arrested on suspicion of extortion.
Sobchak on Tuesday rejected the allegations against Sukanov and claimed his arrest was part of authorities' crackdown on freedom of the press. Arian Romanovsky, another worker at the company, was also arrested.
State media outlets reported that Sobchak bought plane tickets to Dubai and Turkey to mislead the authorities, then crossed to Lithuania through Belarus.
Detectives suspect she is involved in the extortion allegations against Sukanov, and the authorities have issued a warrant for her arrest. Police say that if Sobchak is convicted of the extortion offenses attributed to her, she could be looking at up to 15 years in prison.
Ksenia Sobchak is the daughter of Anatoly Sobchak — the first democratically elected mayor of Saint Petersburg. Throughout the 1990s, he was a mentor and teacher of future president Vladimir Putin
Sobchak served as mayor from 1991 to 1996 and passed away in 2000 — the same year Putin ascended to the presidency.
Sergey Markov, a pro-Kremlin political commentator, said that the raid on Sobchak's villa sends wealthy Russians a message that no one is immune. "If they can arrest the daughter of Putin's patron, that means no one is out of reach anymore."
Ksenia Sobchak has millions of followers on social media and is a controversial figure in the eyes of the Russian public.
She first starred in a reality TV show where she picked up the nickname "Russian Paris Hilton". In a bid to change the public's perception of her, she took part in anti-Putin protests in Moscow in 2011 and 2012. She became a journalist and a vocal opposition activist, often making appearances on TV.
The Russian media personality often uses her platform to publicly criticize Putin and his invasion of Ukraine.
In 2018, she ran for the presidency against Putin but received only 1.7% of the vote. Critics dismissed her as a Kremlin puppet used to give the illusion that the vote is free and democratic.