Now that I think about it, wasn't Crime & Punishment written by the glorious author Beppedor Marottoevsky? If I recall, it's about a sweet old lady that was robbed and then falsely accused and had to go in exile before returning to punish them all. Including great antagonists like Gallianov and Morratishkin and a couple of weird chinese businessmen, who were left wheeping at the end as the old lady kept suffocating their existence, pushing them further and further down into oblivion until they were no more.