Almost every person, having heard the name "Chikatilo", immediately recalls the story of a terrible and ruthless maniac, whose deeds in the twentieth century stirred up the whole world.

While the investigation was going on, the arrested criminal was in solitary confinement. Most investigators were sure that if Chikatilo waited for a decision in the same room as the thieves, he simply would not survive. The reason for this is the bloodthirstiness, groundlessness and immorality of the deed. Even the underworld does not accept sadists and severely punishes such perverted murders.

What exactly spurred an ordinary, it would seem, man to this kind of murder? Why did an ordinary boy from the village turn into the most terrible, merciless and frightening killer that the whole world is still talking about?

“Murderers are not born, but become” - everyone is familiar with this expression. Most often, aggression and all sorts of perversions are the result of childhood grievances, problems and complexes. The biography of Andrei Chikatilo is another confirmation of the world-famous statement.

The Soviet Jack the Ripper was born on October 16, 1936. The boy grew up and studied in his native village of Apple, which currently belongs to the Sumy region. Many argue that Andrei had a congenital neurological disease - hydrocephalus. Problems were indicated by urinary incontinence even in relatively adulthood. Incontinence became one of the main causes of beatings from the mother.

The guy didn’t really remember his father, because after returning from captivity, the man was equated with a traitor and repressed. Chikatilo went to school in 1944. Suffering during the educational process intensified. The boy was the object of constant ridicule. Due to constant embarrassment, he could not study normally, he was afraid to ask questions to teachers and attract attention to himself.

The children's psyche continued to be broken by the mother's stories about the terrible famine, during which Andrei's older brother was eaten. Because of the terrible fear of being caught, the guy stopped going out in 1946, when famine came to the Soviet Union. Constant self-control and complexes always stifled his impulses and did not allow him to feel relief.

Chikatilo graduated from high school in 1954 and tried to enter the Lomonosov Moscow State University. The refusal was argued by the fact that the graduate did not pass the competition. But Andrew did not believe what was said. The guy lived with the stigma of "the son of a traitor and traitor", he was sure that the reason lies precisely in this. Despite the refusal, Chikatilo believed in his importance. As a result, he received a technical specialty.

In the period from 1957 to 1960, the future serial killer has to endure a number of new problems. All this time he served in the army. There, he again proved to be the cause of ridicule, bullying and even sexual perversion by his colleagues.

The inability to relieve stress, constant tension and the injustice of the environment engendered hatred for the whole world in Chikatilo. He could not fight back with his peers, but he gladly suppressed weaker people. This was evidenced by the situation that happened to him in the tenth grade.

On that day, the teenager experienced an orgasm for the first time. Ejaculation did not occur during intercourse, namely at the time of the use of force. The girl who visited Chikatilo's yard intentionally entered into conflict with him, continuing to annoy the young man for some time. Unable to stand it, Andrei threw her to the ground. He did not have to do any manipulations or undress the 13-year-old guest. The usual indignant cries gave an unexpected result.

Chikatilo was very upset by this situation. Despite the experiences, psychologists do not tire of insisting that this was the first time the "Rostov Ripper" felt his power and strength over a weak girl.

Education and work

After the army, the educated Andrei moved near Rostov-on-Don, to the village of Rodionov-Nesvetaiskaya. He combined his work as an engineer with a creative profession. At the same time, Chikatilo wrote articles for the Znamya regional newspaper. These activities did not bring pleasure and the desired satisfaction.

In search of himself, the man entered the correspondence department at Rostov University and graduated from it. Five years later he received another education. The University of Marxism-Leninism at the Pedagogical Institute made it possible to hold leadership positions in educational institutions and teach. It was here that the path of Andrei Chikatilo began, behind which the bloody traces of child victims stretched like a train.

The post of chairman of the district committee of physical culture and sports (1965) was the first job that the future killer enjoyed. Communication with teenagers, observing them and studying child psychology - all this interested him. Interest in the younger generation gradually increased.

Already in 1979, he was able to join the staff of boarding school No. 32. The teacher of the Russian language and literature, the head teacher and even the director - Chikatilo managed to visit all these positions. Despite such a rapid career growth, the man had to quit. The reason for this was the complaints of two students about harassment on his part.

Leaving school for own will”, the man took the position of master of industrial training at Novoshakhtinsky GPTU-39. Here he lingers for four years.

In 1978, the teacher and his family moved to the Rostov region - the city of Shakhty. Chikatilo Andrei Romanovich gets a job at GPTU-33 as an educator.

He cannot hide his inner impulses and interest in growing children. Now the teacher was interested not only in girls. Feeling the boys gave him pleasure and pleasure. Such hobbies and masturbation activities did not go unnoticed by the students. The children laughed and openly mocked Chikatilo, beat him and called him "pedophile", "gay".

Personal life

Andrei Chikatilo was married and raised two children. Even after the first incident with a 13-year-old girl, he promised himself to make love only with his wife.

He suppressed his sexual desires and passion until 1962. It was at this time that Andrei met his sister's friend Faina, who, a year and a half later, became his wife. The wife is next to her man during all his career victories and falls.

The first son of Faina and Chikatilo dies immediately after giving birth. A year later, the woman gives her husband a daughter, Lyudmila, and in 1969 (four years later), a boy, Yuri, appears in their family.

In Chikatilo's family life, everything was smooth and calm. The wife, having learned about all his deeds, could not believe what she heard. Her quiet, accommodating, hard-working and sympathetic husband, the father of two children, could not brutally crack down on children, and then return home and play with his own daughter and son.

The stooped, modest, well-read and soft-bodied man, who, as his relatives thought, could not hurt even a fly, brutally and mercilessly killed children for many years. Looking at the photo of Chikatilo, it is difficult to call him mentally unstable and frightening.

He struck fear into the hearts of the parents of the entire USSR. For ten years, the operational services tried to figure out the maniac, mothers and fathers accompanied their children everywhere, moreover, the authorities managed to shoot the innocent Alexander Kravchenko in the death of the first victim of Chikatilo.

First kill

The first victim of Chikatilo was a nine-year-old girl, Elena Zakotnova. This murder clearly showed the rapist what makes him happy and satisfied. In the murder of Elena Zakotnova, a completely different person, Alexander Kravchenko, was accused and shot.

The fact that this girl was the first victim was told by Chikatilo himself during the investigation:

“After we entered the hut, I fell on the girl. She screamed, and I covered her mouth with my hands ... These screams brought my excitement to the extreme. I wanted to constantly feel and tear everything. When I choked her, she wheezed. It was at this moment that I experienced the most vivid orgasm in my life, ”the serial killer was frank in his interview.

After the incident with the girl, Chikatilo held back for three years. Tension accumulated, and the desire to repeat those “bright sensations” only intensified.

Murders and arrest

1982 was the beginning of a terrible nightmare and fatal for every inhabitant of the Soviet Union. Fear haunts parents and children. Police officers visit the forest belt every month (and sometimes several times) to identify new corpses.

The criminal brutally and pervertedly killed each of his victims: he cut off the testicles of the boys, gnawed off the nipples of the female sex and cut out their genitals, tore the tongue, the clothes of the victims and scattered them around, inflicted numerous stab wounds, gouged out their eyes and perverted sexual acts ( using sticks and other improvised means).

The reason for such cruelty and hatred of the genitals was his self-doubt. Chikatilo felt like an inferior impotent who could enjoy watching the torment of his victims.

For the first time, a criminal and a maniac was detained in 1984. The district inspector was alarmed by the behavior of the man. He was overly excited, molested teenagers. The contents of the suitcase (knife, ropes, dirty towel, Vaseline) confirmed the fears.

The main evidence that could confirm or disprove the guilt of the offender were traces of semen. Unfortunately, then medicine was not so developed, because it was believed that the sperm group should match the blood type. Chikatilo's feature (the discrepancy between these two analyzes) played to his advantage. Soon, due to lack of evidence, the man was found not guilty and released.

The killer was released and continued to commit his merciless atrocities for six years. When the crimes continued, the operatives set about the operation "Forest Belt". Employees law enforcement for several years they hunted for a thoughtful maniac. And only in 1990, Chikatilo managed to be detained. After another murder, the maniac went to the station station, where he was detained by a police sergeant. The young man asked the man to show his documents. Not noticing anything suspicious, the policeman recorded the name "Chikatilo" and let him go.

The discovery of the corpse led to a revision of all documents for the past week. Faced with the familiar name of "Chikatilo", the operatives began planning an interception mission. Caught a maniac when he was returning home from the store. The man began to speak only on the tenth day from the moment of detention.

Court sentence

At the trial in 1992, the killer was accused of 56 murders, and his guilt was not proven in several dozen more crimes. Chikatilo was sentenced to death, which satisfied every person sitting in the hall. Furious parents dreamed of committing lynching, and only a high iron cage saved this maniac. The criminal was in the Novocherkassk prison.

He wrote a large number of letters to the president, asking for pardon and saving his life. All requests were denied. On February 14, 1994, the bloodthirsty sadist, the destroyer of children and women, Andrei Chikatilo, was executed by a shot in the back of the head.

At present, this sadist and pervert has not ceased to be talked about. Films and numerous programs have been made that tell the story of a child who was beaten as a child, who turned into a real monster.

Andrey Romanovich Chikatilo was born on October 16, 1936 in the village of Yablochnoye, Akhtyrsky district, Sumy region, Ukrainian SSR. His parents were over 30 at the time of his birth. Andrei described his father as a quiet, modest person. He often told his son about the war, about how he was in a concentration camp, while crying. Speaking of his mother, Chikatilo recalled that she often failed to devote enough time to her children, all her thoughts were aimed at somehow ensuring their survival.

And this is not an exaggeration, since the hardest trials in the history of the country fell to the lot of the young family - these are the periods of mass famine of 1932-1933. and 1946-1947, and, of course, the Great Patriotic War. At the beginning of the war, Chikatilo's father leaves for the front, while his mother and Andrei from 1941 to 1943 remain to live in the territory occupied by the Nazis. According to A. Korchinsky, the author of an interview with A. Chikatilo's son, Yuri, it is possible that at the age of 6-7 years, Andrei could witness the rape of his mother by a German soldier. Although no confirmation of this can be found from other sources, the correspondent builds his assumptions on the fact that in 1943 Andrei Chikatilo's sister Tatyana was born. At the same time, it is obvious that the father, who was at the front at that time, could not be the father of the girl. Whether it was really so difficult to say. In any case, Andrei Romanovich himself, talking about the horrors of the war, never mentioned such a fact.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

I was in my fifth year when my father was taken to the front. I remember it was a very nice day, summery and warm, and there was nothing gloomy about it. In addition to my father, all the fellow villagers of military age went to the front, and there was no one to do agricultural work, the village was empty.

I remember the horrors of childhood, when we hid from bombing and shooting in basements, quarries, hungry and cold sat in ditches; dashes under the whistle of bullets; I remember how my native house burned, and the atrocities of the Nazis.

As he later recalled, once a detachment of Red Army soldiers passed through the village: young, in new uniforms, they went to take a mortal battle on the outskirts of the village. After the fight, the little boy witnessed a very different picture. He saw the same soldiers as the day before, but now they were all dead, many bodies bloodied, mutilated, without arms or legs. This picture stuck in his memory for a long time.

Chikatilo's father escaped a similar fate. He did not die at the front, did not become disabled, although his fate can hardly be called happy. Having escaped from the encirclement, he went to the partisan detachment. For some time he was a partisan, he committed military actions against the occupiers. Then he was taken prisoner. He worked for the Germans in the mine. The Americans released him. After his release, he was subjected to repressions, since, according to Stalin's canons, he could work for German and American intelligence. He was sent to logging in the Komi ASSR, then to Chuvashia.

So the family was left without a breadwinner during the most difficult period of the mass famine of 1946-47, which had especially difficult consequences in the Ukrainian SSR. Researchers of this period of Soviet history describe the current situation as follows:

The food shortage in 1946 led to the fact that the state withdrew almost everything from food rations. rural population(100 million people), who were offered to survive solely at the expense of their own subsidiary plots. However, due to directives to maximize grain procurements, 8% of collective farms stopped paying for workdays in grain, and most of the rest gave out no more than 1 kg of grain per day. 30% of households did not pay in cash, so people there also could not buy food for money. At the same time, in September 1946, the prices for bread in state stores were doubled. The following figures speak of the scale of the famine: by the spring of 1947, in the Voronezh region alone, the number of patients with a diagnosis of "dystrophy" was 250 thousand people, in total in the RSFSR - 600 thousand, in Ukraine - more than 800 thousand, in Moldova - more 300 thousand. Thus, at least 1.7 million people in the USSR were considered “officially starving”, mortality from dystrophy reached 10% of the total number of people who were diagnosed with this. Especially high was infant mortality, at the beginning of 1947 amounting to 20% of the total number of deaths. The population was in a terrible situation, in a number of regions of Ukraine and the Chernozem region, cases of cannibalism were noted.

Realizing that cannibalism is becoming a reality of life in times of famine, the mother tried to warn her young children from this danger. She told Andrei that during the Holodomor of 1933, his older brother Stepan was allegedly kidnapped and eaten by people distraught with hunger. This story made a proper impression on little Andrei and he did not leave the house, fearing that he, like his brother, might also be caught and eaten.

To understand Chikatilo's personality, the fact that he knew from an early age that his older brother was eaten by starving people is extremely importance. Eating a person was a reality for him, and not an abstraction, as for the vast majority of people. What came to him in the story does not play a significant role, since his father and mother told him about it, moreover, about his own brother. It can be assumed that this firmly settled in his psyche and largely directed his actions, although he was not aware of this. In addition, in his childhood, the most receptive years, he generally saw many dead people and deaths, and death had long become something close and understandable to him.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

I remember the famine after the war, I remember the dead. I remember how I saw with horror how the dead of hunger were taken away along the street - without coffins wrapped in rags, how I heard talk about cannibalism ... I was chubby from hunger along with my mother and sister. My sister and I crawled on the grass, ate "kalachiki", roared and looked out from the collective farm field to my mother when she brought us a piece of black bread.

Naturally, he also develops a fear of being destroyed, a very real danger for himself, in other words, the fear of death. Such fear is almost always unconscious, but it creates a personal disposition, a certain vision of the world, its own philosophy, and all this begins to form from childhood in the absence of a sense of security in cases of rejection by other people, especially parents. In this regard, it should be emphasized that his entire subsequent life only strengthened this fear, since it consisted of a continuous series of humiliations, beatings, sexual abuse alienation from people.

Much later, in 1990-92. all these ghosts of the past will resurrect again in the stories of Chikatilo, he will constantly return to these tragic pages of his biography both in conversations with the investigators who were investigating his crimes, and during the forensic psychiatric examination, and during interviews with journalists.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

In September 1944, I went to the 1st grade, hungry and ragged. At school, from hungry fainting, I fell under the desk. Walked in rags. He was the subject of ridicule and could not defend himself. He was too shy, timid, shy. If I didn't have a pen or ink in class, I just sat at my desk and cried. Sometimes the students talked about this teacher. She was surprised: “What, Andrei has no language ?!” If I needed to go to the toilet, I was afraid to ask for leave.

I could not see what was written on the board - congenital myopia, now I have glasses: - 4.0. I was afraid to ask what was written on the blackboard, I could not distinguish well - I was nervous, crying. We didn’t have glasses in those years, we weren’t tested for vision, and then, with age, we were afraid of the nickname “bespectacled”. I began to wear glasses only from the age of thirty, when I got married.

Since at school I did not learn the material from the words of the teacher - due to absent-mindedness, and from the blackboard - due to blindness, I studied hard at home on my own, using textbooks. This is how secrecy, solitude, alienation appeared in me.

... all my life I was humiliated, trampled on, I despaired, I am spineless, I could not defend myself from the guys. They beat me because of my clumsiness, slowness of action, absent-mindedness, they called me a muddler, a weakling, a woman, I could not give them back. Tears of resentment choked me all my life. I was ashamed even of the fact that I was born. I remember hiding in the weeds until my mother came.

... my relationship with my mother is normal, generally good. She never punished, but she never caressed, and what kind of caresses are there when at work from dawn to dusk. Then everyone died of hunger, so the main caress was a piece of bread.

.... Father is quiet, modest, I am more like him .. I prayed to God that my father would quickly return from exile (after captivity) and protect me. I remember how in those years, in a cold hut - every time I was alone - I knelt before the icon in the corner and prayed: “Lord, give me back my dad!” And in 1949 my father returned from the war. The patient, with pulmonary tuberculosis, was spitting up blood, lying down, moaning. We needed good food, but there was none. My mother also had frequent headaches, but the collective farm did not treat her. And they did not know diseases at that time. He protected me, but not very much, so I tried not to go outside ...

Father, due to his state of health, could not work with full dedication, and he was not given a good job, because he was in captivity. My father and mother worked on the collective farm, and they received nothing for workdays, except for food, which was barely enough. Our family, even by the standards of that time, was poor.

As can be seen from this story, since childhood, Chikatilo was timid, withdrawn, shy, had no close friends, was distinguished by dreaminess, impressionability and a penchant for fantasizing. Andrei was weak and clumsy, in addition to everything, he had a whole bunch of physical defects, because of which he was very worried, such as, for example, myopia mentioned in Chikatilo's story, in addition, it is known that until the age of 12 he suffered from nocturnal enuresis. On his own, he was not able to protect himself, which his peers felt as a child. At the same time, his parents did not protect him at all. The father was "quiet, modest", Chikatilo could not even find psychological support in him. The mother, as can be concluded from his story, seemed to take a neutral position - she did not punish, but did not caress, and this suggests her indifference to her son, which, of course, was fatal for the child, especially if he was viciously pursued by other boys. As Yu.M. Antonyan: “It may be objected that in those harsh years a piece of bread was more important than maternal affection, but one cannot agree with this in any case, since parental love is especially needed, truly vital just in difficult times.”

Studying relationships in such families, psychiatrist A.O. Bukhanovsky, introduced the term "Chikatilo's mothers" into science, whom he describes as cruel women with an imperious character and a pronounced role of a family leader, often lonely or humiliating their husbands, pushing them to the periphery of raising their son. Often, such fathers episodically "wake up the rage of education" - harshly cruel - in fact, they tear off their humiliation in the family on the child. The sons of such mothers have their childhood years, when communication with peers is vital for the formation of a future personality, pass under the strictest control and a ban on all "off-duty" contacts. The tragic lack of communication with peers, parental love and affection, the constant absence of positive emotions, the inability to understand and express oneself contribute to irreversible personality changes. Hence the inability to sympathize, to communicate with other people, the inability to be attached, to love, to empathize. These children do not know how to protect themselves either morally or physically, hiding from reality in a world of unusual cruel fantasies.

Another specialist who had direct contact with Chikatilo, Yu.M. Antonyan believes that the decisive role in the psychological alienation of the individual is played not by the composition of the family, not by its material well-being, not by relations between parents, not by their unseemly and even illegal behavior, but mainly by their emotional attitude towards the child, acceptance or, on the contrary, rejection.

When emotional contacts with parents are absent, their moral values ​​in verbal or behavioral terms are not acquired by the child. If the mother, father do not fulfill the functions assigned to them, the child has a feeling of insecurity, uncertainty, anxiety. If the situation does not improve, such feelings can progress, turning into constant anxiety and even fear. It is important to emphasize that when a child's emotional needs are not met, the need to communicate with people may not form as a result of the distance that was formed between him and his parents at an early stage in life. As a result, the foundations are laid for the future psychological alienation of the individual, his misunderstanding and rejection of the environment and its values, and even the expectation of a threat from it. The underdevelopment of the need for communication, social in its origin, originates in the mentioned most sensitive period of the individual's life.

The danger of these socio-psychological formations for the future fate of a person is noted by L. B. Filonov. Generalizing and deepening, becoming more and more stable and rigid, they deform the personality, acquire a pivotal character, and begin to develop independently. Anomalous personality structures and distorted contours of individual aspects of the personality are created. These parties then begin to react selectively only to some, as it were, "pre-prepared" social influences, filtering them out from the mass of others. A.F. Polis adheres to a similar position, believing that a violation of the primary ties of socialization, emotional contacts can not only contribute to alienation and neuroticism, but also correlate, in all likelihood, with such phenomena as alcoholism, hooliganism, cruelty, and with some others. forms of deviant behavior.

Summing up the foregoing, we can argue that the absence or significant impoverishment of the child's emotional contacts with the mother and father, the rejection of him by one of them, and especially by both, is the psychological alienation of the individual, laying the foundation for further maladaptation. The family, including children in its psychological structure, thus ensures their primary socialization, introducing them "through itself" into the structure of society. If this does not happen, the child is alienated from the family, which creates the prerequisites for a very likely distance in the future from society, its institutions and values. Alienation from the family can turn into a persistent maladaptive existence.

Thus, in the absence of the necessary emotional contacts with parents from an early age, Chikatilo develops and consolidates the idea of ​​not just alienation and incomprehensibility, but also of the hostility of the world around him.

As time goes by, a nondescript, notorious, blind-sighted boy becomes a young man, fear has entered his flesh and blood - fear of humiliation, fear of violence. He is completely alone against the hostile world around him and continues to collect his failures and humiliations from his classmates.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

Once, as usual, because of my own timidity, I was standing in a corner at a break, and then the “furious” classmates pushed a girl at me. She tried not to fall and lingered on me. I did not intentionally, but from the horror that I was wearing a girl, I strongly pushed her away from me. After that, a very offensive nickname stuck to me - “Andrei is strength” ...

The experience of the hostility of the environment gave rise to a feeling of hatred in Chikatilo, which increases over the years. Depressive states were gradually erased - with the manifestation of impotent rage, the experience of feelings of resentment and a sense of one's own inferiority. Later, Chikatilo began to reassess his own personality, thoughts about his own exclusivity appeared. This is most clearly seen in adolescence, when the feeling of inferiority that arose was compensated by an increased interest in learning, a passion for Marxist philosophy, and the expectation of the imminent onset of communism as a deliverance from the injustice and hostility of the surrounding world.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

Teaching was difficult for me. I often had headaches and dizziness. And my attention was kind of distracted. But I stubbornly continued to study until I lost consciousness. Read many books. He admired military literature, especially the partisan "The Underground Regional Committee Operates", "In the Swamps", idolized the "Young Guard". I liked it also because my father was the commander of a partisan detachment. (Later, Chikatilo admits to the psychiatrists who conducted the examination that after reading these novels, he had an almost visible idea of ​​​​how he takes the “lonely tongue”, and, following the order of the commander, ties and beats him in the forest. - Approx. Aut.)

I tried to be ahead of my comrades in my studies. Participated in amateur performances. True, in collective forms - a choir, literary and musical montage. He was the editor of the wall newspaper in all classes. He designed all the documentation for the pioneer detachment, then for the Komsomol group. He was an active agitator, political informant, member of the Komsomol school committee. At school, until late, he drew manuals in various subjects.

Having learned the written and oral lessons, I drew tables. I had two favorite activities. In middle school, I decided to draw an endless series of ordinal numbers and wrote almost up to a million. In the eighth grade, I decided to make a detailed atlas, for all regions and districts, where I wrote out the names of districts that belong to various regions from newspapers. In the geography textbook, on every page I had the name of the secretary general of this country, since I was convinced that communism was already advancing.

Poverty and indelible shame gave rise in me to a stubborn dream of a high political career. I firmly believed that I would not be the last person. My place is in the Kremlin…”

An excerpt from the expert opinion of the commission of the Research Institute of General and Forensic Psychiatry. Serbian (1991)

When analyzing the anamnestic information, the signs that indicate that Chikatilo has a congenital cerebro-organic pathology - dysplasticity, myopia, enuresis - do not attract attention. Against this background, in childhood, pathocharacterological features were revealed in the form of a disharmonious combination of features inherent in the schizoid and epileptoid types of psychopathy, which manifested itself in isolation, vulnerability, increased anxiety, and a tendency to fantasize. Attention is drawn to the nature of children's fantasies, their imagery, sensuality, fixation on negative emotional experiences. At the same age, the ease of occurrence of neurotic disorders in the form of fears was noted, the plot of which also reflected experiences that were significant for him. In prepubertal age, overvalued hobbies appeared. In the structure of neurosis-like disorders of this period, dysmorphomanic manifestations (belief in one's own physical shortcomings) predominated. At the same time, an increased interest in learning, the desire to get an education, to be the best and thereby stand out among peers indicate that he has hypercompensation reactions. This may also indicate an attempt to overcome one's eternal anxiety by asserting oneself in a certain role. At the same age, there is an interest in socio-political and philosophical problems, which for a certain period acquire a one-sided, exaggerated and inflexible character.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

Boys and girls were sitting on our rural street. And sometimes, though very rarely, I was with them. The fact is that I was the only tenth grader on these two streets. The rest worked on the collective farm or did nothing. I was considered too literate. I saw how they played, rolled on the grass, how the guys felt the girls.

But I dreamed of high love, like in movies, in books. If a girl sat down next to me, I was shy, afraid, did not know how to behave, I was shy, trembling, tried to get up from the bench; Parents set me as an example to all children: “What Andrei is quiet, modest, and studies in the tenth grade, and works at home, and on a collective farm.” And it infuriated me - I was lonely, alienated.

... I liked a girl in the 10th grade, Lilya Barysheva. She lived in a railway booth at the station - we visited her once with classmates. I liked the way she played the role of a partisan in an amateur performance. I liked her modesty, femininity. We were taught in the school of sublime love. I liked the freckles on Lily's face. I don't know what kind of eyes she has. With my short-sighted eyes, I could not see into them.

One day we all went to the cinema in the country club as a whole class. It should have happened that in this club I ended up next to Lily. She was a pretty girl and liked by all the boys in our class, but she did not pay attention to me, as if I were an empty place. Because of my poor clothes and my isolation, apparently no one liked me and could not like me ...

In the club during the session, I was not only afraid to touch her with my hand, but I was afraid to look in her direction. And she was fascinated by the film and did not pay attention to me. Afraid to move, I sat through the entire film without understanding what kind of film it was. In the evening, going to bed, I dreamed, imagined that I was hugging her, even kissing her. It was an impossible dream.

I always wanted to talk to Lily or go to her house along the way, but I never dared ...

I saw one way out - to prove myself in the sciences, in work and wait for high love.

In the spring of 1954, in the 10th grade, I once lost my temper.Not far from our house lived a classmate of my sister - Tanya Bala. At 13, she was a pretty big girl. She had full legs, well-defined hips. Once my sister and her parents were visiting relatives in a neighboring village, and I was at home alone. Tanya came to our yard. She talked to me, asked me to call my sister. I no longer remember what I answered her, but after looking around and making sure that no one sees us, he attacked her, knocked her to the ground under a large tree. From surprise or fear, she did not utter a word and did not even offer me any resistance. I, without even thinking that at first it is necessary to expose her and my lower part body, right in the clothes lay down on her and tried to imitate sexual intercourse. Waking up, Tanya tried to push me, to free herself. But she did not succeed for a long time. And in this struggle, I experienced an orgasm. There was some noise in my head, my eyes blurred ...

I was very worried about this weakness of mine, although no one saw it. I wandered around the neighborhood for several hours, shying away from people, afraid that she had told everyone about what had happened. And after this misfortune, I decided to tame my flesh, my base urges. Then he wrote an oath: “Pizda is the organ of human reproduction. I swear not to touch anyone but my wife." The oath was hidden in a secluded place.

Andrey's fear was so great that even his mother, who always cared much more about her daughter than about her son, noticed his condition and asked if he was sick. A little later, this story was forgotten by everyone - three days later, this girl came to visit Chikatilo's sister as if nothing had happened, and Chikatilo himself, several decades later, during interrogation, called this day no more, no less, as the day of his fall.

In 1954, Chikatilo graduated from a rural school with good marks (he had only one four in German, in other subjects he had excellent marks) and convinced of his outstanding abilities and high mission, he left to enter the law faculty of the university in Moscow, where, as Andrei was convinced, he could reach heights in the political field.

The investigator of the prosecutor's office, Amurkhan Yandiev, who got acquainted in detail with this page of Chikatilo's life, said:

- Imagine: a village boy came to Moscow with a suitcase of books, no acquaintances in the city, lived at the station, prepared for the next exam there, went to university and passed perfectly. Amazing focus. And suddenly he discovers that he is not on the list of enrolled. Imagine how he timidly went to the chairman of the selection committee to find out what was the matter. Of course, he did not raise a scandal due to the fact that those who passed worse were enrolled, but he was not. He asked, he was answered: "I did not pass the competition." Silently he turned and left. Already at home, the headmaster of the school explained to him rudely and ingenuously: “You are a fool for going to act at all. Your father is a traitor…”

Having not passed the competition for the Faculty of Law of Moscow State University, Chikatilo, having arrived home, enters the Akhtyrsky School and a year later successfully completes it, receiving the specialty of an overseer of telephone and telegraph communication lines. In 1955, he left on a Komsomol ticket to the Northern Urals, where he worked at a linear technical communications center.

A clumsy, lanky 18-year-old romantic first encountered the wrong side of Soviet life - remote taiga places, living in barracks, a brigade of adult illiterate proletarians, half of whom are hiding from justice ... And next to him is a 35-year-old divorcee, a local resident, going crazy with longing for male caress in the Russian outback Zapyantsovskaya

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

“... I moved to an apartment with Maria. She was the initiator of the resettlement ... from the very first day she began to cling to me with her chest, her whole body. The first night she went to bed with me, I was very worried. She herself took off my underwear and began to cuddle up to me, stroking my whole body with her hands. But all her efforts were in vain, I was so worried that the excitement did not come. So she tormented me all night ... In the morning I came to work sleepy, the guys noticed this, they began to joke, they say, the woman tortured you, they gave different tips- what to do, how and where to caress her. I blushed and walked away. In the evening I wanted to return to the hut, but the guys pushed me out, they said that it was crowded to spend the night with me. I went back to Maria. She lay down with me again, told me not to be shy. However, again it ended in nothing ... I was paralyzed from the memories of the daily ridicule of my comrades. So I fell asleep. The next day at work, they paid less attention to me, only a few older men continued to give advice. After about a week, conversations on this topic stopped altogether, I began to calm down. And on the ninth day I decided ... as usual, we went to bed, I began to touch various parts of her body. Maria began to help me, and it turned out fine ... I was already going to marry her, but my comrades dissuaded me, she was 16 years older than me ... "

After a whole series of unsuccessful attempts to have sexual intercourse, he first had periods of low mood, as Chikatilo himself said, if earlier he was usually cheerful, cheerful, purposeful, then from the age of 18-19 he began to often think about his inferiority, worried that he is “not like the others”, sometimes there were thoughts of suicide. He continued to study a lot, entered the correspondence department of the Moscow Electromechanical Institute. He considered entering the university as a revenge for his unsuccessful life. Despite periodic mood swings, he remained active, believed that he should devote his life to the construction of communism. He fought against injustice, wrote complaints if he encountered any shortcomings or cases of improper attitude towards himself.

An excerpt from the expert opinion of the commission of the Research Institute of General and Forensic Psychiatry. Serbian

At puberty (puberty) A.R. Chikatilo revealed pronounced disorders of psychosexual development with a delay at the romantic stage of the formation of sexuality. In addition to violations of psychosexual development, there is also a violation of the biological basis for the formation of sexuality with a sharp weakening of sexual desire, insufficiency of erections. Chikatilo has a weak sexual constitution against the background of an organic decrease in the thresholds of excitability of ejaculation centers. This is due to the easy achievement of ejaculation (without additional stimulation of the genital organs, without sexual intercourse) during sexually significant actions.

In adolescence, after unsuccessful attempts at sexual intercourse with women, affective disorders are formed with a predominance of a depressive background of mood and periodically occurring suicidal tendencies, as well as sharpening of pathocharacterological features, deepening of isolation, anxiety, vulnerability, increased sensitivity to real or imaginary infringement of his rights, during this period there is the beginning of his litigious activity. Fantasies during this period are distinguished by the predominance of distinct sado-masochistic manifestations.

At the same time, in adolescence and young age, despite the presence of these disorders, there are no signs of social maladjustment, but a low level of heterosexual adaptation attracts attention, which manifests itself in a decrease in sexual desire, erectile dysfunction, and pallor of orgasmic experiences. Erotic fantasizing with a distinct sadomasochistic coloring, characteristic of that period, takes the form of a surrogate sexual activity.

From 1958 to 1961 Chikatilo serves in the army. First, in Central Asia, in the border troops, then he was given a job in his specialty - to serve government communication lines under the department of the KGB of the USSR in Berlin.

In the army, as well as at school, Chikatilo achieves undoubted success in combat and political training, being a newspaper editor and propagandist. He also considered joining the ranks of the Communist Party a major achievement. This significant event for Chikatilo also happened while serving in the army in 1959.

At the same time, he still cannot find himself in communication. When colleagues offered to introduce him to some woman, he refused, preferring to read socio-political literature and listen to the radio. He was worried because of the ridicule of his comrades about the female waist and chest, he was very shy about this, while in the army he had his first passive homosexual contacts, according to him, violent ones. Occasionally he masturbated, while there was no erection of the penis, he restrained ejaculation, because he believed that it was harmful.

Direct speech. A. O. Bukhanovsky

A normal person has two systems of communication: verbal and non-verbal. Moreover, in an informal setting, the non-verbal system is often the main one. Well, for example: a woman says “no” to you, but in her intonation and behavior you catch “yes”. For sadists, such shades are inaccessible, they are only capable of formal sociability. At the same time, in a normal, formal situation, they are no different from us.

Here is the same Chikatilo: he was one of the best in the army. He even joined the party there. And in an informal situation, when communication takes place on a non-verbal level, when intuition is needed, such people do not understand what is happening, they become, as it were, feeble-minded, and they acutely feel this inferiority. Therefore, they carefully avoid such informal situations. In the army, when everyone went on leave - to dances, to the girls - Chikatilo went to Lenin's room and was engaged in "political training." But there was no compensation - on the contrary: the painful condition intensified.

These people don't have self-defense skills. In childhood and adolescence, they were the objects of violence from their peers, although they are often physically stronger than those who offended them. But they are unable to defend themselves. There was an inferiority complex, low self-esteem, which intensified over the years. Their sexual constitution is weak, difficulties in communicating with women further reinforce the inferiority complex.

After being transferred to the reserve, Chikatilo returned to his native village of Apple.

New neighbors settled near the parents' house, one of the neighbors turned out to be Tatyana, who had recently kicked out her drunken husband. Andrey and Tatiana met very soon. Outwardly, Chikatilo has changed a lot, as is almost always the case after the army.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

“…About a week later I started touching her, taking her hands and even kissing her. From the kiss, my throat was dry, my head was cloudy, my heart was beating faster, she answered my kisses. But at the same time, I couldn’t force myself to enter into intimacy with her, because I was afraid that I wouldn’t succeed and I would disgrace myself in front of her ... "

But then he made up his mind. The moment was convenient, there was no one in the house, and the story of five years ago with Maria was repeated - the inadequacy of preparation, discord in feelings, and also a long-standing fear - FEAR OF FAIL.

Direct speech. Andrey Chikatilo

“... I didn’t get excited from excitement, she apparently understood my condition, reassured me, tried to excite me, however, despite all efforts, sexual intercourse did not work, and I only wet my panties ... I was ashamed of my weakness, especially since I saw her displeasure. I haven't seen her for a few days...

Then, a couple of weeks later, there was another attempt to get closer, this time in a grove, past which they walked from the guests, and again a failure. And as Chikatilo said, he was "very angry and he wanted to destroy everything."

Direct speech. Tatiana Narizhnaya

... In the village of Apple, not far from us, the Chikatilo family lived. I made friends with my age-mate from this house, Tanya. Her brother Andrei Chikatilo studied in Moscow. When he came for the holidays, we met and began to meet, it lasted a month and a half. Andrei was affectionate, kind ... Once at my house they decided to get in touch with him, but Andrei did not succeed. Another time we visited his relatives in the village of Maiskoye. On the way to the meadow, Andrei again made an attempt ... But again, he failed.

One detail is interesting - Tatyana Chikatilo also wanted to marry first. Maybe from the depths of his consciousness an impulse was breaking through, pushing him on the right path - calmly, calmly, everything is ahead. Thousands of men keep in their memory their own youthful failures of this kind, which does not prevent them from starting a family in adulthood, living a full life. But fate also vetoed this marriage, and his parents “helped”, who were categorically against his possible marriage to a “divorced woman”. And this love of Andrei Chikatilo gradually became a thing of the past.

So, the world familiar to Chikatilo collapsed, his dreams were not destined to come true, but he did not hang himself, although, as he said in his later interviews, he was quite ready to climb into the noose from despair, he decided to leave ...

Chikatilo's "First Life", the first part of his novel, full of failures, fears and disappointments, is over. He leaves his native village of Yablochnoe to start a completely different life...

It is safe to say that not a single criminal in the entire history of forensic science had such fame, and even during his lifetime. Even before the execution of the sentence (the court ruled to shoot Chikatilo), six books were written about him, films and television films were made, police museums gave the maniac a prominent place in their expositions, and even newspapermen ... Mountains of articles and notes were written about him, and on At the court hearing in Rostov-on-Don, there were almost more reporters in the hall than there were witnesses and relatives of the victims.

He fought to the end for his life, followed his health. In the solitary cell of the pre-trial detention center of the Rostov KGB, where he was kept for greater security, Chikatilo began the morning with gymnastic exercises: he did push-ups, stretched his muscles, jumped in place, made a bridge. And he endlessly wrote complaints against the investigators and the judge, demanded justice and asked for indulgence, given the severe shocks suffered during the period of military childhood and subsequently reflected on his psyche.

Here is a fragment of a genuine document - one of the many messages to higher organizations, where Chikatilo explains his actions:

"I carried out the commands of the commander of the partisan detachment. When I saw lonely standing man, I imagined in it the “language” that needs to be delivered to the forest, tied it up and struck like a partisan. If I saw a naked body (male or female - it was indifferent to me), I tore and threw like a beast. It was not sexual passion, but an animal mental release, despair and anger because nature deprived me of the happiness of an elevated normal sexual life, from excitement to complete satisfaction.

Of course, I could become an alcoholic, drown out my vital needs. But not for this I studied the philosophical views of all times and peoples, went through universities - life and educational, in order to poison my consciousness. I never had a normal sexual relationship with any of the victims. It was a pathetic imitation. I did not specifically catch and did not look for victims. Just by chance came across the same as me. Many of them are hungry, unsettled, unfavorable in life situations. And they stuck to me ... ".

What happened next? How did the "partisan" Chikatilo satisfy his sexual passion, which he refers to as a "pathetic imitation"?

He noticed ten-year-old Olya S. when the girl was returning from evening classes at a music school. Later it turned out that the bus broke down and there was a big break in traffic. It was December, you couldn't walk from school to Novoshakhtinsk, where the child lived. The girl remained at the bus stop waiting for transport, she froze. Here comes a good uncle:

“Come on, I’ll warm you up, right here.” And it was completely frozen.

Random witnesses saw from a distance how a man and a girl were moving across the field in the direction of state farm No. 6. The child was crying, trying to wrest his hand, but the man did not let go and said something excitedly.

From the materials of the criminal case:

“Fraudily, Chikatilo took the girl to the arable field of the state farm, one and a half kilometers from Novoshakhtinsk. Here he attacked her, knocked her to the ground, tore off her clothes, exposed her penis and, threatening with a knife, tried to rape her. When, due to physiological inferiority, he failed, Chikatilo stabbed the child numerous times in the head, chest, cut out the stomach, heart, uterus, and intestines. From received more than fifty stab wounds, the girl died on the spot.

I did not select an example. In any of the 200 volumes of the criminal case 18/59639-85, one can find more bloody, terrible episodes. The maniac inflicted several dozen wounds on almost each of the victims, gouged out his eyes, bit off and swallowed the nipples of the breasts and the tips of the tongues for almost everyone, cut out the genitals and, as he himself admitted, gnawed the female uterus with satisfaction - “it is red elastic.”

Each crime of Chikatilo is characterized by extreme cruelty, not so much in the criminal-legal sense, involving the infliction of suffering on the victim, but, so to speak, in the universal sense.

Evgeny Samovichev, a scientist already mentioned in connection with the Dzhumagaliev case, studying the behavior of the killer at the time of the death of his victims, makes an unusual suggestion. It is so interesting that it is worth quoting it verbatim:

“The Chikatilo case belongs to the category of very rare events. An attempt to cover as a whole the totality of his circumstances involuntarily leads to legends about people who have the ability to turn into wild predatory animals (werewolfs), showing exceptional ferocity and bloodthirstiness in this state. The centuries-old experience of people's encounters with this phenomenon even took shape in the idea of ​​​​a very rare hereditary disease - lycanthropy (or porphyria), with the defeat of which a person changes his appearance and begins to resemble a beast. At the same time, his mind and behavior change. It is difficult to say how reliable the information about the change in the appearance of a person is. But the fact that his inner state can become similar to the state of an angry beast is very similar to the truth.

Whether Chikatilo changed his appearance at the time of the attacks is difficult to say. He never allowed breakdowns - not a single victim managed to escape. But the actions of the maniac are quite consistent with the logic - bestial, inhuman logic of a predator. This is confirmed by his typical pattern of behavior.

From the analytical operational documents of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov region of the letter case "Forest belt":

“To contact the victim, Chikatilo chose the most crowded places: stations, streets, electric trains, so that his search activity would not be conspicuous. He never created conflict situations and tried not to attract the attention of others. If contact was made, Chikatilo always left first, and the victim followed him. To commit the murder, he chose places located near public transport stops in order to quickly leave the scene of the crime. Before attacking the victim, Chikatilo walked with her a distance of one and a half to five kilometers. This made it possible to assess the situation, check for surveillance or other danger. He never left witnesses. After the offender “turned on” to the killing mode, the victim had no chance - no one managed to escape. More than half of Chikatilo's attacks were carried out on the territory adjacent to the railway lines, and the cries for help of the victims were drowned out by the noise of passing freight trains and electric trains. Other places are significantly removed from settlements and crowds of people. In 1988-1990, having felt the special attention of law enforcement agencies, he tries to avoid traditional places to search for a victim and often changes the attack pattern. When committing the last murder of a series of twenty-two-year-old S. Korostik, the maniac leaves on the Forest-Steppe platform, and returns home by train from another Leskhoz platform. All this allows psychiatrists to make a reasonable conclusion about the completely preserved intelligence of the criminal.

Ever since the early 1980s, when the murders had been repeated year after year with terrifying regularity, the people involved in the "Woodland" often had a feeling of complete hopelessness in the successful completion of the search. The entire vast country was looking for him: the police, agents, non-staff employees of the authorities, vigilantes, the KGB apparatus of the USSR, still powerful in those years, was connected to the work more than once, but there was no result.

The following fact speaks of the importance attached to the disclosure of the bloody series. The meeting held by the regional prosecutor's office on this case in Rostov-on-Don in April 1987 was attended by Deputy Head of the Investigation Department of the USSR Prosecutor's Office V. Nenashev and Deputy Prosecutor of the RSFR I. Zemlyanushin. And it opened with the words (I quote from the protocol): “The case of the Forest Belt is under control in all higher authorities, as well as in the Central Committee of the CPSU. There is no more important matter in the country than the Forest Belt.

The head of the investigative-operational group was Issa Kostoev, who served as deputy head of the investigative unit of the RSFSR Prosecutor's Office. The appointment turned out to be successful. It was Kostoev who happened to sign the accusation to a man whom many consider the super-killer of the twentieth century.

But the finest hour of the investigator was ahead.

In 1987, having taken charge of the investigation, Kostoev was in the same predicament as the others. Having exhausted the usual methods of searching and analyzing materials, the head of the investigative team turned to the maniac Slivko, who was sentenced to death by the court, for advice. Issa Kostoev spent the whole day with the killer on death row. He, having listened to the prosecutor's worker and familiarized himself with the circumstances of the case, only shrugged his hands: “It's useless. This is impossible to calculate. I know for myself." Let me remind you that the sadist Slivko could not be caught for more than twenty years ...

In the case of Chikatilo, the nightmare lasted twelve years. When he was detained and charged with 36 premeditated murders with extreme cruelty, he confessed to ... 53! Women, girls and boys. He recalled in detail where, under what circumstances he met, where he took him, what he did. According to his testimony, police officers opened more than one “burial ground”, discovered the places of death of dozens of wanted children: in the forest, on the outskirts of the cemetery, near the railway, next to the floodplain of the river.

Outwardly, the man who committed 53 murders looked like an inconspicuous bald, clubfoot little man. He was fifty-four years old. Andrei Chikatilo had higher education- graduated from the philological faculty of Rostov University, was well-read, erudite. He was well versed in literature, knew history, knew the biographies of many American presidents.

The marital status of Chikatilo did not differ from others. Married, caring father of two children - a daughter and a son. He managed to become a grandfather, according to his relatives, caring and gentle. In everyday life, Chikatilo was the same as everyone else. He walked in a suit with a galetuk, wore a hat, and held an ordinary accounting briefcase in his hands. You will meet this in the crowd - you will not single out for anything. Who would think that in the briefcase of this inconspicuous, gray man, a sharply sharpened knife, rope and vaseline, prepared for the next victim?

Studying the materials of the case, I could not help wondering: 53 murders, and not a single witness! What is it - luck, fate, miscalculation of operational services? After all, more than 200 thousand people were checked for involvement in crimes. And how many people were interviewed in electric trains, at stations, in villages, convoys, airports, schools, residential buildings ...

According to the employees of the criminal investigation department, Chikatilo had an exceptional, downright bestial instinct. In a heterogeneous crowd waiting for a bus or train, he carefully selected a suitable object (as a rule, they were women or children), preferring to deal with mentally handicapped or degraded people. It is easier to get in touch with them, and Chikatilo already had a similar experience, having worked for several years in a school for mentally retarded teenagers. In recent years, he worked as an engineer in the supply department of the Rostov electric locomotive repair plant. A specialty that involves the ability to easily find a common language with any person and provides great freedom of action and a lot of uncontrolled time. All this Chikatilo used for his own purposes. He was constantly in search, selection of the victim.

According to the psychiatrist of the Rostov Medical Institute Alexander Bukhanovsky (his talent and knowledge provided invaluable assistance in solving the crime), those with whom the maniac came into contact were tens, hundreds of times more. Subsequently, Bukhanovsky managed to find an approach to the detainee and even recreate approximately his manner of communicating with the object of interest. Having struck up a conversation with a future victim, Chikatilo was transformed, became an interesting conversationalist, a sympathetic and gallant man. kind, beautiful girl from a good family, the killer offered to help carry the bags. Her naked corpse with numerous stab wounds was discovered the next day in the grove of the Rostov Aviators' Park.

He "worked" with a potential victim. I found a personal approach to each. He promised booze to some, money to others, and fascinated others with stories. If the boy collected stamps, he promised to give valuable specimens from his collection. Someone was lured by the prospect of watching a video. He had tricks ready for every occasion. Once I suggested to the guy to show the place where hazelnuts grow. But he did not forcefully take anyone away, he felt that it was not working out - he turned and began to search for a new object. This probably explains the absence of witnesses.

There were two occasions when people saw him walking with a future victim. But everything seemed so natural, it never occurred to anyone to remember the signs of the “gray monster”. And the sketches created from the fragmentary and vague memories of random passers-by did not look much like the original. Chikatilo acted calmly and prudently. With his good-natured appearance and prudence, he fascinated the victim. It's hard to believe, but there were cases when children voluntarily walked several kilometers with him to a suitable place.

… In 1978, a girl was brutally murdered in Shakhty. A certain Kravchenko is detained on suspicion. Why? A few years earlier, he committed a similar crime - he raped and killed a child. Then, given the age of Kravchenko, the court found it possible to commute the sentence. After serving several years, he was released on probation and worked in chemistry. The crime in Shakhty was committed not far from where he lived.

In hindsight, we can talk about the flagrant blunders of the investigation, and the bias of the court. Now we know who the real killer was. And then, in 1978, Kravchenko himself confessed to the murder, gave a "full alignment." Was there any reason to doubt his confessions? Were. Moreover, the suspect himself changed his testimony more than once. Three times the case was returned for further investigation, three times prosecutors and courts studied the materials. Nevertheless, Kravchenko was sentenced to an exceptional measure of punishment. When did it become clear that a terrible mistake had occurred? Twelve years later, when Chikatilo detailed the details of the episode that became the first in a string of rapes and bloody murders.

The series began to be viewed in 1982. On June 12, in the afternoon, the parents sent thirteen-year-old Lyuba B. to a store in the neighboring village of Donskoy. The child's corpse was found 16 days later in a forest belt.

A month later, two murders at once - sixteen-year-old K. and twenty-year-old N. Both girls were found in the forest belt area. On December 11, the already mentioned ten-year-old Olya S. finished her studies at the Novoshakhtinsk music school and went home. Since then, no one has seen her alive. The girl's body was found in a field only four months later. Nearby - all the same forest belt.

Terrible rumors spread throughout the Rostov region. But they could not reflect the full horror of what was happening. On the body of the victims, as a rule, up to seventy knife wounds, almost all of them had eye injuries. The first version is a mortuary worker. How else to explain that the criminal gutted the dead, like an experienced pathologist? Moreover, the excised organs could not be found at the crime scene. Why did Chikatilo perform monstrous operations? In the testimony of his wife, it somehow flashed: “He always took a saucepan with him. He said that he boils tea in it at work ... ".

The case was put under control in the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Union and received the symbol "Forest belt". Worked out were people convicted of similar crimes, previously convicted, prone to violence, registered with a psychiatrist. Drivers of vehicles were checked, as there was doubt that the victims could independently walk such distances with the killer. Any signal or evidence that would relate to the murders was checked.

And suddenly, an ominous postcard arrived at the Novoshakhtinsk Main Post Office. On the same day, she lay down on the table of the criminal investigation officers involved in the Forest Belt. Here is her text:

“To the parents of the missing girl. Hello parents. Don't be upset. Not your first, not your last. We need 10 of these for the New Year. If you want to bury - look in the leaves of the Darovsky planting. Sadistic Black Cat.

The operatives tried to extract as much information from the text as possible. It was clear that the postcard was written by a person who knows the area - the name "Darovska Posadka" is used only by residents of nearby villages. The detectives went to the place, interviewed people, talked several times with postal workers: who wrote, what the person looked like, did he take a pencil? Unfortunately, the polls did not give anything significant, and time passed. The search for the "Black Cat" was given special attention also because the killer, who always acted with particular cruelty, this time outdid himself. They cut out a child's heart...

Great hopes were placed on the analysis of the handwriting of the person who wrote the postcard. Specialists of the operational and technical department of the KGB of the USSR in the Rostov region carefully studied the style of writing, identified the main characteristic details of the handwriting. A special table was compiled, in which "keys" are marked to identify the handwriting on the postcard with other handwritten texts.

In the personnel departments of Rostov enterprises, institutions, collective farms, state farms, tens of thousands of applications were checked. The handwriting of those hired in Novocherkassk, Shakhty, Novoshakhtinsk, and Rostov was comparable. Anonymous letters, letters from "well-wishers", unidentified correspondents were studied. None of them managed to get on the trail of the "cat".

The body of the girl was searched in the landing area - they dug up all the land in the district until they were convinced that she was not there. The body of a child was found in the opposite direction. Accident? Looking ahead, I’ll say: and later, four years later, without establishing the authorship of the postcard, they again worked with its text, trying to determine the identity of the writer. They failed to do so.

Denied his involvement in the "Black Cat" and Chikatilo himself. It is still unknown who is the author of the cynical and ruthless "joke". To be honest, I was skeptical about this story. Why was the criminal investigation department engaged in unpromising work, diverting powerful forces? Then I was told that it was the comparison of handwriting that helped to find the Vitebsk murderer Mikhasevich, whose victims were 36 women. So, the "cat" was not worked out in vain. Moreover, his prediction of ten victims tragically came true. In 1983, exactly ten corpses were found in the Rostov region. By all indications, the crimes belonged to the Forest Belt series.

What happened in 1984, and today, many years later, makes the employees involved in the Rostov series grim. Twelve people. He cut, raped, killed indiscriminately: a mother and daughter, a schoolboy who went to the chess Olympiad, a tramp who decided to drink at someone else's expense. The same way. Monthly. And in July and August - three people at a time.

Viktor Burakov, who headed the special task force (now with the rank of general, he leads the criminal police of the Rostov Central Internal Affairs Directorate), appeals to psychiatrists and sexologists: you need to understand the motivation of the criminal's behavior - where does such sadism come from? Is there a way to predict his actions? Is it possible to create a psychological portrait of him using the scarce data available?

Based on the materials of the case, a psychological portrait of the criminal was compiled. Now you can already see how close it is to the original. Here is this orientation: physically well developed, perhaps possessing virtues and manners that are attractive to women. By nature, he is closed, kept apart, unsociable, lives alone or with close relatives, possibly has a personal vehicle. When the victim is identified, then from a closed and uncommunicative, the offender turns into a talkative, charming, endearing person.

Experts carefully studied everything related to crimes - the time of day when the crime was committed, the place where they met the victims, their height, appearance, eye color, hair color, manner of dressing and talking. It was found that the killer prefers people with blond hair, avoids those with curly hair. Doctors even took into account such a parameter as electrical discharges in the atmosphere. It seemed that everything that could be done was done ...

According to Mikhail Fetisov, head of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov Region, the operatives tried to play ahead of the curve, calculate the next move of the criminal and lure him into a trap. The entire multi-kilometer route Taganrog-Donetsk-Rostov-Salsk was controlled by police officers, and suburban electric trains, buses, and stations were operationally covered.

Accompanied by operatives, the female detectives, disguised as "in the taste" of a maniac, drove around in night trains as a bait, walked in the areas of forest belts. Hidden police posts were set up, helicopters flew over the controlled territory on a regular basis, and in the Aviator Park in Rostov, where five corpses were found, detectives were constantly on duty under the guise of cyclists. They tried to create "pockets": they openly showed where the posts were located, lured them into traps. And what? In the afternoon, in the center of the city, on a small island of green next to a car overpass, he killed the next child.

Having been in Rostov-on-Don, I took a special look at this place. Next to the lawn, where stunted bushes and birch trees stick out, cars rush by, city buses drive, pedestrians scurry about. Away residential multi-story houses, the shops. How could the tragedy happen? Why, again, not a single witness, eyewitness? Mikhail Fetisov, recalling that terrible summer, admitted that every time he returned home, the first thing he did was go into the room of his sleeping son - he wanted to personally make sure that everything was in order with him.

The first time Chikatilo was arrested in the fall of 1984. It was in that year that the criminal investigation officer Alexander Zanosovsky, who was on duty at the bus station, detained a suspicious man. The instinct of an experienced operative worked flawlessly. He took Chikatilo "under the cap", noticing that he was interested in lonely vagrants.

The materials of Lesopolosa contain a unique report - an explanation of police captain Zanosovsky, who, together with his partner Akhmatkhanov, detained Chikatilo six years before he was formally charged! I intend to quote the report in full. After all, it is nothing more than a documentary story about the search by the bloodiest maniac of our days for his next victim:

"I was on duty at the bus station with Akhmatkhanov. They were dressed in civilian uniform. Being next to a public transport stop, you notice a tall, about 180 centimeters, thin man of about forty-five. The features of his face resembled a wanted man in a sketch. He was wearing glasses, without a hat, and had a brown briefcase with him. He had acted suspicious before, and we decided to watch him. Bus N 7 approached from the railway station towards the airport. Observed twirled among the passengers and climbed into the bus. We followed in. His strange behavior immediately caught my eye. He behaved restlessly, constantly turning his head, as if checking to see if he was being watched.

Not noticing anything suspicious, the observed tried to get in touch with the girl standing next to him. She was wearing a dress with a slit on her chest. He never took his eyes off her body. On the way, the citizen touched one of the women by the legs, a conflict began, and he was forced to leave the salon. I crossed to the other side and got up with the passengers who were waiting for the regular bus in the other direction. The bus approached, we drove back ... He stood in front of the women in the cabin, examined them intently, clung to them. I sat down with a lonely girl, tried to talk to her, but she got up and got off at the nearest stop. The observed hurried after her, but the girl quickly left. The citizen moved towards the store, near which a group of women was standing. He approached them, then departed. This went on for 15-20 minutes. Then he walked to the next stop, and from there he arrived at the railway station. I sat for twenty minutes looking around next to the sleeping woman and went to the main bus station. He approached groups of women, listened, went up to the waiting room.

He sat down next to a girl who was reading a book and spoke affectionately about something. When the girl went down to the first floor, we learned from her that the citizen was interested in where she was going. Upon learning that the girl was going to the village of Morozovsk, the observed was delighted and said that he was going there too. He said about himself that he works as a teacher. When the first girl left, a young woman sat down next to the citizen. They started talking. The observed first hugged her, and then laid the girl's head on his knees, covered her with a jacket and began manipulations of a clearly sexual nature. After that, they separately left the building of the bus station. From there, the observed person went to the Central Market, where he was detained by us."

Alexander Zanosovsky told me about that case with the chagrin of a professional detective:

“When I grabbed him by the collar, I realized that I was not mistaken. Sweat poured down his face, he became nervous, visibly pale. We opened the briefcase - there is a sharp knife, rope, towel, vaseline ... Isn't it enough to seriously work with it? But for some reason no one did it. It turned out that citizen Chikatilo had an unsuitable second blood type. Still not: I can forgive myself that I didn’t interrogate him personally at the police department, handed him over to the investigator of the prosecutor’s office ... ”

Here it is necessary to make an explanation. On many of the victims, traces of semen from the fourth group were found. It is generally accepted (at least until recently) that all human secretions belong to the same group. And therefore the search for the criminal was concentrated on people with the fourth blood group.

From the materials of the criminal case: “... it should be noted that an extremely rare phenomenon characteristic of Chikatilo is a paradoxical discharge: blood of the second, and other discharges of the fourth group. Under the condition of the search sign of the criminal by blood type, this phenomenon provided Chikatilo with a kind of alibi ... Knowing that the investigation for the murders he committed was looking for a person with the fourth excretion group, Chikatilo, in order to prevent the detection of his biological secretions in the next victims, pushed the earth into their rectum , and the teenager Yaroslav M., who was killed by him, tore out and threw out the rectum.

In the criminal investigation department of the Rostov Central Internal Affairs Directorate, to this day, there is a cabinet with a filing cabinet "Forest belt". It contains twenty-five thousand cards, where information was entered about those who fell into the field of view of the police. Persons who lingered in the forest belt, had sexual deviations automatically got into the file cabinet, data on drivers of vehicles who were in the area of ​​the crime were also entered there. People with the fourth blood group were worked out especially carefully, regardless of the alibi or their place of work.

The suspect Chikatilo, detained by Zanosovsky and Akhmatkhanov, was taken to the police department at his place of residence. His case was handled by a member of the brigade of the Prosecutor's Office of the RSFSR, the forensic prosecutor of the Saratov region Yu. Moiseev. The detainee turned out to have a second blood type, which means that he could not have anything to do with the murders in the forest belt. True, Chikatilo still had minor sins. He was sent to jail for stealing linoleum and a battery. He received a trifling term, given that by that time the sadist had killed more than a dozen people.

From the case materials: “Chikatilo was initially checked for involvement in a series of murders in Rostov-on-Don, and then was transferred to Novoshakhtinsk for testing for involvement in the murder of a minor P., whose case was investigated separately. These formal checks, carried out without taking into account all investigative and operational materials, as in 1978 after the murder of Z., allowed Chikatilo to evade responsibility for the second time. Moreover, the loss of the confiscated knife, with which, according to his confession, several murders were committed, and some other items that were material evidence in the case, significantly complicated the course of the investigation "...

Chikatilo did not stay behind bars for long. Having been released in December 1984, already in January he got a job as an engineer, and then as head of the metal department of the Novocherkassk Electric Locomotive Plant. And, picking up his irreplaceable briefcase, he set off to wander around Rostov in search of another victim.

In August 1985, Chikatilo went on a business trip to Moscow. In a copse near the building of the Domodedovo airport, he attacks the eighteen-year-old Pokhlistova. Kills with a ferocity surprising even for a beast like him. He inflicts several blows with a knife, ties his hands with twine and again begins to beat with a knife, receiving special pleasure from this. Then he completely undresses the dying girl and ... bites off the nipples of her breasts.

And later in the same month he meets a drunken tramp near the Shakhty bus station. Her tormented corpse is found nearby in forest plantations. The mouth of the victim is clogged up to the stomach with dry leaves and dirt ...

The employees of the criminal investigation department begin to work out everyone who could be in contact with the tramp. It was established that on that day she was in the reception center. Suspicion fell on one of the police officers - the driver of the car, but after a thorough check, the version was discarded. I am writing about this to remind you: everyone was trained for involvement in the Forest Belt, regardless of their social status and professional activities.

By the way, a police officer was suspected of being guilty of the Moscow murder (the same "forest-belt" handwriting of the crime). After questioning the passengers of Domodedovo, it turned out that a brand new police UAZ without license plates had been seen nearby. In the town of Sukhobezvodnaya, Gorky region, ordinary UAZ vehicles are converted into police ones, and the route from there to Rostov-on-Don passes by Domodedovo. Checked - it converges: in those days, one of the employees of the Rostov Department of Internal Affairs was on a business trip. He had to drive a new car. A lot matched. The suspect's son studied at a boarding school in the Shakhtinsky district. The father often went to visit the child, he could find himself on the way to places where crimes were committed. They checked everything, literally calculated the route by meters, counted alibis by minutes, compared blood type, interviewed acquaintances, looked for witnesses. Not confirmed, again a dead end, the killer was not caught.

The launched search engine, like a huge dredge, weeded out everyone who was of interest to the investigation. Later, police officers will publish such figures. More than 200,000 people were tested for involvement in crimes. All data were entered into the computer memory. During the operation "Forest belt" information has been accumulated on 48 thousand people with any sexual deviations. Law enforcement officials had the idea that the criminal should be looked for among persons with no previous convictions. But the work was carried out in all directions.

During the years of the search, 5845 people who previously had a criminal record were put on special records. More than 10 thousand socially dangerous mentally ill were in sight, 419 homosexuals were identified (at one time the version was worked out that the perpetrator was from among them). 163,000 drivers of personal and state vehicles were checked for involvement in Lesopolos.

During the existence of the operational-investigative group, which included up to fifty first-class specialists from the region, the republic and the country, 1062 crimes were solved. Among them are forty murders, 245 rapes, robberies, robberies, thefts, 91 cases of sodomy and indecent acts.

Teams of specialists filmed men walking with children in order to identify them later and conduct a check. Many hours of video recordings of railway station life were made. In the search process, they could help identify the perpetrator. OMON officers with night vision devices sat in hiding places in the forest plantation area in the hope of finding someone who had been eluding the nets for more than ten years.

How to call it: monster, werewolf, nonhuman?

Chikatilo's wife assured that he could not stand the sight of blood, he was very worried when she had to have an abortion. But at the same time, according to her, for the last seven years he shied away from intimacy with her, rejected any attempts with indignation: “Loafer, fat! What do you want: give a stallion?

Was it possible to identify the maniac before?

According to the head of the Main Directorate of Criminal Investigation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, Ivan Khrapov, if the murders were not sexually based, they would be solved much faster. Even under the condition of an incorrectly determined blood type and other costs. But in this case, the detectives did not have any information. Such crimes are carefully hidden from others, as they are considered a disgrace even in the criminal environment, so talking about them is not only not accepted, but also dangerous. It was clear that the established operational methods were not suitable. The agents, with the help of which many crimes are revealed, are not able to help here, and you can only rely on your own strength, perseverance and experience of employees.

It is clear that Chikatilo hid his second life from others. He himself (according to his "confession") tried not to think about her even at the moment when he was looking for a victim with his eyes. The maniac was transformed unexpectedly - “jammed”, and he suddenly turned from a kind uncle into a brutal rapist.

And another interesting detail in the knowledge of the personality of Chikatilo. He was once asked if he was worried about what had happened, did he feel sorry for those killed? He calmly replied in a hollow voice: “I did not feel sorry for anyone. When I left the forest belt, everything was left behind, beyond some kind of line.

There seemed to be no end to it. They wait in Rostov, but he kills in Shakhty or Novocherkassk. These areas are taken under control, but the trouble happens again in another place. Dead children are found in the Botanical Garden of Rostov. Already other rapists and murderers are “mowing down” under Chikatilo, knowing his manner of cracking down on victims. They are caught, exposed, proven crimes. And he still remains at large. So it was a year before the capture of the ripper.

A cipher message came from the Salsky district: in the area of ​​​​the village of Novo-Manych, in a forest belt, the disfigured body of a raped woman was found. The entire task force rushes to the scene. The handwriting is the same - the wounds, the nature of the injuries, the naked corpse ...

It is known that in villages, where every resident is in plain sight, it is more difficult to hide any information than in the city. Once again, the detectives thought that luck was near. They quickly created an identikit of the murdered woman, put up posts on the roads, interviewed passing drivers: did they see the victim on that fateful day, did they drive the man to that place? And soon one of the drivers remembered the man, even called his last name. It turned out that he was a twenty-year-old guy who had once been convicted of rape and lived in the Salsky district after his release. The detainee confessed to his deed, told about another murder. But, as the check found out, he had nothing to do with the Rostov series ...

1990 brings new killings. Nine people become victims in Shakhty, the Rostov Botanical Garden and, of course, a favorite place - a forest belt stretching along the railway tracks. It was there, near the Leskhoz station, that the long bloody trail of the ripper ended. November 1990 was on the calendar...

Getting off at a nearby station, Chikatilo enters the forest with the victim, does his job and returns to the train alone. Igor Rybakov, an employee of the exposed barrier, asks to see a document. He quite calmly shows his passport: "I'm returning from a friend from the dacha." The operative fixes the surname. Outwardly, an ordinary elderly man, neat (he washed his shoes in a puddle of mud), with a tie, a briefcase in his hands. Only on the neck some kind of pink spot. Like crushed blood. Now it seems that the nets were so densely spaced that the killer could not avoid getting into them. But Chikatilo and this time bypasses all the barriers.

A few days later, mushroom pickers find another corpse near the Leskhoz station. The medical examiner sets the time of death to be seven to eight days. They check the reports of the employees on duty that day. One of them mentions the name Chikatilo. Second blood type? Already in sight?

From that moment on, Chikatilo was under the scrutiny of the criminal investigation department. All his movements around the city were recorded, connections were checked, his biography was studied. And it became clearer and clearer: this is it. There can't be so many coincidences. The suspicion was confirmed by the behavior of Chikatilo. He was in active search, made acquaintances with single women, children, appeared in "those very" places.

The detention of the maniac was carried out by Vladimir Kolesnikov, at that time - the deputy head of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov region, and now - the first deputy minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. The arrest of the most terrible criminal of the current century looked ordinary, without chases and shootings. Kolesnikov waited for the object to leave the cafe: “Are you Chikatilo?” Hearing an affirmative answer, he gave a command to the detectives. Handcuffs clicked on the maniac’s wrists and he slowly, raking his feet, wandered, accompanied by operatives, to the waiting car ...

When Chikatilo began to testify, "broods" were organized - in the words of the detectives, these are trips to the crime scene with a video camera to consolidate the facts. In one of the districts of Shakhty, having learned about the arrival of the killer, the place of death of the child was surrounded by crowds of people. In order not to commit lynching, they had to urgently call the OMON, pull up soldiers from the nearest military unit to cordon off.

During the hearing, which took place in the regional court for almost six months, Chikatilo tried to portray insanity. He shouted, insulted the judge and the assessors, one day he arranged a "striptease" - despite the handcuffs, he managed to pull down his trousers. The efforts of the maniac were in vain. Doctors recognized him as sane, and the court's verdict - execution - was greeted with applause from everyone in the hall of the Rostov House of Justice. Such an end to the story of a man whose name has become synonymous with fear and suffering is logical, there was no need to wait for another. But the very identity of the killer surprises and remains a mystery.

Many have tried to decipher Chikatilo. And many were able to communicate with him. During the preliminary investigation and, already awaiting the execution of the sentence in the Novocherkassk death row prison, the maniac did not shy away from meetings, talked with operatives, psychiatrists, psychologists, and journalists. Everyone saw him differently. One seemed to be an absolute schizophrenic, poorly oriented in the world around him and not even understanding where he would soon be taken from the prison cell. Others seemed to be a cunning monster with a well-preserved intellect, who does not lose hope for the abolition of the death penalty and is ready to use any chance for this.

From conversations with those who saw him after his arrest, it is clear that Chikatilo never revealed himself to anyone, reflecting only a part of his "I", a fragment of consciousness. Like a mirror broken and then glued together from fragments.

Who was Chikatilo?

What allowed him to scour the country as an invulnerable beast for twelve years in search of new victims and commit murders of incredible cruelty? It is impossible to explain everything by the mistakes of the police and the prosecutor's office, miscalculations of science or a combination of circumstances. There is no answer to the natural question: did Chikatilo himself understand who he really was?

- a detailed study of the life and crimes of Andrei Romanovich Chikatilo

The name of Andrei Chikatilo has become a household name in Russia: he is undoubtedly the most famous domestic serial killer. Perhaps Chikatilo became so popular because before his case in the Soviet Union, the crimes of maniacs, especially sexual ones, were not discussed by the general public. In a prosperous socialist state moving towards communism, there can be no maniacs, this is a capitalist infection, the Soviet people are not like that ... Approximately this point of view was propagated by the authorities. But this point of view turned out to be erroneous, and the devoted communist Andrei Romanovich Chikatilo turned out to be a serial killer maniac.

Chikatilo was born on October 16, 1936 in a small Ukrainian village in the Sumy region. Childhood Chikatilo was sometimes strong psychological shocks. Andrei's older brother, Stepan, went missing in 1931. Parents suspected that he was eaten by cannibals during a terrible famine in Ukraine in the 30s, about which his mother told little Andrey. For a child, this was an incredible pressure on the psyche, perhaps he also played a role in the formation of the future killer.

The Great Patriotic War began, Chikatilo's father went to the front, was captured. After his release in 1945, he was recognized as a "traitor to the Motherland", which, of course, did not correspond to the truth. Andrei, still a child, disowned his father, admitting his "betrayal", but nevertheless he was attacked at school.

In general, he grew up a lonely child. He did not have good friends, he was shy, timid. “The teachers were surprised at my helplessness,” Chikatilo said during the investigation. “If I didn’t have a pen or ink, I would sit and cry.” Despite his congenital short-sightedness, Andrey refused to wear glasses, he was afraid of being ridiculed, being branded as a "bespectacled man". In addition, for a long time the teenager hid the problem of bedwetting, which still manifested itself in his youth.

Needless to say, things with the girls at Chikatilo were going badly. He was very shy, he rarely met, and if it came to bed, at the decisive moment he did not succeed, he was ridiculed several times. Sexual problems, most likely, had a very strong impact on Andrei's later life and his "career" as a maniac.

Subsequently, he will tell such an episode that happened to him in his youth. “A thirteen-year-old girl came into our yard, blue trousers peeking out from under her dress ... I said that my sister was not at home, she did not leave. Then I pushed her, knocked her down and lay down on her. I didn't undress her and I didn't undress myself. But I immediately ejaculated. I was very worried about this weakness of mine, although no one saw it. After this misfortune of mine, I decided to tame my flesh, my base impulses, and vowed to myself not to touch anyone except my future wife. Another case that contributed to the transformation of Chikatilo into a monster.

After leaving school, Andrei enters the university and successfully graduates from it. By distribution, he gets a job as a telephone engineer in the small town of Radionovo-Nesvetaevsky in the Rostov Region. Chikatilo works diligently, having saved a small amount of money, he immediately sends it to his parents.

In 1962, his sister introduces Andrei to a local girl, Faina, who soon marries him. Despite the obvious passivity of her husband in bed, the couple will have two children, Lyudmila (1965) and Yuri (1969). Chikatilo loves his wife and children very much, is a caring, sensitive father and husband.

In 1970, Andrei Romanovich completed a course in Marxism-Leninism and literature in absentia, received a diploma and got a job as a teacher at school No. 32 in the city of Novoshakhtinsk. The teacher's work is not going well. Chikatilo is not able to control his students, they constantly laugh and mock him. Despite such an unfortunate state of affairs, Chikatilo remains at work. As he will tell later, being in the company of children, boys and girls, he was pleased.

Facts are emerging that the teacher Chikatilo is harassing his students. Chikatilo is politely asked to leave the educational institution, but the facts are not widely publicized. In another school, Chikatilo is caught in a more frank occupation. He tried to persuade a sleeping student to oral sex, but the older students who noticed this beat Andrei Romanovich. After this incident, there was always a knife in Chikatilo's briefcase.

Soon Chikatilo and his family moved to the city of Shakhty. It is there that the "Maniac from the forest belt", as the newspapers will dub him, will begin his bloody crimes.

December 22, 1978 Chikatilo commits his first murder. His victim is 9-year-old Lena Zakotnova. Noticing her at a tram stop, the maniac lures her to his hut in the forest, promising to treat her to American chewing gum, a treasure for a poor Soviet girl. There, the killer knocks Lena to the floor, tries to rape her, and then inflicts several stab wounds in the stomach. The half-dead girl Chikatilo throws into the Grushevka River, where two days later her body will be found.

Surprisingly, the maniac could be caught after the first crime. There was a witness to how Lena was taken away by a tall, thin man with glasses. Chikatilo was detained according to the identikit, but his wife Faina gave him an alibi for that day. If not for her, perhaps the lives of another 52 people would have been saved ...

Another suspect, Alexander Kravchenko, was involved in the case, from whom a confession was literally knocked out. Despite the vague arguments of the prosecution, Kravchenko was executed in 1984. And the real killer, Chikatilo, remained at large.

He managed to restrain his terrible needs for three years. In 1981, there was another murder, the victim was 17-year-old Larisa Tkachenko. The girl was, in fact, a juvenile prostitute, whose main clients were young soldiers. Making contact with Chikatilo, she did not suspect anything bad, assuming she would go about her usual business.

The maniac noticed Larisa at a bus stop near the city library. He invited the girl to take a walk, and she agreed without a second thought. Of course, she did not count on the end that she expected. Chikatilo and Tkachenko went shallow into the forest, where the killer knocked the girl to the ground, undressed her and beat her badly. To muffle the cries of the unfortunate, he covered her mouth with earth. Soon Larisa stopped resisting...

The next day, September 4, the body of Larisa Tkachenko was discovered. During interrogation, Chikatilo will say that if the first murder frightened and embarrassed him, then when he killed Tkachenko, he experienced jubilation and joy. It is not surprising that after such sensations the maniac could not stop.

In 1982, the killer had already committed 6 crimes. He worked out a plan of action for himself, which practically did not fail: while traveling by bus or suburban trains, he looked out for lonely children at the stations. If it was possible to lure the victim into the forest belt, where Chikatilo most often committed murders, her fate was sealed.

The investigation was hampered by three facts: firstly, crimes of this kind were new, there were no good specialists in serial murders in the Rostov police. Secondly (which follows from the first), the investigation believed that the killer of the boys and the killer of the girls were two different people. And, thirdly, many bodies were found several months after the murder (some were not found at all), it was difficult to identify and process them, revealing the style of the killer. Thus, the case proceeded sluggishly, there was not even a suspect.

The following year, Chikatilo doubled his bloody score by committing 8 more murders (among the victims 4 children). The maniac committed all his crimes with terrifying cruelty. From the materials of the investigation: “When examining the corpse (victim), the following bodily injuries were found: multiple stab and incised injuries of the face, abdomen and external genital organs: nine stab-cut penetrating blind wounds of the abdomen with damage to the small and large intestines, complete cutting off of part intestines and its partial removal from the abdominal cavity with gross ruptures of the mesentery of the small and large intestines. Two of these injuries were formed as a result of repeated (at least 18-20) immersions of the blade with rotation around the axis at different angles ... One stab wound of the right eye socket, two stab wounds of the right auricle. Incised wound of the tongue with complete cutting off of its tip, by making several sawing-cutting movements in the direction transverse to the tongue. An incised wound in the area of ​​the external genitalia with complete cutting off of the scrotum and penis. 23 stab wounds in the chest and abdomen…” Mutilated corpses were regularly found in the forest belt.

The situation became critical. In September 1983, the experienced Major Mikhail Fetisov and his investigation team arrived from the capital. Fetisov was extremely critical of the work of his predecessors, immediately declaring that all the murders were the work of the same sexual maniac. In addition, he actively uses the concept of "serial killer", which was previously presented as inherent in Western countries, but not in the ideologically pure Soviet Union.

The first piece of evidence obtained during the investigation is a sperm sample of the killer obtained from the body of one of the victims. Sperm of the 4th group, therefore the circle of suspects is significantly narrowed. However, evidence has the opposite effect. A suspicious subject was detained by the police on September 14, 1984. Subject introduces himself as Andrei Chikatilo. However, a subsequent check shows that Chikatilo has the 2nd blood group (in 99.9% of cases, the groups of various secretions and blood coincide), and he is safely (having excluded, however, from the party) released. Where he is again taken for murder.

In 1984, the maniac committed 15 brutal murders: 9 adult women and girls and six children became victims of the maniac. In December, he moves to a new job, a factory near Novocherkassk. His position is associated with constant departures and business trips, which provides a convenient opportunity to commit crimes. Committing murders in different cities of a large country, it is very difficult to get caught, this was proved by the American Ted Bundy.

The following year, he commits two murders of women, one of which is in Moscow. In December 1985, the operation "Forest belt" starts, taking place under the control of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The new head of the investigative-operational group Issa Kostoev organizes patrols at railway stations, the best police forces and even vigilantes are thrown to catch the maniac. However, the operatives do not know that Chikatilo has also been a combatant since the seventies. He is also on duty at the stations, diligently catching himself. The operation is taking place on a large scale in three cities: Shakhty, Rostov and Novocherkassk. During the operation, more than a thousand (!) Various crimes were uncovered, over 200 thousand people were checked for involvement in the case, and many people with sexual and mental disabilities were registered. However, the perpetrator has not been found. Kostoev even resorted to the help of the previously caught pedophile maniac Slivko, but he could not help either: “It's useless. This is impossible to calculate. I know for myself."

The surge of excitement around the case forces Chikatilo to be very careful. In 1986, while waiting for the peak of the active work of the investigation, he does not commit a single murder, peacefully celebrates his fiftieth birthday (for the average maniac, by the way, a significant age). However, the next year he starts killing with new force, and will continue his bloody work for another four years ...

On May 16, 1987, while on a business trip in the Urals, Chikatilo kills 13-year-old Oleg Makarenkov. During the next business trip, already in Zaporozhye, he commits an incredibly brutal murder of a 12-year-old boy. The attack was so furious that a fragment of a knife, which was wielded by a maniac, remained at the crime scene. The third murder is already in Leningrad. On September 15, Yura Tereshonok (16 years old) becomes a victim of a killer. After the guy was dead, Chikatilo began to run around and shout: “I am a red partisan! I took the language. I have captured the enemy!"

As you can see, Chikatilo was well aware that while he was being hunted so fiercely, it was better to commit crimes in other regions. As already mentioned, such tactics greatly complicate the work of law enforcement agencies. While all forces are thrown at the capture of a maniac in Shakhty and Rostov, he calmly commits murders in Moscow and Leningrad.

In the 88th year, once again believing in his elusiveness, Andrei Romanovich returns to the killings in his region. An unknown girl in April, 9-year-old Lucy Voronko in May and Zhenya Muratov, 15 years old, in July become the new victims of Chikatilo. All police efforts are in vain so far, the serial killer is at large.

He begins the next year with the murder of 16-year-old Tatyana Ryzhova. The maniac lures her into the empty apartment of his daughter (she left her husband and lives with her parents), where he gives the "guest" vodka to drink. Then he kills: the half-drunk girl is not even able to resist. Chikatilo's corpse is made lazy with a kitchen knife, pieces of the body are taken out of the apartment and calmly carried along the street to the place of "burial". Check it at this moment the police patrol - and it would all be over. But Andrei Romanovich is lucky again.

In 1989, he commits four more brutal murders. He kills 19-year-old Elena Varga on the way to his father's birthday party on August 19th. Noticing a lonely girl at the bus stop, he, in his favorite manner, invites her to his place. However, in the grove it knocks to the ground and kills. Having slaughtered the girl, the maniac brutally mocks the corpse, cuts off the breasts, after which he wraps the remains in scraps of clothing and ... calmly continues on his way to the holiday.

The bodies found by the police are often so mutilated that they cannot be identified. Even experienced operatives who had seen a lot were horrified by what they saw.

The beginning of a new decade, 1990, is the end of the bloody revelry of the maniac Chikatilo. However, before he is taken into custody, the serial killer will commit eight more chilling crimes.

On November 3, the body of the seventh victim of Chikatilo, 16-year-old Viktor Tishchenko, was found. Issa Kostoev decides to increase the number of police patrols. Small groups of police officers in civilian clothes, watching literally every suspicious man, carefully examine the forest belt and the areas adjacent to the railway stations. But, nevertheless, they fail to prevent the latest murder committed by Chikatilo.

On November 6, a maniac takes 22-year-old Svetlana Korostik away from the Leskhoz station. He leads her into the forest, where he kills her. After that, he begins to cut off pieces of flesh from Svetlana's body, and eats some of them. Having finished his bloody ritual, Andrei covers the mutilated and stripped corpse of a woman with earth and fallen leaves. It would seem that everything is as usual, but Chikatilo makes a puncture, which will cost him his freedom (and then his life). Returning to the station, he attracts the attention of Sergeant Igor Rybakov: the victim's blood remained on the killer's cheek and earlobe. Rybakov checks documents, but the sergeant has no grounds for arrest, and the maniac is again free.

Nevertheless, the meeting with Rybakov played a decisive role in the capture of the serial killer from the forest belt. Kostoev came across Rybakov's message, an episode about a man with the wrong blood type surfaced, and several more episodes related to the murders and Chikatilo. By order of Kostoev, a special group of disguised operatives was assigned to shadow Andrei Romanovich.

On November 20, Chiktilo left work: a boy, one of the victims, bit his finger during a struggle, Chikatilo went to see a doctor. Having made an x-ray (the finger turned out to be broken), Andrei Romanovich went in search of victims. While he is trying to take the boys into the woods, he is being watched by a surveillance team. There is no doubt about Chikatilo's guilt. On that day, the maniac was unlucky: one boy was taken away by his mother, the other could not be persuaded. The killer went to the store with nothing - to drink a bottle of beer. At the exit from the grocery store, three men in civilian clothes approached him. "Are you Chikatilo?" Handcuffs snapped on the maniac's wrists.

With him, the maniac had a briefcase in which they found a knife, a piece of rope and a can of Vaseline. After a search of Chikatilo's apartment, 23 more knives, a hammer and a pair of boots were found, a trace of which was found near the corpse of one of the victims. Faina Chikatilo refused to believe that the killer from the forest belt was her own husband, "so soft, kind, sympathetic." Her husband wrote to her from the pre-trial detention center: “Now I would sit at home and pray on my knees for you, my sunshine. And why did God send me to this earth - so affectionate, gentle, caring, but completely defenseless with my weaknesses?

After that, a series of endless interrogations and investigative experiments began. Chikatilo was taken all over the country, to all the cities where he managed to commit murders. Once, when he was taken to the site of one of the murders, information about this became known to the residents of the city of Shakhty. Crowds of people gathered, and the police and prosecutors had to urgently call the riot police so that people would not tear Chikatilo apart. The maniac confessed to his crimes, showed on a mannequin how he cut, beat, strangled. However, by the beginning of the court session, he retracted all his confessions, assuring that he had made them under pressure from law enforcement agencies.

The murder trial began on April 14, 1992. During the process, he was kept in the KGB detention center, carefully guarded: among the relatives of the victims were employees of the authorities, the killer could be reached in a simple pre-trial detention center. While on trial, Chikatilo was locked in a cell-cell, which protected him more from the relatives of the victims than from escape. Speaking at the trial, the father of 11-year-old Ivan Fomin could not utter a word for a long time, then he gathered his courage and said: “I have a request to the court. No need to sentence him to death. Do not. Let it be 15 years. Let less. But then from the KGB casemates, where he has been hidden for so long, he will come to us. Listen, Chikatilo, what will we do to you: we will repeat everything that you did with our children. Chikatilo, we will repeat everything! And you all, drop by drop, will feel how much it hurts ... "

Chikatilo's lawyer showed the client as a seriously ill, unfortunate person who needed urgent help. The maniac himself diligently played out of himself insane: he spoke utter nonsense, dirtyly insulted the judge and the prosecutor. One day he dropped his pants and shook his cock and said, "..."

Despite all the antics of a maniac, he was sentenced to death. The verdict "execution" was met with applause. However, even after that, the killer continued to resist justice. Every day in the solitary cell where he was kept, Chikatilo began with exercises. And then he wrote complaints against representatives of the law, investigators, and a judge. Before the execution of the sentence, Chikatilo wrote a petition for pardon to the president then already Russian Federation Yeltsin. But the request was rejected.

On February 14, 1994, Andrei Romanovich Chikatilo, sentenced to death for 52 premeditated murders, was executed with a single bullet to the back of the head.

10 YEARS ago, serial killer Andrei Chikatilo was shot. He was detained in 1990 after 12 years of searching and charged with the murder of 30 people. He confessed to 53. The victims of the maniac were women and children, both girls and boys.

The trial lasted six months. The verdict on the exceptional measure was met with applause by all those present in the meeting room of the Rostov Regional Court. But the condemned man himself did not believe until the very end that he would be shot. Employees of the Novocherkassk prison, where the maniac was waiting for the execution of the sentence, said that he very carefully monitored his health, did exercises every morning, read a lot and wrote endless letters complaining about the investigators and the judge.

But everyone else was looking forward to his death. Many research institutes tried to obtain the killer's brain, and the Japanese allegedly offered $20 million for a piece of his gray matter. But where and when Chikatilo was shot and in what place his remains are buried, only a limited circle of people still knows. For the first time, one of its participants shared his memories of that execution with AiF.

Monday, February 14, 1994 was unusually windy and frosty. Minus 17 degrees and not a single snowflake on the frozen ground. Only in the second half of the day did it start to snow, and by evening it was already snowing with might and main.

UAZ drove up to the checkpoint of the Novocherkassk prison. The escorts came out of the room, holding on both sides of a man whose crimes the whole world knew about ... Without a hat, in handcuffs, powdered with snow, Chikatilo peered into the people around him.

Because of his height and handcuffs, he could not get into the car. Someone unceremoniously pushed him from behind, and the people in the car dragged him inside. Chikatilo groaned, but did not utter a word. An attempt to squeeze him into a specially equipped cramped booth did not work. So he remained sitting on the floor, at the feet of the people guarding him. The cars drove out of town. Ahead was a "UAZ" with Chikatilo and guards, behind - "UAZ" with the head of the special group and the prosecutor.

Approximately an hour later they arrived at the place. The iron gates opened, letting in cars and people frozen along the way. In the dark courtyard were a doctor and two others: the caretaker of the buildings and a representative of the Internal Affairs Directorate. Greeting, they tried to joke, saying that they had not seen each other for a long time. We went down to the basement, resembling either a warehouse or a bomb shelter: along the walls - pipes, cable harnesses, on the floor - boxes, some kind of rubbish. In a small, dimly lit room littered with old furniture, they placed Chikatilo with two guards. The offender was seated on his knees on the floor, and if not for the handcuffs, one would have thought that he was praying. The face is clean-shaven, the remnants of gray hair are disheveled, on the right cheek there is a fresh abrasion, apparently received when getting into the car. Outwardly, Chikatilo was calm. He probably believed the guards, who said that he was being taken to Moscow for examination.

The prosecutor, who supported the prosecution in court, entered. He greeted the prisoner cordially and asked how he was feeling. They had known each other for a long time, so Chikatilo smiled and finally calmed down. The prosecutor asked why he refused to leave his autograph on a book written about him that morning. Chikatilo replied that he had not read this book and did not know whose it was. He asked if she was here to bring. The prosecutor left and immediately returned with a book by M. Krivich and O. Olgin "Comrade Murderer". I asked the guard to remove the handcuffs. Chikatilo, squatting, began to write with the prosecutor's pen: "... thank you and everyone who suffered with me, and so that there are no more such criminals or patients like me," signed and dated February 14, 1994.

A minute later, the prosecutor was already checking the prepared documents: the verdict, the ruling and the order of the court, the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, signed on January 4, 1994 by B. Yeltsin. The leader of the group said, "Let's go." Everyone bustled as they made their way down the long corridor to the far end of the cellar. To the left was the only open room. They entered it. The cold seized the already chilled people. Against the wall, to the right of the entrance, at the far end, stood a small desk, long outdated in some study. At the table - four of the same old chairs. The prosecutor was the first to squeeze through to the table, followed by a representative of the Internal Affairs Directorate, a doctor, and the head of the group.

They brought in Chikatilo. He was still calm. They closed the iron door. Fulfilling the required formalities, the prosecutor specified the surname, date and place of birth, the date of the verdict ... He asked if he knew about the Presidential Decree. Chikatilo got worried: "What, refused?" The prosecutor, evading a direct answer, said: "Listen, I will read it to you." The decree consisted of only a few lines. Chikatilo listened in silence, but either did not understand or did not believe: his face did not change and did not utter a word. The prosecutor read the decree again. Finally, Chikatilo asked: "So, now they will shoot me?" Everyone was silent. The pause dragged on uncomfortably. Then the prosecutor suddenly said in a hoarse voice: "Execute the sentence." At the same second, another door silently opened to the left of Chikatilo. The guards abruptly turned the sentenced man to her, pushed him, and he, having taken two steps, disappeared into another room. A second later there was a dull bang. It was a shot. The clock showed 20.00. Hastily signing the necessary documents with their hands trembling either from cold or from excitement, all those present began to rise.

The first to enter the execution room was the doctor, followed by all the others. Chikatilo was lying face down on the floor, stretched out to the full length of his large body. His heart was still beating, pushing a thick stream of blood into the bullet hole. Blood was noisily flowing down somewhere, and an outsider, hearing this sound, might think that somewhere the tap had not been closed. Someone suggested shooting again, but the doctor said that this was no longer required. Inhaling powder smoke, they exchanged meaningless words. Only the assistant performer remarked:

Wow, he said: "And the heart is still beating."

Who said? the prosecutor asked.

He is Chikatilo.

The prosecutor did not believe.