If you think about serial killers it's likely that names like Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy,
and David Berkowitz aka Son of Sam pop into your mind.
Yet why is it that we always think about American serial killers?
Surely despite the media blackout, on the other side of the Iron Curtain the Soviet
Union must have had its own string of brutal serial killers?
Why then haven't we heard about these Soviet killers?
Well, as mentioned the iron curtain is a big reason for a lack of publicity around Soviet
serial killers.
By the time the USSR dissolved and Russia opened up to the outside world, the names
of American serial killers were already famous around the globe.
Russia on the other hand had basically been living in a total media blackout for decades,
and the world knew little about what life was like behind the Iron Curtain- let alone
how many serial killers the USSR really had.
It's not just the world that was in the dark about Soviet killers though, with its own
population largely ignorant to the whole serial killer phenomenon.
As the state had a tight grip on all media, the government would routinely censor out
any stories involving murder, as it was deemed inappropriate for public consumption.
People shouldn't have to live in fear for their lives, and sometimes ignorance really
is bliss.
Unfortunately though, this ignorance spread to the Soviet Union's own police forces.
Thanks to a general clamp down on any news about mass murders, the entire serial killer
phenomenon was largely unknown to Soviet law enforcement.
Outside of a few major police departments, most police investigators did not even know
that this phenomenon existed.
Ignorance was so great about serial killers and their methods, that murder sprees were
typically chalked up to being the work of cults or perhaps terrorists.
A lack of knowledge of the serial killer phenomenon also helped to ensure that many serial killers
were never discovered, which itself added to a relatively lack of publicly known Soviet
serial killers.
When the work of a serial killer was explained away as cult activity or terrorism, then nobody
would suspect that a serial killer- an otherwise normal individual and literal wolf in sheep's
clothing hiding in their midst- was actually the culprit.
This not only allowed serial killers to continue killing or simply move across the country
to kill elsewhere, but to never be caught.
While the United States was carefully studying the serial killer phenomenon, everything from
developing the abilities to profile killers, to serial killer methodology, and even serial
killer psychology, the Soviet Union made little if any effort to study a phenomenon that most
of its law enforcement did not even know existed.
Thus, even when a serial killer was suspected, he or she stood a great chance of not being
caught, as Soviet police did not understand serial killers or their methods as well as
their American counterparts.
But the Soviet Union did in fact have some pretty prolific serial killers, and some of
them were truly monstrous, rivaling anything that American killers may have done.
In late summer of 1982, Soviet police in the city of Rostov discovered the body of a 13-year
old girl left in the woods.
She had been assaulted, stabbed, had been mutilated either before or after death, and
then had her eyes gouged out.
Within days, two more young women were discovered in similar condition.
Immediately Soviet authorities suspected that this was the work of the same person or group
of people, but where American investigators would have started profiling this killer and
predicting future victims, the Soviets were all but helpless to discover the killer's
identity due to their lack of knowledge on the serial killer phenomenon.
The killings continued, and by 1984 there were a total of 23 victims.
The victims included prostitutes, young children- both boys and girls- and local women aged
up to 45.
All of the victims had been assaulted and mutilated, and in some instances the killer
had clearly chewed on the victim's body either before or after death.
The police realized that they were dealing with a serial killer, but kept a lid on any
news out of a desire to not alert the killer but also because Soviet authorities did not
want to admit to the crime spree.
At this point American investigators would have long ago built a profile of the serial
killer, predicting where and when he would strike next and narrowing down a list of suspects.
Based off the people he killed and the time he killed them, they would even be able to
geographically narrow down an area where the killer may live.
Soviet authorities however had no knowledge of profiling techniques, and thus did the
next best thing.
Soviet police rounded up and questioned anyone that they deemed suspicious.
This included foreigners, former criminals, and anyone seen as stereotypically undesirable.
These roundups drew up little in hard evidence, and nobody could be pinned for the crimes.
Yet as the years progressed, the soviet authorities began to increase their knowledge of serial
killers, and started building a profile of their killer- though sadly their inexperience
led them to look for the wrong suspect.
At one point a middle-aged man was observed by police as he approached several young prostitutes
and then entered an abandoned building with one in tow.
The police quickly confronted the man, discovering him to be a local Communist Party member named
Andrei Chikatilo.
He did not fit the profile of the killer they were looking for- young, anti-social, and
with a history of violence- and thus let Chikatilo go.
Another six years would pass and the bodies continued to pile up.
Victims were being discovered in wooded areas that were located near bus and train stations,
and this led police to finally realize that the killer was using public transportation
to move around.
Soviet police then put a cunning plan into action: they stationed police in most of the
train and bus stations around Rostov, making sure they were clearly visible to all visitors,
but left a few stations on the city's outskirts unwatched.
These however were bait, as Soviet officers wearing normal civilian clothes would watch
these stations.
It was hoped that the killer would thus avoid the obviously monitored stations and use the
stations that seemed to be clear of police.
The trap worked perfectly, and in November of that year an undercover officer approached
a 54 year old man walking out of the woods near one of these remote stations.
The man had a cut on his finger and a smear of blood on his cheek, but he explained that
he had cut himself on some thorns while walking through the woods.
The policeman had no good reason to hold the man and let him go, but not before identifying
him- as Andrei Chikatilo, the same man who had been discovered leading a prostitute into
an abandoned building in 1984.
The next day Soviet authorities decided to search the woods where Chikatilo had been
found, and discovered the body of a young girl there.
Chikatilo was immediately placed under investigation, and a few weeks later, police secretly watched
as he approached a young boy offering him a bottle of beer.
The police believed that Chikatilo was trying to lure the boy away to kill him, and immediately
sprung their trap, arresting Chikatilo.
According to Soviet criminal code though, the police could only hold Chikatilo for 10
days if they had no physical evidence or witnesses linking him to the crime.
The soviet cops knew they had their man, but frustratingly could do nothing to jail him.
Due to their inexperience with serial killers and the government brushing their existence
under the rug, the Soviet police force had little experience gathering forensic evidence,
and thus would need to rely on a confession to jail Chikatilo.
What Soviet police lacked in forensic techniques though, they more than made up for with cleverness.
Soviet authorities decided they would try the old good cop/bad cop trick, and sent detectives
to aggressively grill Chikatilo for hours, threatening him with everything from the death
penalty to life in prison.
Chikatilo however would not confess to anything, and remained quiet the entire time.
Next, after allowing Chikatilo a small break, they sent in a psychiatrist named Alexander
Bukhanovsky.
Bukhanovsky brought Chikatilo food and offered him coffee.
He was kind and sociable, explaining that he was a doctor and not a police officer,
and thus had no interest in gathering evidence.
He was only there to help Chikatilo.
Bukhanovsky and Chikatilo spent the day together, chatting about Chikatilo's life, and gradually
Chikatilo grew to trust the doctor.
Then, one of the Soviet Union's most horrific serial killers began to spill his secrets.
Chikatilo spoke about growing up in the 1930s, in a farm in the Ukraine during Stalin's collectivization
campaign, which saw the death of millions of Soviet peasants to famine.
When the Nazis invaded, his father was captured as a POW, and after his release was treated
as a traitor and potential spy Stalin's regime.
Chikatilo's young life was one of hardship and sacrifice, and things only got worse as
he got older.
He was plagued by an attraction to much younger girls and boys, but was frustrated by impotence.
In 1955 Chikatilo applied to law school in Moscow, and despite being above-average intelligent,
was denied because he performed so poorly on his entrance exam.
He instead got a degree in a vocational school and married one of his sister’s friends,
moving to Rostov and having two children with his wife.
He eventually took a job as a teacher in a secondary school and became a member of the
Communist Party, living by Soviet standards a pretty good life for a Soviet citizen.
Despite this though, he was plagued by his impotence and coupled with an inability to
perform with his wife, and felt like a failure.
He vented these frustrations out by molesting the children that he taught, and wanting to
keep the incidents a secret from state authorities, he was quietly fired from his job by the school's
director in 1974.
He and his family moved to the outskirts of Rostov and he took another teaching job, though
unknown to his wife he rented a small three-room cottage outside of town.
In 1978 he lured his first victim there, a nine year old girl that he assaulted and then
stabbed to death.
Tragically, blood was discovered on the street near his cottage, and he was questioned by
Soviet police- but because Chikatilo was a married family man and Communist Party member,
he was viewed as “respectable” and out of suspicion.
Instead a local man with a previous history of violence was arrested and charged for the
murder, and then executed.
The close brush with police scared Chikatilo, and he laid low for a few years.
He left his teaching job to become a low-level government employee at a distribution center,
which let him freely travel in the area and be away from home and work for days at a time.
This would make the perfect cover and grant him the opportunity needed to kill as he wished.
In September of 1981, he lured a 17 year old girl from a library and assaulted, then killed
her.
His killing would continue for nine more years, with a total count of at least 56 victims.
After the stunning confession, Chikatilo would go on to show to the police how he committed
his murders, using mannequins in the basement of a local KGB office.
His trial took place after the fall of the Soviet Union, and would be Russia's first
major media circus.
Two years after his arrest, Chikatilo was led from his death row cell to a soundproofed
room in the Novocherkassk prison and executed with a single gunshot behind the right ear.
The Soviet Union did in fact have many serial killers, though the true number will tragically
remain unknown.
A lack of forensic evidence gathering techniques and a general ignorance of the serial killer
phenomenon means that many of the Soviet Union's most brutal killers remain undiscovered.
Even today though Russian authorities are combing over cold case files from the Soviet
era, and it's hoped that some justice may be found as new investigative techniques and
DNA evidence are brought to bear on decades old evidence.
If there was a serial killer on the loose in your area, do you think it would be safer
for people to know or is ignorance really bliss?
Were the Soviets right in censoring out news of serial killers?
Does western media glamorize serial killers too much by giving them so much attention?
Let us know in the comments!
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