Russian media have speculated that Pichushkin was motivated, in part, by a macabre competition with another notorious Russian serial killer, Andrei Chikatilo, who was convicted of killing fifty-two children and young women over a twelve-year period. After his arrest, he was found guilty of 49 murders and three attempted murders. In 1992, 18-year-old Pichushkin invited one of his friends, Mikhail Odiychuk, with him on a "killing expedition." The park is enormous, encompassing more than 2,700 acres. What is love? In it, he discussed at length his need to kill. [10], Moskalyova's body was discovered in Bitsa Park on 14 June 2006, complete with Pichushkin's trademark injuries. The Maniac eyed 32 for at least an hour before he made his move. .css-m6thd4{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;display:block;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;font-family:Gilroy,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.2;font-weight:bold;color:#323232;text-transform:capitalize;}@media (any-hover: hover){.css-m6thd4:hover{color:link-hover;}}Pablo Escobar. Then she tells a story about a lie he once told. He wants to be understood, and he likes to say he never lies. _Da, ladno. Only a few recent serial killers have been as prolific, including Andrei Chikatilo, also Russian, convicted of fifty-two murders in 1994, and Yang Xinhai, who took sixty-seven lives in central China from 1999 to 2003. Theyre impossible questions, but theyre the only ones that really matter now, and every time they come up, Natasha cries and shakes her head and stares through a window at the darkened courtyard below. As the killings progressed, Pichushkin's attacks grew even more savage. The killer was caught in 2006 when he killed his coworker, a woman who had informed her son that she would be out on a walk with Pichushkin, linking him to the crime. There are pins commemorating the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, Tolstoy pins, Lenin pins, a pin from Minskninety-two pins in all. He had gone on a walk with Marina Moskalyeva, another co-worker. There had been other lies, of course, countless tiny deceptions meant to lure his victims into the park, but no one had ever asked Pichushkin point-blank if he had ever killed anyone. His sister exclaimed: This madman, hes so fascinating. The death of his beloved grandfather affected him deeply and he became aggressive and violent towards others soon after. He would also push a vodka bottle into the gaping wound in their skulls, which became his trademark. It was very important for Pichushkin that people think he was a hero, so I made him feel like a hero.. To stop drinking, the man said. Only two, or possibly three, of his victims were women. Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads, Name: Alexander Pichushkin, Birth Year: 1974, Birth date: April 9, 1974, Birth City: Moscow, Birth Country: Russia. "This first murder, it's like first love, it's unforgettable," he later said. He killed prolifically over the next decade and also began competing with another serial killer, Andrei Chikatilo. Russian serial killer Alexander Pichushkin, nicknamed "The Chessboard Killer," was caught in Moscow and convicted in 2007 of killing 48 people. Everyone knows everyone else: the babushkas gossiping on their apartment stoops, the kids kicking soccer balls in the courtyard, the old men smoking cigarettes. Due to his behavior, Pichushkin's mother decided to transfer him from the mainstream school he had been attending to one for children with learning disabilities. According toBiography, the dates on the board corresponded to the dates on which Pichushkin had murdered his victims. He told Odichuk he wanted to kill someone. [4] Following this accident, Pichushkin frequently became hostile and impulsive. Initially, he admitted to "only" killing 48 . The Disturbing Story Of Alexander Pichushkin, The Russian Chessboard Killer Who Strove To Kill 64 Victims. Sometimes, when the Maniac and his prey reached the well, he would propose a toast to his dead dog. Unable to be sentenced to death after the suspension of the death penalty in Russia in 1996, he received a life sentence with the first 15 years to be spent in solitary confinement. But theres something else: In Russia, which remains violently homophobic, it may be that people have a hard time believing a gay man is capable of the kind of power or force of will that defined the Maniac. Pichushkin moved into his grandfather's home and was encouraged to pursue intellectual pursuits outside of school. His first murder was committed in 1992, when he was still a student. Alexander Yuryevich Pichushkin (Russo: ) (9 de abril de 1974) um assassino em srie de origem russa. He used to ask, Wheres Sasha? she says. The Maniac was worried that this foul-smelling, inebriated little man would change his mind and turn around, depriving Pichushkin of what he believed was his. Finally, everyone but 32 disappeared, heading inside to their apartments or ducking into the grocery store. In the early 2000s, he began murdering again. He removed his weaponsometimes a hammer, sometimes a wrench with a tool used for removing nails; in this case he didnt specifyfrom his jacket and struck 32 on the head, hard, but not hard enough to kill him. He lied, knowing everyone would know he was lying. And still they did nothing. Alexander Pichushkin a Russian serial killer known as the Chessboard Killer and The Bitsa Park Maniac. Soon he will be moved from his jail in Moscow (where his mother has been able to visit twice a month, bearing gifts of cigarettes, cheese, and salo, or salted lard) to a maximum-security prison, probably in the north or maybe in the Ural Mountains, where he will spend the first fifteen years of his sentence in solitary confinement. Because that is what I do, Pichushkin supposedly said. They could do it together, he told him. Before perestroika the system was better, says Alexander Bukhanovsky, the serial-killer expert. All rights reserved. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. They said they just wanted to talk to him about some burglaries, but I thought there were a lot of police for a burglar, and I asked Sasha, Did you rob someone? and he said, No. . The Maniac, after all, is a clerk at the grocery store where they both work. Later, he branched out and began killing younger men, women, and children too, attacking them behind and taking them by surprise. [9], In September 1992, Pichushkin was romantically rejected by Olga A., his 18-year-old neighbor, as she was already in a relationship with a man named Sergei B. Pensioners. That chessboard belonged to Alexander Pichushkin, otherwise known as "The Chessboard Killer," one of the most notorious serial killers in Russian history. I am going to drop you from the window and you will fall fifteen meters to your death" He then watched these videos repeatedly to reaffirm his power. Except for his mother and Suprunenko, almost everyone else is here at the recently renovated Supreme Court of Russia, on Povarskaya Street in the center of Moscow: Natasha Fyedosova, Pichushkins lawyer Pavel Ivannikov, the panel of three judges, the prosecutor in his royal blue military-style uniform, the babushkas who lost sons and husbands, the younger men and girls whispering into their cell phones, too scared to look at the Maniac, who looks bored, then amused, then angry. Children were forbidden to venture into the woods. Alexander Yuryevich Pichushkin (Russian: , born 9 April 1974), also known as the Chessboard Killer (Russian: ) and the Bitsa Park Maniac (Russian: ), is a Russian serial killer who is believed to have killed at least forty-nine people, and possibly as many as . She had no idea he would be so serious. Echoing her son, she says he never lies. The trees loomed over the power lines on Balaklavski Prospekt, and a red-taupe sky stretched across the forest. In court he wont be able to recall what she was saying, or trying to say, but hell remember the penultimate moment with absolute clarity. He sought something purer: an untainted death. Bitsevsky Park is a long, rolling forest filled with trees, streams, and clearings. It was at this time that Pichushkin began to develop a more sinister hobby that, at the time, remained unknown to anyone: whenever he knew he was going to come into contact with children, he would take a video camera along and proceed to threaten them. But he wanted to kill. Now everyone is leaving the courtroom, and the Maniac is putting his hands behind his back so someone we cant see can handcuff him. Nacido el 9 de abril de 1974 en Mytishchi, (ciudad cercana a Mosc) durante el periodo de la antigua Unin Sovitica, Alexander Pichushkin tuvo una infancia muy complicada. Following his arrest the police discovered a. However, by 1992, this practice had become insufficient to satisfy his urges. In an effort to both dull the pain of the loss as well as to calm his severe aggressive tendencies, he began to consume large quantities of vodka. Now she is sitting in her apartment at 8 Khersonskaya, which is identical to Natasha Pichushkinas at 2 Khersonskaya, smoking Vogue cigarettes and talking about him. Before his arrest, locals referred to the unknown killer as the Bitsa Park Maniac.. He grew up on 2 Khersonskaya St. in Moscow, six minutes away from the north end of Bitsa Park where he would claim most of his victims. Also Known As: Alexander Yuryevich Pichushkin. It was only after the bodies started turning up in the forest that the Interior Ministry took over the case and that people like Andrei Suprunenkopeople who actually know how to find serial killersstarted looking for him. (Bullshit. [1] Ex-funcionrio de supermercado, conhecido na mdia russa como "Manaco do Parque Bitsa" ou "Assassino do tabuleiro de Xadrez". This was strange; usually you had to hit the buzzer to get into the building. On October 24, 2007, Alexander Pichushkin was found guilty of murdering forty-eight people. As if proud of his crimes, Pichushkin said this at the trial, "I thought it would be unfair to forget about the other 11 people." Written on the board, in all but two of the squares, were calendar dates. The jury deliberated for only three hours before finding him guilty of 48 counts of murder and three counts of attempted murder. He lived there with his mother Natalia Elmouradovna, his younger half-sister, her husband, and their son in a two-bedroom apartment on the fifth floor. That chessboard belonged to Alexander Pichushkin, otherwise known as "The Chessboard Killer," one of the most notorious serial killers in Russian history. Alexander Pichushkin killed his first victim in 1992 but killed only sporadically until 2001, when he began regularly targeting victims. [3] Pichushkin was aware of the note, but was undeterred. There was total shock when we heard it was Sasha Pichushkin, says Natasha Fyedosova, a pale blond woman of 27 whose father, Boris Fyedosov, was the thirty-sixth victim. The public envisioned a monster, an animal of a man, potentially more than one man, hiding around every corner, living in shadows, preying on the weak. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. He mostly targeted homeless elderly men, luring them with offers of free vodka. They were dank, charmless, and overflowing with tenants, but they were the first single-family homes most of these people had ever lived in. What's for certain, though, is that there may be a handful of missing person cases in Moscow that will one day be linked to the Chessboard Killer. Pichushkin first committed murder in 1992 - the same year the police convicted fellow Russian citizen, Andrei Chikatilo, of mutilating and killing 52 people. At least thirteen corpses (including, possibly, that of victim 32) are believed to be stuck somewhere in the sewage system. 9, 1974) is a Russian serial killer and sadist who was raised in a seemingly stable household lead by his stepfather, mother, and shared with two half-siblings. And then Pichushkin began to tell us that hed killed more than sixty people. Pichushkin told him about the park, the sewage wellhis entire m.o.and Suprunenko began to understand the fates of all those people who had disappeared. We were in shock when we realized how many people hed killed, he says. Little is known of Pichushkin's early years. The victim was Mikhail Odichuk. The Chessboard Killer, is a prolific Russian serial killer who murdered 48 people. Average IQ of serial killers 33.5 A huge difference! In the beginning, we only had thirteen bodies. The most important fact about Nikolai Zakharchenko is that he was the forty-first victim. She accepted. While he might not be as well-known as some American serial killers, Alexander Pichushkin alleged to killing at least 60 people in Russia. A week later, Lobov was back at the metro station when he happened to see Pichushkin, who would tell everyone in court that it didnt matter what Lobov claimed because nobody would believe a punk who hung out at metro stations, which is true everywhere and especially in Russia. ", 13 Unsettling Facts About Alexander Pichushkin, The Chessboard Killer. [18] During his trial, Pichushkin was housed in a glass cage for his own protection. When Pichushkin realized that Odichuk wasnt serious about killing, he killed Odichuk instead. (Russia doesnt have the death penalty.) His co-workers always referred to him as quiet, perhaps a little strange, but certainly not dangerous. Pronin accompanied him to an isolated area in Bitsa Park, whereupon Pichushkin pulled out a bottle of vodka and offered him a drink. 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