We continue the series of publications about the criminal Tula of the 90s. The first part.
The beginning of the 90s went down in history with an unprecedented rampant crime. For comparison: in 1991 in the Tula region it was committed
23,557 crimes, and a year later - over 31 thousand. Not a week passed without commercial tents, security booths in the first parking lots, offices, shops and markets burning in Tula or in the regions. Rarely did any entrepreneur try to seek protection from the police: everyone knew “which way the wind blows.” From Kosaya Gora, from where Bourgeois (Sergei Khimin) ruled the Station and part of the Sovetsky and Central districts. From Zarechye, where the Leshy brothers and Osipov’s brigade ruled. From Novo-Medvensky, from where the brothers of Kazanets commanded affairs in the Proletarsky, Venevsky and Kireyevsky districts. From Krivoluchye, where the Isakovskys’ patrimony was...
Arson of cars, kidnappings and taking them into the forest, intimidation with irons and other abominations, so effectively shown in crime series, were the terrible and harsh truth of life. In the 90s there was no businessman who did not pay tribute. If you give up the “roof”, you will burn out. If you don’t accept the conditions, they’ll put it on the counter, and the debt will instantly grow so much that you’ll have to give everything just to stay alive.
Racketeering was treated as a necessary evil. These were the unspoken rules of the game: if you open even the most crap business, you have to pay for protection from other guys.
Ambarnikov (Ambar) is considered the founder of the Tula racket: he was the first to put together a brigade to take money from businessmen, and he was the first to leave for another world. Ambar's group worked on a big scale. Their last thing: on June 29, 1993, they received a new car from the owner of one of the Tula open-air “car showrooms”. If they disobeyed, they threatened to burn down the parking lot and kill the owner.
Sloboda wrote about gang warfare. These were obvious “greetings from the dashing 90s.” On October 4, 2003, the recently released Sergei Gatilov (Greek) was killed at the Zarechensk cemetery. December 19, 2003 on the street. Bondarenko’s former “comrades-in-arms” planted explosives under the front axle of Kazants’ (Gennady Kazantsev) jeep. Kazantsev, whose legs were blown off by the explosion, died in hospital
But Ambar himself was the first to say goodbye to life: in the summer of 1993, on Ryazanka, an improvised explosive device tore the car and its new owner to shreds.
Tula detectives, even years later, recalled with disgust the terrible sight: pieces of a car, body parts, everything mixed up. For our criminologists, this was the first explosive examination in their practice, or, as it came to be called, explosion-proof examination.
The power of the criminal underground rested on the “concepts” and authority of criminal leaders. But, according to the laws of the jungle, the leaders of the pack sooner or later had to go into the shadows, leaving the throne to the young. No one wanted to give up their powers voluntarily.
No one counted how many goals were scored in the criminal battle of the 90s. Grigory Pavlovich Zubarev is already in the rank of deputy. The head of the criminal police service of the Internal Affairs Directorate recalled that in the early to mid-90s, every month there was a bloody “arrow” with burnt cars and explosives.
In 1995, in the Leninsky district (the name “burial ground of the region” stuck to it), 40 murdered people were discovered, 20 of them could not be identified.
In addition to the internal squabbling for the right to leadership in the brigade and the status of “authority,” no less acute were the squabbles for spheres of influence between individual gangs: for the right to “milk” specific areas, enterprises, parking lots, markets and other places of profit. This was a new round of confrontation, when the gangs devoured each other. The rule of the Roman conquerors “divide and conquer” worked flawlessly: in order to take over the area of responsibility of competitors, it was enough to quarrel between them.
This is exactly what happened with the Zarechny group of Osipov and Gatilov (Popik and Grek), which was engaged in extortion in Tula and the region. In 1994, a split occurred in the brigade; Gatilov claimed the role of leader and decided to kill the leader. According to one version, the two leaders of the brigade were pitted against another Zarechensky authority, Andrei Leshkov (Leshy).
On May 25, 1994, Gatilov’s people gathered at the site near the mass graves in the old Zarechensk cemetery, armed themselves and set off in several cars to look for Osipov. A few hours later, at the entrance to the Zarechensky Bridge across the Upa, the Gatilovskys shot at Popik’s car. Together with Osipov, the leader of the “group of athletes,” Tsarev, who happened to be in the car, also died.
It is noteworthy that the murder occurred on the day of the wake of another criminal authority of Zarechye, Puchkov, nicknamed Puchok. He was shot in a casino after a quarrel with one of his brothers. Many of his “boys” came to remember the authority at the Tulitsa cafe.
The day before, the Gatilovskys shot the driver Osipov and threw the corpse into Bezhka. The leader knew nothing about this, but felt threatened.
It is no coincidence that at the funeral dinner it was said: “Greek, do you want war? You will get it! But the roles of hunter and victim were already distributed. Tsarev got into this game by the will of fate: Osipov, after the wake, could not get behind the wheel and asked the more sober Tsarev to replace his missing driver.
Victims of the bloody showdown in 1994: Igor Osipov (Popik), head of the Zarechensk group, and Valery Tsarev, leader of the “athletes”
The police quickly caught the participants in the massacre on the bridge. The detention saved the lives of many, although only temporarily.
At this place, the Gatilovskys waylaid the car,
in which Tsarev and Osipov were traveling
Gatilov and his people were put on trial in 1996, the leader received 5 years in prison and 8 years in a general regime colony. In 2003, Grek was released, having received the right to early release for good behavior. Subsequent events showed that he was in vain in his haste to freedom. On October 4, 2003, he died from five shots in the head near the mass graves at the Zarechensk cemetery: according to investigators, he arrived in a “nine” to meet someone, but did not even have time to get out of the car. It is symbolic that the murder took place on the site of former gatherings of the Gatilov and Popik brigade.
The same fate - years of atrocities, arrest, imprisonment, release and retribution - was prepared for Gennady Kazantsev, the leader of the largest Tula brigade in the early 90s.
The Kazanets gang was created in the summer of 1993 - spring of 1994. The leader of the group, a resident of Novo-Medvensky, Gennady Kazantsev, who had no previous conflicts with the law, gathered around him thugs from all over the region. As in the gang of Popik and Grek, there were almost no criminals among the Kazantsev gang: the brothers of the second wave of the 90s would have criminal records and Zonov tattoos.
The backbone of the Kazanets gang consisted of the Venev and Kireev brothers, young, daring, who did not have rich parents or connections to get out into the public.
In addition to Kazantsev, the affairs of the group were run by two former employees of the Station District Department of Internal Affairs, who officially worked as the general director and deputy director of the private security company BIS.
Former police officers helped Kazantsev with weapons; he bought some of them himself in Izhevsk. The gang's arsenal included a Kalashnikov, four TT guns, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, explosives and grenades. All this was confiscated during a search after the arrest of the leader.
The Kazantsevskys, under the cover of BIS, made their living through racketeering, imposing tribute not only on private stores, but also on large enterprises in Venev, Kireevsk, and Arsenyevo. For example, Arsenyevsky and Venevsky dairies. Every month the bandits received an average of about $100-150 per object for “protection”. If a businessman did not want to work with BIS, armed thugs burst into the office, and no one refused the “roof.” Other brigades were also afraid to contact Kazantsev. Enough with the murder of a repeat offender in Venev. He tried to divide the area with the Kazantsevskys. The competitor was visited by bandits in police uniforms and offered to go to the district department. But in fact, they took him to a deserted place in the Mikhailovsky district near Ryazan, hacked him to death with an ax, burned him and buried him.
Most of the gang was arrested on May 23, 1995. One of the accomplices, who was caught stealing, wrote a confession, where he spoke about all the atrocities of the Kazantsevites. The bandits were charged with four murders, extortion and robbery. The trial lasted more than 6 (!) years. The leader faced up to 20 years, but the case fell apart. Intimidated witnesses refused to confirm their previous testimony. In February 2002, the prosecutor dropped charges for three of the four murders and asked for Kazantsev only 7 years and 9 months - six months more than the Kazantsevs had already spent in pre-trial detention. A month later, Kazantsev was released, and in December 2002 he exploded in his jeep on the street. Bondarenko.
To be continued
Bandits have neither romance, nor evolution, nor good intentions. These are extremely cynical people who are ready to do anything to achieve their goals. When now they say that they have become white and fluffy, this is not a qualitative change, these are just age-related changes.
“Brothers, don’t shoot at each other,” sang the now forgotten performer Evgeny Kemerovsky in the second half of the 90s. But the “lads” shot. In every regional city in Russia there is a corner of the cemetery lined with luxurious monuments. People ironically call them “alleys of heroes” - these graves actually contain “heroes of the 90s” who died in gangster wars.
But not everyone died: according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the criminal groups included several hundred thousand people. For more than 10 years, an entire social stratum lived according to the concepts of “refining topics”, “resolving issues specifically.” Today everything is in the past, but the people who once made up this layer have not gone away. They are among us. Are there “former” bandits, how do they live and what are the “fighters”, “authorities” and “foremen” of the 90s doing now?
The organized crime group “Uralmash” lasted on the public horizon of Russia longer than other criminal brands. Its leader, Alexander Khabarov, tried to fit into his new life not secretly, like many of his colleagues, but openly. The result of the unsuccessful rebranding was the mysterious death of Khabarov in pre-trial detention center No. 1 in the city of Yekaterinburg. In the spring, the Prosecutor General's Office closed the last page in the case of this criminal community. The first part of his story is typical of its time. The second one is unique
It is best to approach the grave of Alexander Khabarov at the Northern Cemetery of Yekaterinburg from the back and backwards. Having stood in front of the monument, you should leave in the same way - without turning around. The fact is that recently a security camera was installed on a nearby pine tree, which records everything that happens nearby. To the question “Who installed it?” the friends of the deceased do not give an answer. Law enforcement agencies also do not confirm their involvement. The easiest thing would be to climb a pine tree, cut off the wires and see who comes. But none of Khabarov’s friends dare to do this. The times are not the same anymore.
Two years have passed since the leader of the Uralmash group was found dead in the cell of pre-trial detention center No. 1 in the city of Yekaterinburg. Then this event shook the entire Urals. The newspapers wrote that the region was on the verge of a new criminal war. However, no war followed. When the Prosecutor General's Office finally closed the investigation two months ago, announcing that Khabarov was not killed, this event went almost unnoticed.
“People want to believe that he was killed, but we, close people, are sure that he hanged himself. How he was brought to this is another matter...
Opposite me is one of Khabarov’s closest friends. He agreed to communicate on the condition that I would not mention not only his last name, but even his first name. Let's call him Mikhail. Despite his close relationship with the deceased, he begins the conversation with the words: “There is no need to make a hero out of him.”
“Everyone was an animal in those days.” And those who started from the beginning have blood on their hands up to their elbows. Another question is who went which way later. To a certain extent, Khabarov went through the same evolution as many of us. First: “I will rob everyone!” Then: “No, only scoundrels!” And finally: “I will give.” But if you write the whole truth about him, you will have to insult his memory. Without this, it will be a lie. It’s better to write not about Khabarov, but about the phenomenon of which we were all a part.
The criminal life of Sverdlovsk in the 80s revolved around restaurants. “Space” was considered the hottest place. It was he who became a kind of cradle of Sverdlovsk organized crime. Here they exchanged news, shared ideas, made peace and conflicted. At the end of the 80s, restaurants became a kind of “control room” for new opportunities. And the first places where wild capitalism arose were the Central Park of Culture and Culture named after. Mayakovsky (the “shpiles”, that is, gamblers, were already in full swing there), the station square (here they “twisted caps” - thimbles - scammers) and, of course, the Shuvakish clothing market. It was here that traders from all over the Urals came to buy goods.
— Do you know how an organized crime group is born? - asks Mikhail. - There’s a man standing there, trading. An ordinary punk comes up to him, gives him a hard time, takes his money and runs away. And there’s a strong guy standing next to him. It's just worth it. The merchant looks around - there are no police. Then he runs up to this guy and begs him to catch up with that punk and return his money. The guy catches up, beats up the offenders and returns the stolen goods to the dealer.
He is happy: “Listen, let you be somewhere nearby all the time, and I will pay you 10 percent of the proceeds per day.” The guy says: “What? Let's". It lasts a day or two, and then he thinks: “I’m hanging around here too cheaply. He approaches the neighbor of that merchant: “Listen, brother, how about you pay me too?” Bratello vs. Then a strong guy calls that punk and says: “Listen, beat this one up.”
Bratello immediately agrees. Then the guy approaches the third merchant, the fourth, and so on. So an organized criminal community appeared before our eyes. But at what point exactly did it originate? When did the guy approach the second merchant? No. It appeared when businessmen began to turn not to the police, but to people with strong muscles. Why did this happen? This is the main question of that time.
Mikhail is right, but only partly. The process of “roof formation” was reciprocal in nature. On the one hand, in the late 1980s, cooperators really rushed to look for strong people, faced with the fact that the official authorities were unable to solve security problems, guarantee the implementation of transactions and resolve economic disputes. On the other hand, the inhabitants of the greasy restaurants, gyms and clubs of war veterans in Afghanistan were not really expecting a special invitation. Having entered the “topic”, they rushed to the grain places, making offers to the “commerce” that could not be refused.
The Uralmash organized crime group originated in a small area around schools 115 and 117 in the Ordzhonikidze district, where the giant Uralmash plant is located. Actually, as a community of young energetic guys, it took shape already in 1984. Everyone trained at the same stadium, with the same coaches, fell in love with the same girls. These were guys from the factory outskirts, in whom the spirit of revenge was very strong in relation to the more “major” youth from the center.
Ordzhonikidze district of Yekaterinburg is the homeland of the Uralmash residents. The organized crime group disappeared, your faces and gestures remained the same.
Grigory and Konstantin Tsyganov are rightfully considered the “godfathers” of the Uralmash group. Together with them, their friends, relatives, neighbors in the yard started the business: Sergey Terentyev, Alexander Kruk, Sergey Vorobyov, Andrey Panpurin, Igor Mayevsky. The core consisted of “athletes”, far from thieves’ concepts and thieves’ romance. The main motivation was not the lifestyle, but the spirit of competition and profit.
Indifference to the thieves' traditions is evidenced by the fact that the leaders of the group entrusted the command of the power bloc to Sergei Kurdyumov, a man who by that time had managed to visit the zone and had the status of “lowered” there. It was Kurdyumov’s hatred of the crime lords that determined this choice, which he fully justified by his cruelty towards the enemies of the group.
At first, the Tsyganovs’ organized crime group was one of several dozen similar groups in the city. The division of “gangster Yekaterinburg” into Uralmash and central ones began to rapidly take shape in the early 90s - after Grigory Tsyganov was killed on the orders of Oleg Vagin, the leader of another large racketeer group formed around the central market. Brother Konstantin took the place of the murdered man, and after a fierce two-year confrontation, the Uralmash organized crime group became the main force in the city.
The echo of that war can be clearly heard at the Shirokorechenskoye cemetery - the oldest and most prestigious in Yekaterinburg. There used to be a parking lot at the entrance. Now here is a cemetery for “centers.” In scale, it is second only to the memorial to those who died in military hospitals, which is located right behind the fence. 100 meters from the burial site is the grave of the first pioneer of the world, Anna Bychkova. And another 100 meters away are Boris Yeltsin’s father and mother-in-law.
“Khabarov appeared among the Uralmash team in the early 90s,” says Sergei Plotnikov, an expert at the Center for Extreme Journalism of the Sverdlovsk Region. He has been tracking the topic of the Yekaterinburg criminal world for many years and knows it better than all the civilians in the city.. - Moreover, the future leader of the organized crime group, by and large, does not come from Uralmash.
Indeed, Khabarov grew up in the city of Krasnoufimsk, Sverdlovsk region, in a family of civil servants: his father was the secretary of the district committee, a holder of the Order of Lenin. Khabarov graduated from the Sverdlovsk State Pedagogical Institute and served in a group of Soviet troops in Germany. Upon returning, he defended his Ph.D. thesis and worked as the director of a children's sports school of the Olympic reserve in Nordic combined and alpine skiing. It was in this capacity that he was known to many participants in the Uralmash organized crime group. Khabarov rose very quickly thanks to his intelligence and ability to manage. According to his close friend, whom we conventionally called Mikhail, it was he who created an effective and multilateral structure from a powerful security group:
— Did he learn management skills somewhere?
- No. He had this by nature. Once, back in 1990, when Seryoga Terentyev reproached him for finding his foremen idle, Khabarov answered him: “With the correct organization of work, the foreman and the team leader do not work.” He later loved to repeat this phrase. In those days, no one had any idea what management was, but Alekseich already instinctively understood its laws.
When Grigory Tsyganov was alive, Khabarov was something like a financial director. In calligraphic handwriting he wrote down all cash receipts and expenses in a notebook. After one of the two brother leaders was killed and the other left for Turkey to escape police persecution, Khabarov was elected “helmsman”. This was a very correct decision, since times were already changing and other qualities were required to consolidate success - not brute force, but the ability to think, count and negotiate. From that moment on, the Uralmash people retrained from banal racketeering to what is now called raiding.
“Uralmash men” are defending the Saldinsky metallurgical plant they captured, and a group rivaling them is preparing to storm the plant’s management.
“Minority shareholders of various enterprises often came to us,” says Mikhail. — They asked for help to defend their rights. They didn't always agree. Khabarov listened to all opinions, sometimes took a time out to think, but if he made a decision, it was final. And he knew how to act in critical situations. “I take everything upon myself!” - we heard this phrase very often.
At first, “assistance to minority shareholders” was in the nature of threats and brute force. Gradually the instrumentation became more subtle. Since the mid-90s, it was more of an organizational work. According to former members of the group, its number at that time reached two thousand people, most of which were hired personnel: lawyers, lawyers, managers, and journalists.
“When we entered any enterprise, we took everything into our hands,” says Mikhail. — This was full-fledged crisis management. And there was no such enterprise that we would have destroyed. Everything worked and is working properly.
The group continued to form a “common fund”, contributing half of the profits to it, and its manager was Tsyganov, who was in Turkey. However, this was not just dead money for a rainy day. Very soon, the common fund turned into a full-fledged investment fund: Uralmash employees began to invest in business. At first - in any, and then - giving preference to its legal types. According to law enforcement agencies, members of the Uralmash organized crime group established about 200 companies and 12 banks, and also acted as equity participants in another 90 companies.
“Uralmash won the war with the “center” not even because it acted with greater cruelty, but primarily due to its constructive position,” says City Duma deputy Andrei Kabanov. — The “centers” were banal racketeers. They treated their businessmen as cash cows, which they were ready to slaughter at any moment for immediate profit. And the Uralmash team calculated the situation several moves ahead. Apparently, the specifics of the sport that Khabarov was involved in worked here. In cross-country skiing, it is not aggression that is important, but endurance and the ability to calculate strength.
The view of Andrei Kabanov (aka Dyusha) can be considered unbiased, since he himself never belonged to either the Uralmash group or the center. The current deputy and sincerely believing Orthodox Christian does not hide the fact that in the early 90s he was a drug addict and an active representative of the so-called “blue group”. “Bruises” were and are called here representatives of the traditional criminal world, living according to criminal concepts and recognizing the power of thieves in law. However, in Yekaterinburg, unlike, for example, the Far East, the South of Russia and even Moscow, the influence of the Blues has always been purely symbolic. According to Sergei Plotnikov from the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations, they could not even be called a group.
Sergei Terentyev, one of the leaders of the Uralmash organized crime group, is being transported from Moscow to Yekaterinburg.
- It's more like Wednesday. A certain background of existence. In the early 90s, they also had their own economic interests, but they were momentary and inconsistent. The Blues were late everywhere. However, they were taken into account because they understood that in a zone where anyone could find themselves, these people had real power.
Evgeny Agafonov is a pensioner today, and until 2002 he headed the Department for Investigation of Premeditated Murders and Banditry in the Regional Prosecutor's Office. After being forced into premature retirement, he speaks with contempt for both the state he worked for and the criminal gangs he fought against.
“Bandits are not characterized by romance, evolution, or good intentions,” says Agafonov. - These are extremely cynical people who are ready to do anything to achieve their goals. When now they say that they have become white and fluffy, this is not a qualitative change, these are just age-related changes.
“Their crimson jackets hang in the closet and can come in handy at any moment,” Sergei Plotnikov from the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations agrees with Agafonov. - A person who has been convinced many times of the effectiveness of violence can no longer work in a civilized manner. The temptation is too great.
- Remind you what they were doing? - continues Agafonov. - Please. For example, they almost completely controlled the vodka business. No one can count how many people died from it. They supplied sex slaves abroad. In the early 90s, during a search, we confiscated a stack of ready-made foreign passports from them - all that remained was to catch these girls on the streets from the list, intimidate them and send them to their addresses. How many have already been sent out?
One can only guess. If it was necessary for the cause, they killed pregnant women and even like-minded people in cold blood. When they needed to remove one person, to be sure, they planted an explosive device in a crowded place, designed to blow up heavy equipment, and it did not explode only due to chance. They even seriously considered the option of eliminating a competitor by shooting at a taking off passenger plane from a portable missile system.
- But don’t these forms of life inevitably appear in conditions of weakening of the state?
- Has it weakened on its own? It was undermined, including by these organized crime groups. What do you think happened to Konstantin Tsyganov after his accomplices fired on the RUBOP? He was released on bail! Of course, he immediately disappeared. The Uralmash workers worked very competently. They combined extremely daring actions with very clever combinations. We worked for the future.
They, like Japanese corporations, cultivated their employees, starting from the school desk. They led their students, patiently waiting for them to come to work in the police and prosecutor's office. Until better times, they were engaged in bribery of existing high-ranking employees. These were not just guys who wanted to earn money and then go into the legal sector and remember what their names were. They had ambitions. Do you know what we confiscated during almost every search? Film "The Godfather". This was their guide to growing their structure.
— But the film “The Godfather” has a sad ending for the mafia.
- That's it.
From the windows of his apartment, Agafonov sees the palaces of gypsy drug dealers living in the Verkh-Isetsky village every day. And gypsy drug dealers remember very well the “meeting of authorities”, which in 1999 was organized by the “City Without Drugs” foundation, friendly to Uralmash. In general, this kind of rallies is Yekaterinburg know-how, which turned out to be surprisingly effective.
In 2005, Alexander Khabarov was found dead in a pre-trial detention center. Suicide or help?
“The gypsies were horrified when they saw 500 powerful guys with stern faces from the windows,” recalls one of the foundation’s employees. “The guys just stood there and left.” This was enough to stop drug dealing in the village for six months.”
The foundation became famous for its unconventional approach to eradicating drug addiction. Patients, with the consent of their parents, were forcibly placed in rehabilitation centers, kept chained to beds for the first month, and then kept under guard. Drug dealers were brought to their senses with brute force. The approach turned out to be barbaric, but correct. After just two years of the foundation’s work, child mortality from overdoses in Yekaterinburg disappeared completely, and adult mortality fell several times.
“No, it’s not true that “City Without Drugs” appeared as a Uralmash PR project,” says Andrey Kabanov, who at that time was the third person in the fund. — Khabarov supported us later. This was during a live broadcast on local television. Roizman and I began to talk directly about the fact that the drug trade in the city is protected by the police. Khabarov called directly to the studio and said: “Guys, what are you doing?! They will kill you. Say that we are with you. Together they will be afraid of us.”
Nevertheless, only the naive in those days did not understand that “City Without Drugs” was Khabarov’s first independent step into politics. However, the first political maneuvers with the participation of the Uralmash team took place back in 1995, when they helped the re-election of the regional governor Eduard Rossel, and also a year later - during the presidential elections. Khabarov then organized the “Workers’ Movement in Support of Boris Yeltsin,” for which he received a letter of gratitude from the re-elected president and a watch with a dedicatory inscription from the governor.
It was then that Eduard Rossel will say words that will become classic for the era when regional authorities offered criminal leaders an unspoken compromise: we give you recognition, you give us investment in the local economy. Let's quote this statement verbatim: “In general, I want you to stop talking about Uralmash or something else there... So they tell me, this comrade is there, he is, so to speak, the Uralmash leader, which means he heads there... He is a thief, a bandit, and so on Further. Well, I invite him to my place, I say: “Well, thief, come in, sit down. Tell me how you live, back and forth, that means...” And I give him an instruction, and he fulfills this instruction - to spend money on capital construction in the Sverdlovsk region. I invite the second one. Nice man. Smart. He is running a normal business."
In 1999, Khabarov officially registered the OPS (Socio-Political Union) Uralmash. The fact that the abbreviation of the new association could also be deciphered as “organized criminal community” was a clear challenge to law enforcement agencies.
“Most of the criminal leaders of the 90s simply promoted well-fed politicians and lobbied their interests through them,” says Sergei Plotnikov from the Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations. — Khabarov decided to go into politics on his own. At that moment he stepped onto a road that inevitably led him into a loop.
Mikhail, who is not Mikhail, takes another sip of cognac from a glass and closes his eyes tightly for a few seconds, as people usually do when they have to talk about unpleasant things:
“I think this was the wrong step.” Even then it was necessary to go into the economy and put an end to the past. It was already clear that such an organizational model as an informal financial and industrial group, which we were at that time, had outlived its usefulness. It was a huge bag with a variety of businesses: from small shops to large factories. Nothing even legally united them - the center of attraction was only Khabarov’s personality. This business had to be built somehow. But he wanted not just to infiltrate big business, but to enter it with his own charter. Since the late 90s, it was not the pragmatist in him who spoke, but the idealist.
Others believe that Khabarov entered politics guided by some higher-order motives. He quickly found his bearings in the new conditions. Having brought the majority of deputies under control, Khabarov actually began to trade in the opportunities that his position provided. First of all, on the land market of Yekaterinburg.
“In 1999, I conducted a survey of all candidates for deputies,” says Elena Savitskaya, editor-in-chief of the local television company ESTV. — Among the questions was this: “Which of the heroes of folk tales or literary works do you identify yourself with?” Do you know what Khabarov answered? With Emelya on the stove.
- Why?
“He said this: “Because Emelya is the smartest. He has achieved such a position that he can lie on the stove and do nothing, and everything happens for him according to the pike’s command.”
Most of the Shirokorechenskoe cemetery in Yekaterinburg is occupied by the graves of the “centres” - competitors of the “Uralmashites”.
Serious pressure on the Uralmash OPS began to be felt in the summer of 2003, when the RUBOP began to harshly put pressure on the “City without Drugs.” The activities of rehabilitation centers were paralyzed. Khabarov did not stand up for the friendly structure then. However, the attack on the fund only led to the fact that, on the wave of popularity, its chairman, Yevgeny Roizman, was elected to the State Duma, and his deputy, Andrei Kabanov, to the city Duma.
A year later, Khabarov received another blow. The holder of the common fund, Konstantin Tsyganov, who had been in Turkey all these years, announced to his comrades that this was no longer common money, but his personal money. This dealt the Uralmash team not so much a material as a moral blow. The proposal to punish Tsyganov was rejected - for past services and out of respect for his late brother. But in fact this event was the beginning of the end. Khabarov then gathered the core of the community and said: “That’s it, guys. No one owes nothing to nobody".
“But he himself took this break very hard,” recalls Mikhail. “In the last year before my arrest, I couldn’t find a place for myself, fell into depression, and went on a drinking binge. I knew that they would take him a week in advance. It could have disappeared, but it didn't.
Khabarov was arrested on suspicion of coercion to commit a transaction. According to the investigation, he put pressure on the management of Bank 24.ru so that part of the shares he owned would be exchanged for a block of shares of Uralplastpolymer JSC owned by the bank. However, most experts agree that the criminal case was only a tool in a struggle that had completely different goals. After the arrest and then the death of Khabarov, statements in the media followed one after another that he allegedly suffered for standing in the way of the Caucasian mafia, which tried to enter the city. There is some truth in these statements. But only a share.
“We had such an authority here - Eduard Kazaryan,” says Sergei Plotnikov. “He was forced to leave the country at one time, but continued to supervise some business here through his man, Alexander Varaksin. However, gradually this Varaksin became an independent figure and decided that he no longer needed to pay Kazaryan. He turned for support to a very influential thief in law - grandfather Hasan [Aslan Usoyan]. And he decided to take advantage of the situation in order to strengthen his position in this region. In response, in August 2004, a wave of pogroms swept through the city in street cafes owned by immigrants from the Caucasus.
“In those days, I told Khabarov that he shouldn’t get involved in these squabbles,” Mikhail recalls. - This is not a conflict on his level. If you go into big business, forget about petty fuss. But he didn't listen.
The last straw for law enforcement agencies was another “rally of authorities.”
“It happened in the very center of the city, in the park behind the Opera House,” says Elena Savitskaya. — About 200-300 strong guys gathered. Within a radius of 500 meters from that place, people were blown away by the wind, although it was rush hour. The police were also nowhere to be seen. I have never seen Khabarov like this before. Usually he is tongue-tied, but here he spoke with such charisma that it gave me goosebumps. He began to give instructions to those present. Apparently, among them there were not only locals, because the names of other regions were heard. Apparently, Khabarov was building parallel power structures in the clearing of grandfather Hassan. He then accused the local authorities of not wanting to resist the expansion of those forces that could lead to destabilization of the situation in the region. I remember the phrase: “We will not allow a second Beslan here.” And one more thing: “Vladimir Vladimirovich, we are with you.”
“In the language of the special services, this is called the “emergence of a parallel center of power,” says Sergei Plotnikov. — The Uralmash people have always had a kind of Bolshevik syndrome - establishing their own justice. Take it from the bad guys and give it to the good guys. Like, we will squash all the bad guys, and we will have capitalism with a human face.
Many of my interlocutors expressed similar opinions. In their opinion, if the country had collapsed at some point, the Uralmash residents could well have become a state-forming force in a small territory. But the country grew stronger, the new management system took shape, and the forces that once replaced this system no longer had a place in it.
“Khabarov violated two borders at once,” says Mikhail. — He got into the sphere of competence of both the legal authorities and the thieves. After his death, many suggested that it was grandfather Khasan who, through our police, decided to eliminate Khabarov. I don't think that's true. As far as I know, an order simply came from Moscow to show everyone their place.
Khabarov’s death was hardly part of these plans. At the same time, he did not look like a person who was capable of killing himself without outside help. Khabarov had no skills to behave in captivity: he never sat. We know that on the eve of his death he was interrogated for a long time.
“What strings were pressed there, how it was processed is still a mystery to us,” says Andrei Kabanov. - But I’ll tell you what. I know for sure that he hanged himself, but I pray for him. The Lord will figure out whether he did it consciously or not.
Experts agree that the former Uralmash enterprises only benefited from Khabarov’s death. But, despite the death of the leader of the organized crime group and the destruction of this structure itself, the myth continues to live its own life. It benefits too many people.
“We try to sit quietly below the grass, and still they don’t let us forget who we are and where we come from,” says Mikhail. — It seems that RUBOP is bored without Uralmash. And from time to time, strange proposals are received from various people who have never had anything to do with us at all. For example, they name the amounts for which they are ready to be removed from the list of members of the Uralmash OPS. “But we never were!” - these people say. And they are answered: “We don’t know, we don’t know. For some reason you are registered with us.”
— Or maybe RUBOP really has nothing to do now?
— The victory over organized crime played a cruel joke on the police. In fact, they replaced us. In Soviet times, we didn’t like the cops, but when they imprisoned us, no one was offended. Because they were imprisoned honestly and for a reason. And now this moral balance has been disrupted. They became the same as we were. And they have something to do. Now a new criminal generation is growing up. Have you noticed that during the times of the so-called rampant organized crime groups, the streets were calm? Because people prone to crime did not attack civilians with a baseball bat, but went into shops, restaurants, and factories.
Now the generation of 12-14 year olds is eyeing a baseball bat, but they won’t even be allowed near the stall. Where will they go? That's right, outside.
Not only were they not afraid, but they even deliberately stood out from the crowd
The Wild Nineties actually began in the late 80s; It was then that criminal groups emerged en masse throughout the country, and bandits began to enjoy no less influence than party bigwigs. Very soon, respectable citizens learned to distinguish “brothers” from ordinary people by appearance.
Golden chain on the oak tree
There are several legends that tell us where crimson jackets came from and why the nouveau riche loved them so much. One way or another, in the early 90s it became fashionable among bandits to wear just such jackets - perhaps they just wanted maximum contrast with the deliberately grayish clothes of the Soviet nomenklatura, yesterday’s “powers of this world.”
However, the crimson jacket itself did not indicate belonging to the criminal world; it was supposed to be complemented by a massive gold chain as thick as a finger. Chains were worn directly over jackets. “Brothers” also respected gold signet rings – the larger, the better.
Instead of a jacket the color of a jungle sunset, many wore leather jackets. Many were wearing “comfy sweatpants.” Three-day stubble and short hair were also in great fashion among the “bros.”
Your cherry "nine"
The VAZ-2109, or “nine,” was enormously popular among the “workers of the underworld,” that is, among those with whose hands the gangster bosses carried out their dark deeds. This car differs favorably from the same “eight” in that it had four side doors; It was possible for five of us to get out of it quite quickly, arrange a quick firefight, then quickly climb inside and drive off in an unknown direction.
Bandits of a higher class chose a “wide jeep” - Jeep Grand Cherokee. Not only did it have a comfortable, roomy interior, it could reach a decent speed and looked impressive - it could easily drive along our Russian roads where most foreign cars shamefully got stuck. True, he consumed a lot of fuel - but wealthy criminals did not care, and gasoline was prohibitively cheap back then. The Toyota Land Cruiser SUV was also valued.
And of course, BMW was very much loved in the gangster world. The abbreviation “BMW” was then popularly deciphered in its own way – “extortionist fighting vehicle.” It was an honor to have a quick, easy “bekha”.
Taganka, all nights full of fire...
Any self-respecting bandit listened to blatnyak and had a collection of corresponding CDs, or, in extreme cases, audio cassettes. This genre was respectfully called Russian chanson, but in reality it has nothing to do with creativity Charles Arznavour or Edith Piaf there were no songs popular among criminals. They glorified the prison world; the lyrical hero of the songs usually spoke in the first person - telling in a deliberately hoarse voice how unfair the villainous fate was to him.
From the windows of the bandit cars thundered the songs of the group "Lesopoval", songs Mikhail Krug and other performers who managed to understand what kind of money can be made from the interest of the new masters of the world in thieves' romance. And restaurant musicians, when starting work, first of all learned “Vladimirsky Central” and “Taganka”, knowing full well who would order the music for them.
Hands up!
What's a bandit without a weapon? The “barrels” they carried were very different: from imported “Beretta” or “Glock” pistols to Soviet classics like the TT (“Tula Tokarev"; he was especially respected by killers) or a pistol Makarova.
Almost every group had machine guns Kalashnikov– as well as homemade, handicraft weapons, which were usually brought from the North Caucasus; take, for example, the famous Chechen Borz assault rifles.
Yes, the bandits of that time were conspicuous - obviously because of the acute sense of impunity. Nowadays everything is more difficult: not everyone can distinguish a bandit from a decent person at first glance. It's a pity.
We all know that the nineties were very hot times. Then legal and illegal business began to emerge. At times they were closely related to each other. This symbiosis was so profitable that influential groups fought for the right to work together with legal businessmen, sometimes starting real wars. As an echo of them, today we can observe the unusual graves of bandits of the 90s, which capture the imagination of ordinary people.
A little history
In the early 90s of the last century, various groups and gangs actively developed. They took control of small, medium, and later large businesses. Without doing practically anything, they made good profits. Of course, each gang wanted to conquer as wide a field of influence as possible. For this purpose, bladed weapons and firearms were used. And the graves of bandits of the nineties appeared in cemeteries.
It is known that the heads of groups who were worshiped and who had the most money from illegal business were the first to be shot. For example, in Yekaterinburg, the “lads” even managed to establish international illegal connections to make money from the sale of scrap metal. The very first big war began here, as a result of which several hundred “brothers” died on both sides. There were similar wars in St. Petersburg and other cities.
Unprecedented luxury
After high-profile murders, luxurious graves of bandits began to appear in cemeteries. Uralmash was one of the first to begin erecting real masterpieces in honor of its leaders.
These monuments are characterized by the fact that granite and marble were not spared for their construction. Tombstones were made both in the form of a classic slab and a full-length monument. The greater the position the deceased held, the more granite was used for his monument.
Sometimes you can even find entire memorials that occupy a huge area. In addition to the monument and tombstone, in such places there are also stone flowerpots, tables and benches for relaxation.
Friends and relatives tried to ensure that the monuments on the graves of the bandits fully reflected the fact of how significant a person the deceased was during his lifetime. Even more luxury can be observed at family graves, where relatives who were members of the same group are buried. In this case, the burial place looks especially regal.
Full length portrait
But no matter how luxurious the tombstone is, the graves of 90s bandits are also distinguished by the special style of the portraits on it. The deceased is usually depicted at full height. Outwardly, he has a typical look for that time: the clothes of a classic bandit.
There are several options here. The deceased can be depicted in a tracksuit and an eight-piece cap, if this is how the “brothers” knew him. But he may appear before you in a leather jacket with a typical cut for that time and in jeans.
Later graves show businessmen wearing crimson jackets. It is not even necessary that the portrait be in color. It is immediately clear to everyone that it is raspberry in color.
As for the image itself, the engraving on the stone is often done in color, although this is much more expensive than the usual two-color design.
It's all in the details
Not the least important thing in portraits is their detail. Almost every one depicts the famous gold chains - the main attributes of the leaders of that time. It doesn’t matter whether these are the graves of bandits in Moscow or in other cities.
There are also very specific details. There are portraits with a bunch of car keys in their hands or with their favorite keychain. In some portraits, the deceased is depicted with a handful of seeds, which he loved so much during his lifetime.
Items such as a lighter, matchbox, cigarette, mobile phone, rings, rings, signets are also common. All these details create the impression as if a living person is looking at you from a tombstone and is about to call you out. This causes fear and apprehension among strangers, as it did during the life of the person depicted on the tombstone. Looking at him, you immediately understand that this is a real authority of the criminal world.
Embracing the angels
It is known that criminals have a special concept of the Christian faith. They created their code based on its main postulates, bringing them to their own realities. Therefore, the monuments on the graves of bandits are often strewn with Christian symbols.
The most common one is a cross. But this is not surprising, since it is also on the graves of other people; it is under the cross that a person is sent to the afterlife. The cross protects his soul in the “other world.”
But images are rare for ordinary people. Since most of the authorities did not die by their own death, it is not just crosses that must protect their peace, but the highest deities. Therefore, the monuments on the graves of bandits are hugged by angels, and they stand over the deceased, as if fulfilling their mission, which they failed to accomplish during his lifetime.
Tombstones in the form of churches and domes are also typical for bandits. In the criminal world, this is a special symbol that the “brothers” transferred to cemeteries for their brothers and colleagues.
On a Mercedes to the afterlife
Probably the most amazing part of the tombstones that decorate the graves of 90s bandits is their cars. It was the 600th Mercedes that became a symbol of that time, it was the one that the most authoritative bandits drove, and it was its image that was transferred to the tombstones.
Some people thought a simple drawing was not enough, so the graves of bandits in Togliatti and other cities are decorated with monument cars. Carved from granite to life size, they stand directly on the grave of the deceased.
True, Mercedes is not the only brand that can be found in cemeteries. There are even tombstones in the shape of motorcycles. Particularly interesting examples are a car half hewn from stone, while the other half remains untreated stone.
Paired graves
Along with single graves in cemeteries where bandits of the 90s lie, there are also double graves. Close relatives are buried there. For example, the graves of the Uralmash bandits in Yekaterinburg are famous for the common burial place of the brothers who founded this sports-gangster group. They are united by one tombstone, on which those who are buried in them are carved in full height.
The same graves are typical for a brother and sister, and for a husband and wife. There are even family graves in which their children also lie next to their parents, since the gang wars were extremely cruel. They killed everyone: both children and adults. As a tribute to their memory, the most luxurious tombstones and family crypts were erected.
Simplicity and conciseness
But not all 90s gangster graves are so striking. There are simple but tastefully decorated places in cemeteries. And this does not mean that the person was completely uninfluential during his lifetime, or that he had little money. It’s just that his relatives and friends understood that he no longer needed excessive showing off. Therefore, such graves are decorated with a simple tombstone, on which, in addition to the main portrait, there may be 1-2 more minor ones, illustrating the life of this person in all its manifestations.
Decades later, we can already talk about such a cultural phenomenon as the bandits of the 90s, and what is left of them. These are unusual tombstones that demonstrate the special attitude of people towards the memory of their deceased comrades.
On August 8, 2003, one of the last surviving leaders of the Orekhovskaya group, Andrei Pylev, nicknamed Dwarf, was detained in the Spanish resort of Marbella. Among the most notorious crimes of the organized crime group is the murder of the killer Alexander Solonik and businessman Otari Kvantrishvili. Who were the Orekhovskys and what happened to them - in the Kommersant-Online photo gallery.
The Orekhovskaya organized crime group was formed in the south of Moscow in the area of Shipilovskaya Street in the late 1980s. It mainly included young people aged 18–25 with common sports interests.
Over the years, the organized crime group has grown into one of the largest criminal communities in Moscow. The group became famous as one of the most brutal Russian gangs of the 1990s, responsible for such high-profile cases as the murder of Otari Kvantrishvili and the assassination attempt on Boris Berezovsky in 1994, as well as the murder of the famous killer Alexander Solonik in Greece in 1997. In the second half of the 1990s, the organized crime group, most of whose leaders fell victims to internal strife, weakened. In the early 2000s, the remaining Orekhov “authorities” were put on trial and sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.
In the photo: members of the organized crime group Viktor Komakhin (second from left; shot in 1995) and Igor Chernakov (third from left; was killed in 1994 the day after the murder of the leader of the organized crime group Sylvester)
In the 90s, playing thimbles brought serious profits. Orekhovskaya brigades protected thimbles from the “Polish Fashion”, “Leipzig”, “Electronics”, “Belgrade” stores near the “Domodedovskaya” and “Yugo-Zapadnaya” metro stations
The Orekhovskaya organized crime group also extorted money from drivers engaged in private transportation near the Kashirskaya metro station. In 1989, gas stations in the Sovetsky and Krasnogvardeisky districts of Moscow came under the control of the group.
In the photo (from left to right): Andrei Pylev (Karlik; in prison), Sergei Ananyevsky (Kultik, killed in 1996), Grigory Gusyatinsky (Grisha Severny; killed in 1995) and Sergei Butorin (Osya; received a life sentence)
The leader of the group was Sergei Timofeev, who received the nickname Sylvester for his resemblance to actor Sylvester Stallone. He was killed on September 13, 1994 - his Mercedes 600 was blown up on 3rd Tverskaya-Yamskaya Street. Sylvester’s murder was a blow to the organized crime group, and the division of his inheritance cost the lives of most of the Orekhovskaya leaders. The killers have still not been found, and even Boris Berezovsky was named among the possible organizers: it was Sylvester who was associated with the assassination attempt on the businessman in the summer of 1994
According to one version, Sylvester’s murder could have been revenge for the shooting of the leader of the Bauman organized crime group, Valery Dlugach, nicknamed Globus (pictured on the right). Dlugach was killed in 1993 by Alexander Solonik, a killer of the Kurgan organized crime group, which at that moment collaborated with the Orekhovskaya group.
While Sylvester was alive, his power united several brigades, whose leaders were friends: pentathlete Igor Abramov (Dispatcher; killed in 1993), 1981 USSR boxing champion Oleg Kalistratov (Kalistrat; killed in 1993), hockey player Igor Chernakov (Double student; pictured on the right; killed in 1995), boxer Dmitry Sharapov (Dimon; killed in 1993), bodybuilder Leonid Kleshchenko (Uzbek Sr.; pictured on the left; killed in 1993) 
In 1993–1994, the Medvedkov group joined the Orekhovskaya organized crime group.
In the photo: one of the Orekhovskaya leaders Sergei Butorin (left) with Medvedkov’s colleague Andrei Pylev (Karlik; currently serving a prison sentence).
One of the most high-profile cases of the Orekhovskaya organized crime group was the murder of businessman Otari Kvantrishvili, associated with criminal circles. He was killed on April 5, 1994, while leaving the Krasnopresnensky baths by one of the Orekhovskys - Alexey Sherstobitov (Lesha Soldat; sentenced to 23 years in prison in 2008)
Sylvester's heirs fought for power for many years. On March 4, 1996, not far from the US Embassy on Novinsky Boulevard, Sylvester’s closest assistant and his heir in the organized crime group, Sergei Ananyevsky (Kultik; pictured in the middle), was killed. He got his nickname because he was involved in bodybuilding and was the 1991 USSR champion in powerlifting. As it turned out later, the killer was a member of the Kurgan organized crime group Pavel Zelenin
After the death of Sergei Ananyevsky, Sergei Volodin (Dragon; pictured on the left) became the leader of the organized crime group.
In the photo: the funeral of Sergei Ananyevsky at the Khovanskoye cemetery
Soon after the murder of Sergei Ananyevsky, Sergei Volodin (on the right) was also shot. Sergei Butorin (Osya) becomes the new leader of the organized crime group.
Having become the leader of the organized crime group, Sergei Butorin entered into an alliance with the Medvedkovsky brothers Andrei and Oleg Pylev (Malaya and Sanych) and collaborated with the Kurgan organized crime group, which did not prevent him from becoming a customer of the main killer of the Kurgan gang, Alexander Solonik. In 1996, Butorin staged his own funeral and went into the shadows for a while, and in the early 2000s he fled to Spain, but was arrested in 2001 and sentenced to life imprisonment, which he is now serving
Alexander Solonik (Valeryanych) is a killer of the Kurgan organized crime group, involved in the murder of the adopted son of thief in law Yaponchik and the leader of the Bauman organized crime group, Vladislav Vanner, nicknamed Bobon. He escaped from custody three times. He was killed in Greece in 1997 by a member of the Orekhovskaya organized crime group Alexander Pustovalov (Sasha Soldat; sentenced to 22 years in prison in 2005) on the orders of Sergei Butorin
Sergei Butorin (pictured) and his accomplices are behind many high-profile murders: the leaders of the Kuntsevo group Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Kuligin, the falcon group Vladimir Kutepov (Kutep) and others
Marat Polyansky is a killer, member of the Orekhovskaya and Medvedkovskaya organized crime groups. He was involved in the murder of the Kurgan organized crime group killer Alexander Solonik, as well as Otari Kvantrishvili. He was detained in February 2001 in Spain. In January 2013, he was sentenced to 23 years in prison.
Oleg Pylev (pictured) was detained in 2002 in Odessa, Andrei Pylev in 2003 in Spain. Oleg Pylev was sentenced to 24 years in prison, Andrey - to 21 years
Source: http://foto-history.livejournal.com/3914654.html
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