Execution of those sentenced to death in the USSR. The death penalty in the USSR: chilling stories about the fate of three convicted women (13 photos)

History of the crimes of Antonina Makarova (1920 - 1979)

The Great Patriotic War found Antonina in Moscow, where she went to study after school. The girl could not remain indifferent to the misfortune that happened to her country, so she immediately signed up to volunteer for the front.

Hoping to help the victims, 19-year-old Komsomol member Makarova experienced all the horrors of the infamous “Vyazma Cauldron.” After the hardest battles, completely surrounded, of the entire unit, only soldier Nikolai Fedchuk found himself next to the young nurse Tonya. She wandered through the local forests with him, he made her his “camping wife,” but this was not the worst thing she had to endure while they tried to survive.

In January 1942, they went to the village of Krasny Kolodets, and then Fedchuk admitted that he was married and his family lived nearby. He left Tonya alone

In fact, the police immediately noticed the girl, but not for the purpose discussed above, but for more dirty work. One day, a drunken Tonya was put behind a Maxim machine gun. There were people standing in front of the machine gun - men, women, old people, children. She was ordered to shoot. For Tony, who had completed not only nursing courses, but also machine gunners, this was not difficult; even being very drunk, she coped with the task. Then she didn’t think about why and why - she was guided by only one thought that pulsated in her head throughout the war: “Live!”

The next day Makarova found out that she was now an official - an executioner with a salary of 30 German marks and with her own bed

Antonina Makarova’s work schedule looked something like this: execution in the morning, finishing off survivors with a pistol, cleaning weapons, schnapps and dancing in a German club in the evening, and love with some cute German at night. Life seemed like a dream to the girl: she had money, everything was fine, even her wardrobe was regularly updated, even though she had to sew up holes every time after being killed.

Sometimes it’s true that Tonya left her children alive. She fired bullets above their heads, and later local residents took the children along with the corpses from the village to transfer the living ones to the partisan ranks. This scheme may have appeared because Tonya was tormented by her conscience. Rumors about a female executioner, “Tonka the machine gunner,” and “Tonka the Muscovite” spread throughout the area. Local partisans even announced a hunt for the executioner, but were unable to reach her. In 1943, the girl’s life changed dramatically.

Photo shows confrontation: witness identifies Makarova

While Antonina was living her new correct life, the remains of about one and a half thousand people were found in mass graves in the Bryansk region. Soviet investigators took the investigation seriously, but only 200 people were identified. The KGB was never able to get on the trail of the punisher, until one day a certain Parfenov decided to cross the border... In his documents, Tonya Makarova was listed as his sister, so the teacher’s mistake helped the woman hide from justice for more than 30 years.

The KGB could not accuse a person with an ideal reputation, the wife of a brave front-line soldier, an exemplary mother of two children, of horrific atrocities, so they began to act very carefully. They brought witnesses to Lepel, even policemen-lovers, they all recognized Antonina Ginzburg as Tonka the Machine Gunner. She was arrested, and she did not deny it.

The front-line husband ran through the authorities, threatened Brezhnev and the UN, but only until the investigators told him the truth. The family renounced Antonina and left Lepel.

Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg was tried in Bryansk in the fall of 1978

At the trial, Antonina was proven guilty of 168 murders, and more than 1,300 more remained unidentified victims. Antonina herself and the investigators were convinced that over the years the punishment could not be too severe; the woman only regretted that she had disgraced herself and would have to change jobs, but on November 20, 1978, the court sentenced Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg to capital punishment - execution.

At six in the morning on August 11, 1979, after all requests for clemency were rejected, the sentence against Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg was carried out.

Berta Borodkina (1927 - 1983)

The source of illegal income was various frauds that Borodkina put into practice, receiving at least 100,000 rubles from it, for example: sour cream was diluted with water, bread and cereals were added to minced meat, the strength of vodka and other alcohol was reduced. But it was considered especially profitable to mix cheaper “starka” (rye vodka infused with apple or pear leaves) into expensive Armenian cognac. According to the investigator, even an examination could not establish that the cognac was diluted. There was also the usual miscalculation; the holiday season became a real breeding ground for scammers.

Borodkina demonstrated a completely different attitude towards high-ranking party and government officials who came to Gelendzhik during the holiday season from Moscow and the Union republics, but even here she pursued primarily her own interests - the acquisition of future influential patrons. Among her “friends” is the Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Fyodor Kulakov. Borodkin provided the highest ranks not only with rare delicacies, but also with young girls, and in general did everything possible to make the officials’ stay comfortable.

Borodkina did not like her name, she wanted to be called Bella, and she was nicknamed “Iron Bella”. Lack of education did not prevent her from skillfully hiding the tails of her expenses and writing off shortcomings. All her work was as transparent as possible from the outside. But this could not go on forever, even those in power could not cover her for so long, although they made good money thanks to Bella’s machinations.

During the search in Bella’s apartment, various precious jewelry, furs, crystal items, sets of bed linen that were in short supply at that time were found, in addition, large amounts of dengue were unsuccessfully hidden in different places: radiators, bricks, etc. The total amount seized during the search amounted to more than 500,000 rubles.

“Iron Bella” kept threatening the investigation and waited for release, but high officials never intervened...

Bella's testimony took up 20 volumes, another 30 criminal cases were initiated, and she named difficult names. During the investigation, Borodkina tried to feign schizophrenia. But a forensic examination recognized her acting as talented, and Borodkina was found guilty of repeatedly accepting bribes totaling 561,834 rubles. 89 kopecks

This is how the case of the director of the trust of restaurants and canteens of the city of Gelendzhik, Honored Worker of Trade and Public Catering of the RSFSR Berta Borodkina, who knew too much about high-ranking people and flaunted it, ended. Then she fell silent forever.

Tamara Ivanyutina (1941 - 1987)

How did it all turn out? One day, 4 people ended up in intensive care. Everyone was diagnosed with an intestinal infection and flu after lunch in the same school cafeteria. Everything would be fine, but only after some time the patients’ hair began to fall out, and later death occurred. Investigators interviewed survivors and quickly determined who was involved. During searches of the canteen workers at Tamara’s house, Clerici liquid was discovered, which was the cause of the death of the visitors. Tamara Ivanyutina explained that she committed such a crime because the sixth-graders who were having lunch refused to arrange chairs and tables. She decided to punish them and poisoned them. However, she subsequently stated that the confession was made under pressure from investigators. She refused to testify.

Tamara began her murderous activities when she realized that she could get rid of a person without attracting attention at all. So she got an apartment from her first husband, who died suddenly. She did not want to kill her second husband, but only gave him poison to reduce sexual activity. The victims were the husband's parents: Tamara wanted to live on their plot of land.

Tamara's sister, Nina Matsibora, used the same liquid to get an apartment from her husband. And the girls’ parents killed relatives, communal neighbors, and animals that did not please them.

At the trial, the family was charged with numerous poisonings, including fatal ones.

The court found that for 11 years, the criminal family, for mercenary reasons, as well as out of personal enmity, committed murders and attempted intentional deprivation of life of various individuals using the so-called Clerici liquid - a highly toxic solution based on a potent toxic substance - thallium. The total number of victims reached 40 people, 13 of which were fatal, and these are only the recorded cases about which the investigation managed to find out something. The process dragged on for a year, during which time they managed to attribute about 20 assassination attempts to Tamara.

In her last word, Ivanyutina did not admit her guilt in any of the episodes. While still in pre-trial detention, she stated: in order to achieve what you want, you don’t need to write any complaints. It is necessary to be friends with everyone and treat them. And add poison to especially evil people. Ivanyutin was declared sane and sentenced to death. The accomplices were given different prison terms. So, sister Nina was sentenced to 15 years. Her subsequent fate is unknown. The mother received 13, and the father - 10 years in prison. Parents died in prison.

In 1987, the Soviet Union was rocked by a horrific crime: a Kyiv school dishwasher poisoned 20 people. Her name was Tamara Ivanyutina, and she became the third and last woman in the USSR to receive capital punishment for her atrocities.

Dreams of wealth

Tamara Maslenko was born in 1941. From childhood, her parents instilled in her the idea that the most important thing in life is material well-being. And little Tamara dreamed that in the future she would bathe in luxury and drive a black Volga.

After graduating from school, Tamara married a truck driver. Drivers at that time did not receive the worst money, but Tamara was much less interested in her betrothed’s salary than in his apartment. The selfish spouse did not want to share the property with anyone.

On one of the flights, Tamara’s husband felt unwell. He stopped the car and went for a swim in a nearby river. When he dried himself, he discovered a tuft of his hair on the towel. The truck driver was able to get home, where he died of a heart attack. Then no one suspected Tamara.

After a short time, she married Oleg Ivanyutin. His parents owned a country house and a large plot of land, which Tamara had her eye on. First, she sent her husband’s father to the next world, who died after tasting soup from his daughter-in-law. The father-in-law complained of discomfort in his legs and pain in his heart. The mother-in-law outlived her husband by only a few days: at the funeral, Ivanyutina gave her a glass of water with poison.

She intended to adapt the land of the deceased old people into a pig farm. There was only one problem - to get hold of food for the pigs. In Soviet society during the times of “developed socialism,” petty theft in the workplace was commonplace, so Tamara decided to get a job in the school canteen, where she could steal food.

Deadly breakfasts

Dishwashers were not paid decent money, and there were very few people willing to do such work. Therefore, despite the boorish and rude behavior, Ivanyutin was not fired. Then look for a new person for who knows how long. Ivanyutin was irritated by everyone around her: one said the wrong thing, another did the wrong thing, the third looked askance. The vengeful woman did not forget any of this.

Soon after Ivanyutina appeared in the cafeteria, four people rushed to the hospital with mysterious symptoms: two teachers and two students. One of the victims complained of hair loss. But health workers did not take these complaints into account.

Six months later another tragedy occurred. This time - with nutritionist Natalya Kukharenko. The poor woman's legs were numb and her heart ached. Unfortunately, it was not possible to save her.

The largest poisoning occurred in March 1987 - then 14 people were taken away from the school in an ambulance at once. The preliminary diagnosis is influenza. The symptoms are familiar: leg pain and hair loss. The treatment did not produce results, and then doctors began to lean towards the version of poisoning.

By interviewing witnesses and the victims themselves, it turned out that they all had lunch later than others and ate soup. Law enforcement officers interested in this case decided to exhume Kukharenko’s remains. As a result, thallium, a highly toxic heavy metal, was found in the body of the deceased woman.

Investigators suggested that the substance was used to bait rodents and could have gotten into food due to someone's negligence. But this version was denied by the sanitary and epidemiological station.

Then the police began checking the personal data of school staff. It turned out that the dishwasher was working under a false work book. They began to carefully check Ivanyutin. Strange details of past poisonings with similar symptoms emerged.

During a search of the poisoner, they found the same thallium solution. A friend from a geological exploration expedition supplied her with the deadly substance. Supposedly for baiting rodents.

Without a shadow of remorse

During interrogations, Ivanyutina did not regret what she had done one bit. Two sixth-graders angered her by not wanting to move the tables in the cafeteria, while others “fell out of favor” because they asked for food for the kitten. But the poisoner needed the food to feed the pigs.

The psychiatrists who examined the criminal found her sane, albeit with extremely inflated self-esteem and an exaggerated desire for wealth. These character traits came from their parents: Anton and Maria Maslenko purposefully raised their daughter in a similar way, and, as it turned out later, they used the same technique when dealing with people they disliked - they simply added poison to their food.

The court found Ivanyutina guilty of 20 poisonings, nine of which were fatal. The criminal did not admit her guilt in any of the episodes. My only regret was that I was never able to buy a black Volga.

The mother and father of the attacker were sentenced to 13 and 10 years, respectively. They ended their lives in prison. Ivanyutina herself received the death penalty - execution. The sentence was carried out at the end of 1987. She became the last woman executed in the USSR.

In the USSR, several women were sentenced to capital punishment; however, some of them had their sentences changed to life imprisonment at the last moment. However, three criminals were still executed. Why were they shot?

Tonka the machine gunner

Antonina Makarova was born in 1921 in the Smolensk region, in the village of Malaya Volkovka, into the large peasant family of Makar Parfenov. She bore her father’s surname, but received the “pseudonym” Makarova at school: when the girl entered the first grade of school, because of shyness she could not say either her first or last name. When the teacher asked her again, one of her classmates shouted: “Yes, she is Makarova!”, referring to the name of her father. That's what they wrote down.

Classmates recalled that Tony had a revolutionary heroine in his childhood: Anka the machine gunner. After graduating from school, Antonina went to study in Moscow: there she was caught by the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. The girl went to the front as a volunteer, but did not really have time to serve her Motherland: she ended up in the Vyazma operation - the notorious battle of Moscow, in which the Soviet army suffered a crushing defeat. An entire unit was killed: only Tonya and a soldier named Nikolai Fedchuk managed to survive. For several months they wandered through the forests, trying to get to Fedchuk’s home village. They literally ate pasture, slept on the ground and, quite naturally, became close. Feelings flared up between the young people, but when they managed to get to the soldier’s village, the “camping wife” found out that he actually had a wife. Tonya left him with her, and she went further alone and came to the village of Lokot, occupied by the German invaders. She stayed there.

There she continued to be a “camp wife” - this time of German, not Soviet soldiers. She drank a lot and often partied with the occupiers. Tonya was often raped - even in groups - and was given housing and food in return. According to legend, one day they made Tonya drunk and put her in front of a Maxim machine gun, ordering her to shoot at a crowd of prisoners. Tonya, who before the war took not only nursing courses, but also machine gunners, did not refuse. Since then, she was nicknamed the Thin Machine Gunner and, for a regular salary of 30 marks, was ordered to shoot people. And everyone indiscriminately: men, women, children and the elderly. There were often mishaps with children: sometimes bullets flew over them, and they managed to survive. The surviving children were taken out of the village along with the corpses, and partisans rescued them at the burial sites. At the same time, the Germans allowed Makarova to take the things of the dead, which she did, washing them of blood and sewing up bullet holes.

So rumors about Tonka the Machine Gunner reached the partisans, who were outraged by the betrayal of the female monster. They even put a reward on her head, but they were unable to get to Makarova. Until 1943, Antonina continued to shoot people. Then, however, the Soviet army reached the Bryansk region, and Antonina would not have fared well, but she very “successfully” contracted syphilis from someone, and the Germans sent her to the rear, to the hospital. She escaped from there, managing to obtain documents proving that all this time she allegedly worked as a nurse in the hospital.

Thanks to the documents, she even found a job, entering a Soviet hospital, where at the beginning of 1945 she met a young soldier, Viktor Ginzburg. The young people got married, and Antonina Ginzburg “appeared” instead of Tonka the Machine Gunner. After the liberation of the Bryansk region, Soviet investigators learned a lot about Tonka the Machine Gunner, but could not get on her trail. They interrogated witnesses, clarified details, checked, but they never found out where she might be hiding.

Meanwhile, Ginsburg led the life of an ordinary woman. They lived in the city of Lepel, she and her husband had two daughters, she worked and even spoke to schoolchildren, talking about the hardships of difficult wartime. Naturally, without mentioning his “exploits” in front of the German troops. As a result, the KGB hiccupped her for almost 30 years, and found her almost by accident. A certain citizen Parfyonov, going abroad, submitted forms with information about his relatives. There, among the solid Parfenovs, for some reason Antonina Makarova, after her husband Ginzburg, was listed as her sister. Antonina was detained right on the way from work. True, they did not immediately punish him; an investigation began. They say that even a former policeman-lover was brought in for interrogation so that he could confirm whether it was the same Tonka the Machine Gunner or not. Only when all the data coincided did they begin to judge Ginzburg.

At first, the husband and daughters tried to get the mother released: investigators did not say why exactly she was arrested. However, when the true reason for the detention became clear to them, they stopped trying to appeal the arrest and left Lepel. Antonin Makarov was sentenced to death on November 20, 1978. She immediately submitted several petitions for clemency, but they were all rejected. On August 11, 1979, Tonka the Machine Gunner was shot.

Berta Borodkina was born in 1927. She didn't like her name, and the girl preferred to call herself Bella. She started working as a barmaid and waitress in a Gelendzhik canteen. Soon, for her success in work, the girl was transferred to the position of canteen director: there she became an Honored Worker of Trade and Catering of the RSFSR, and also headed a trust of restaurants and canteens in Gelendzhik. They say that she had many connections: among those who provided her patronage were members of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, as well as the Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Fyodor Kulakov.

The scheme of work was simple: visitors to cafes and restaurants were constantly cheated, dishes were prepared from expired products, due to which dizzying sums were released. Bella spent them on bribes to high-ranking officials and serving them at the highest level.

During the specified period [from 1974 to 1982], being an official in a responsible position, says the indictment in the Borodkina case, she repeatedly personally and through intermediaries in her apartment and at her place of work received bribes from a large group of her subordinates. work. Of the bribes she received, Borodkina herself transferred bribes to responsible employees of the city of Gelendzhik for assistance and support in their work... Thus, over the past two years, 15,000 rubles worth of valuables, money and products were transferred to the secretary of the city party committee Pogodin.

The last amount in the 1980s was approximately the cost of three Zhiguli cars.

It was a real restaurant mafia: every bartender, waiter and director of a cafe or canteen had to give Borodkina a certain amount every month, otherwise the employees were simply fired. At the same time, there were no checks or audits - connections with officials helped. But in 1982, an anonymous person reported that in one of Borodkina’s restaurants, pornographic films were shown to selected visitors. It is not known whether this information was confirmed, but during the audit it turned out that during the years of leading the trust, Borodkina stole more than a million rubles from the state - an incredible amount at that time. Borodkina's house was searched, finding furs, jewelry and huge sums of money hidden in heating radiators, in rolled up cans and even in a pile of bricks near the house. Bertha herself did not admit her guilt for a long time, however, according to her sister, in prison the defendant was tortured and given psychotropic drugs, under the influence of which she began to confess. In August 1983, Berta Borodkina was shot.

Tamara Ivanyutina, before Maslenko’s marriage, was born into a large family living in Kyiv. They said that from early childhood, parents instilled in their children that the most important thing in life was material security. It was not for nothing that Tamara went into trade - in Soviet times it was a grain-producing place. However, very quickly Ivanyutina fell for speculation and received a criminal record. It was very difficult for a woman with a criminal record to get a job back then, so she got herself a fake work book and in 1986 got a job as a dishwasher at school number 16 in the Minsk district of Kyiv. She later told investigators that she needed to work in the canteen in order to provide chickens and pigs with food waste. However, not only for this, as it turned out.

On March 17 and 18, 1987, several students and school staff were hospitalized with signs of serious food poisoning. At first there was a theory about an intestinal infection, but it soon disappeared: all the victims lost their hair. In the first hours, two children and two adults died, another 9 people were in intensive care in serious condition. A criminal case was opened. The investigation interviewed the victims, and it turned out that all of them had lunch the day before in the school canteen and ate buckwheat porridge with liver. Later it also turned out that the nurse responsible for the quality of food died two weeks ago, according to the official conclusion - from cardiovascular disease.

All these circumstances aroused suspicion among the investigators, and it was decided to exhume the body. An examination showed that the nurse died from thallium poisoning. This is a highly toxic heavy metal that affects the nervous system and internal organs, and also causes total alopecia (complete hair loss). All employees of the school canteen were searched, including Ivanyutina, in whose house they found “a small but very heavy jar.” In the laboratory it turned out that the jar contained “Clerici liquid” - a highly toxic thallium-based solution. Later, the woman confessed, saying that in this way she wanted to “punish” the sixth-graders who refused to set up tables in the cafeteria. However, it later turned out that this was not the woman’s first crime.

It turned out that poisoning people was customary in Ivanyutina’s family. Her parents and sister had been using thallium to commit poisoning for 11 years at that time - since 1976. Moreover, both for selfish purposes, and in relation to people who, for some reason, family members simply did not like. They purchased the highly toxic Clerici liquid from a friend: the woman worked at a geological institute and was sure that she was selling thallium to her friends for baiting rats. In addition, Ivanyutina poisoned her first husband, and then his parents - because of the apartment. Then she married a second time, but also unsuccessfully. Having decided to ruin the man gradually, she began to poison him with small portions of poison. He began to get sick, and Tamara hoped to receive a house and land after his death. Ivanyutina also poisoned school party organizer Ekaterina Shcherban (the woman died), a chemistry teacher (survived) and two children - first and fifth grade students. They asked the woman for the remaining cutlets for their pets, which greatly angered the criminal. The children died.

As a result, the court proved 40 episodes of poisoning committed by members of this family, 13 of which were fatal. Ivanyutina’s sister Nina was sentenced to 15 years in prison, her father and mother to 10 and 13 years. Tamara Ivanyutina was shot.

In the former USSR, the topic of execution of death sentences was closed.

The direct participants in this process signed a “non-disclosure agreement.” But today the state and bodies to which they gave subscriptions no longer exist. And a man who carried out death sentences in Azerbaijan for more than two and a half years, the former head of the institution UA-38/1 UITU of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Az SSR Khalid Makhmudovich Yunusov says:

Usually the Supreme Court warned us in advance about such prisoners; they came to us only after death sentences had been imposed on them. Nowadays they put handcuffs on every prisoner, but then only on those sentenced to death. As the head of the prison, I was obliged to accept him, to offer to write a petition for clemency, but if he considered the sentence to be unfounded, we - I and another employee who happened to be nearby at that moment, drew up an act on the refusal of the convict to write a petition for clemency, which was sent in the same way , as well as applications asking for pardon, to the supervisory prosecutor at the prosecutor's office of the republic, which in turn forwarded all these applications to the presidium of the Supreme Council, first of the republic, and then of the USSR. There was a special review commission there. While she was considering the statement of the convicted person, the man was with us.

How long did it usually take from the moment the sentence was passed until it was carried out?

In different ways: three months, six, sometimes up to a year. A special package arrived from the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a decree of the Supreme Council, which roughly said: “Your request for clemency has been considered...” In this case, the death penalty was replaced by a fifteen-year prison sentence. Or: “The sentence must be carried out.” We called the prisoner and announced this to him.

During the period that the condemned were with us, they changed beyond recognition. If at first they still hoped for something, then day after day... They distinguished every step. The fifth building of the Bailovsky prison, where death row prisoners were put, was very small.

There was a special order classified “top secret” (I don’t remember its number now), which was kept by the head of the prison. According to this order of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, death row prisoners were to be kept in solitary confinement, in exceptional cases two people each, if there were not enough places. Now five or six people are crammed in. Previously it was not allowed, as this could lead to all sorts of excesses.

In the fifth building, controllers, in order to exclude the possibility of their communication with prisoners, collusion with them, or who knows what else, underwent special selection to work with a special contingent. Suicide bombers, as they say, have nothing to lose; they die to the next world. There shouldn't be any information leakage. I signed a non-disclosure agreement about this secret, but today there are no those to whom I gave it, there is neither the Soviet Union, nor the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs...

Were relatives allowed to see those sentenced to death?

Only with the permission of the Chairman of the Supreme Court.

Has it ever happened over the years of your work that a death row inmate died before his sentence was executed?

In less than three years I had only one such case. In cases of “meiveterevez,” for example, fifty people were imprisoned. There was also someone sentenced to death in this case. But he was diagnosed with throat cancer, from which he died.

How often were pardon decisions made?

There were two such cases. For example, I remember that a young guy from Belokan was pardoned; he killed one and seriously wounded another.

It was like this: he just came from the army, twenty-one years old, worked as a tractor driver. He’s plowing the ground, either the chief engineer or someone else from the authorities drives up to him: “Why didn’t you plow properly...”, and swore at him.

The guy grabbed a tire iron and crushed his skull with it, wounding his driver, who rushed to help, and he received serious injuries.

He did not write a petition for pardon, saying! “If you’re guilty, let them shoot you. We don’t forgive swearing.” I called the supervisory prosecutor, who, after seeing him, decided that the guy should take his chance. “He will serve fifteen years,” he told me, “he will be released at thirty-six, he will still be young.” He's probably already left...

They showed on television how a man goes into a specially designated room, stands with his back to the door where the window opens, and is shot in the back of the head...

It wasn't like that with us. They killed us in a very cruel way. The procedure itself was not worked out. I even addressed the Minister of Internal Affairs on this issue. He promised to send me to Leningrad, where there was a different system, but he was killed.

It was done this way before me, and, as they say, it was handed down to me by inheritance. Everything happened at night, after twelve o'clock. The head of the prison and the supervising prosecutor had to be present - maybe we would shoot some fake person and release the criminal for millions.

In addition to those whom I named, the execution of the sentence had to be attended by a doctor - the head of the medical examination, who confirmed the fact of death, and a representative of the information center that was responsible for the registration.

We drew up an act - necessarily me and one of the members of the group that carried out the sentence. In the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the republic there was such a special secret group, which consisted of ten people. During the years that I worked, I was the eldest there. I had two deputies. The first deputy did not carry out the sentences - he was afraid of blood. Before that, he worked somewhere in the OBKhSS, and then made his way here to the position of deputy head of the prison.

The other one later died, apparently, all this affected him. My deputy was supposed to replace me at least once a quarter so that I could somehow take my mind off this nightmare. In three years of work I had thirty-five people. And not a single block without anyone... Once there were six people...

When taking the convicted person to carry out his sentence, we did not tell him where we were taking him. They only said that his petition for pardon was rejected by decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council. I saw a man who at that moment turned gray before my eyes. So, no matter how much inner strength a person had, at that moment they did not tell him where they were taking him. Usually: “Go to the office.” But they understood why. They started shouting: “Brothers!.. Farewell!..” A terrible moment when you open the door of that office and a person is standing, not walking through... The “office” is small, about three meters by three, the walls are made of rubber. When a person is brought there, he already understands everything.

Is there blood all over the office?

It is all closed, tightly, only a small window. They say that even when a ram is tied, he understands why, there are even tears in his eyes. People reacted differently at that moment. The spineless and weak-willed immediately fell. They often died before the execution of the sentence from a broken heart. There were also those who resisted - they had to be knocked down, their arms twisted, and handcuffed.

The shot was fired with a Nagan system revolver almost point-blank into the left occipital part of the head in the area of the left ear, since vital organs are located there. The person immediately switches off.

In your practice, has a person dodged a bullet at that moment?

No, there were two or three of us. And then, you have to shoot skillfully so that he dies immediately.

In films there is a scene in which the condemned man, outwardly calmly, kneels down, lowers his head, if it is a woman, then even removes the hair from his neck. Is this really what happens?

There was a case: an uncle and nephew - cattle thieves - killed two policemen. One of them did not immediately, because he begged: “Don’t kill, I have three children and two more children of my deceased brother...” Scoundrels, I simply don’t consider such people to be people.

I look at the guy, and he: “It’s my uncle, not me.” My uncle had been convicted five times before, he was a big guy, he had no neck, we couldn’t put handcuffs on his hands, his wrists were so wide. One day, while doing push-ups, he hung from the ceiling and raised the alarm.

The guard opened the cell and he rushed at him. Then the four of us pounced on him...

In general, they took my uncle into the “office”, but he didn’t want to kneel down, so we had to use force and knock him down. He fell, hit his head on the concrete floor... He was hit with seven bullets, his head was crushed, his brains were in all directions. I even thought that I should have put on a robe... He was still breathing, the big guy. He didn’t have to become a criminal, but somehow use his abilities for good. In general, I was breathing... Suddenly, I don’t know where, it dawned on me - I approached him, gave him two shots under the shoulder blades, in the lungs.

Then they brought my nephew. When he saw the corpse, he immediately fell. The doctor stated: “No need, I’m already ready...” Just in case, we fired three test shots...

After such work, I sometimes couldn’t come to my senses for a week. Now I’m telling you, and this whole picture is before my eyes...

Have there ever been times when you felt sorry for someone sentenced to death?

There was a director of a juice lemonade factory in Belokany. Lemonades from his factory were featured at congresses. But then something happened, he was “given” theft, he was in prison for a long time, he was a very pious and fair person. They allowed him to pray and gave him a small rug. I performed namaz five times a day. And he said to the foreman (they were on good terms): “I know they will shoot me.”

When they took him to execution, they didn’t even put handcuffs on him. He himself calmly lay down and said: “I know that it is fair.”

For example, I am against giving the death penalty for embezzlement. There was one man from Nakhichevan, the father of eleven children. We then reasoned among ourselves: “Well, they will shoot a man for theft, and he has so many children. How will they grow? Who will feed them? And then, these are eleven enemies of this state, society.”

When the pardon came for him, he was replaced with fifteen years, he fell right under his feet. I calculated that he had fourteen years and so many days left to serve, I don’t remember how many now. They brought him to his senses. “I’m not for myself,” he said, “for eleven children.”

There was an article in “Arguments and Facts”: “Who, where and how carries out the death penalty.” There it was written about the “executioner’s chances” that they were going crazy, losing their minds...

You see, I don’t consider these executed people to be people, scum! I even wanted to make a file cabinet for myself, but then I said: “To hell with them!” Look at the photo of this executed man.

Young. What did he do?

Raped and killed his daughter. But in this photo - Ramin. He and his partner killed the driver of the car and threw his body into a ditch. They took clients at the bus station, started a conversation, if they noticed along the way that the person was wealthy, then they took them to some remote place, killed them and threw out the corpse...

This Ramin was previously in a colony, had five convictions and killed another person there with wire. A decision quickly came to him...

Relatives of those executed come, but they are no longer there. We had a “philosopher”; the day after he was shot, his father came. It was Saturday, he came to see me: “I saw in a dream that I was dressing him in white...” - he felt. “No,” I say, “don’t worry, he was taken to the Supreme Court, go there.”

There was another such case. Two were supposed to be executed, and the day before one of them asked me: “There is nothing against me? I had a dream that they were taking me away...” I just received the package, it was in the safe. I open it, and it contains their names. What should I call it?

But why shouldn’t the relatives know that the person was no longer alive? Take the body and bury it yourself?

Don't know. Maybe in order not to embitter people... There are stories that they were sent to Siberia, to the mines. This is some kind of hope... But they didn’t say the burial place.

Where was it?

Twenty years have already passed since then. Then it was next to one of the cemeteries, 40–50 kilometers from Baku.

What did the “philosopher” do?

He taught in one of the districts. He got to know his tenth grade student better, promised to marry her, take her to Baku, and actually cohabited with her.

And after some time, she heard that he was wooing another girl. She said that she would go to complain about him to the party committee. Then he took a dumbbell, took her to Ganly-gel, killed her on the shore of the lake and threw the corpse into the water. He denied it for a long time, but then they proved it to him. He managed to smuggle a volume of Lenin into the cell. And I will say, he “had strength behind him.” Twice I received telegrams from Moscow about suspending the execution of the sentence.

This one (photo again), look, a young guy, a native of Ganja, born in 1955, non-partisan, eight years of education, single, previously convicted several times. In Saratov he committed the murder of a sixty-three-year-old citizen, having previously raped her. And then he killed his army friend, the store manager.

In prison he tried to escape, he, a fool, did not know that the doors are locked with double keys, one is with the controller, and the other with me. You can't open it without two keys. There was one old-timer on duty, his last duty was, we even prepared a certificate of honor for him.

The guy asked him for water. The guard shouldn’t have opened it, but he simply showed humanity, opened the “feeder” and handed out water in a plastic mug. The guy grabbed him by the overcoat, wanted to twist him, wring his hands and take the keys. But the foreman had already served for twenty-five years, he was experienced, he left the overcoat in his hands, turned around and raised the alarm. He, as it turned out, managed to prepare the fittings and wanted to kill this foreman.

Here is Veliyev Hamid (shows photo). Is this a person? At night he killed his wife, his three-year-old and one-year-old children. She allegedly cheated on him. And how can you feel sorry for this type?

Have you and your group members told anyone what kind of work you do?

Never. I work in a prison, that's all.

Did your loved ones know?

My wife guessed. Sometimes I came home not myself. We even had an article in our charter, according to which for each execution of a sentence two hundred and fifty grams of alcohol were required. I’ll tell you what: I haven’t even cut a chicken before or after, I can’t.

Why did you take this job?

You see, they appointed. I had been catching bribe-takers six years before. I'm tired of it, I'm just making enemies for myself. The authorities, knowing my ability to work and my integrity, sent me to the department of speculation and agriculture. They threw me at some aces with my hands to ruin them. Well, I’ll kill one, the other, and then they’ll give me a car accident, and that’s it.

Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Azerbaijan Kazimov, who was in charge of this area at that time, sending me to this work, asked: “Aren’t you afraid?” I answered: “I worked on the railroad, where people’s corpses had to be collected, photographed, and sometimes I collected them piece by piece.” Do you know what he said? “These are dead people. You are still young." I was thirty-five years old.

And work is like in the army - whoever is obedient is assigned to him. This is life. I say: “What? There will be a verdict, so everything will be legal.”

Only later did I think about this question. This is actually legalized murder. The state judges a person for killing another person, and at the same time becomes a criminal.

But you yourself just said that almost all of them evoked a feeling of disgust in you and, in your opinion, deserved death. Or should they continue to kill others?

I would execute notorious murderers. But if a person killed through carelessness or in a fit of anger, then no. Economic crimes should not be executed by execution at all.

Usually in films suicide bombers are asked: “What is your last wish?” Does this actually happen in reality?

One of the first people shot was a young boy from the city. He killed his uncle, and then stuck the corpse’s fingers into a socket, supposedly he died from electric shock. When he was called in for interrogation for the last time, they asked: “What will be your last wish?”, they usually ask formally. He asked for a cigarette. They ask for a desire, but who fulfills it? If he asks for a smoke, then yes. And if he wants a feast?.. These are unrealistic things.

Well, maybe he will ask you to convey something to your loved ones or to see someone for the last time?

No, I didn’t have such cases, I only remember about the cigarette.

You talked about cases involving men. Did women have to be shot?

There were no women with me.

Why did you work so little - only three years?

After the assassination of Interior Minister Arif Heydarov, changes took place. But in general, they don’t work in this position for a long time. From the words of senior employees, I heard that one of those who worked before me suffered a mental disorder in connection with these executions. Then the order was: whoever worked beyond the “ceiling” for five years was given the rank of colonel. They sent me to rest homes; there were some in the Moscow region, but I personally have never been there.

Was the warden necessarily required to take part in the execution of the death sentence, or was this only entrusted to you?

According to the charter, there had to be a boss.

Do you still think that there are some special qualities that people need in this job, because not everyone can do it?

I didn’t think about it then. Then I realized that this was legalized murder. After all, both the Koran and the Bible say: “Life is given by God and taken away by God”... I agree, the Council of Europe correctly demands that we limit ourselves to life imprisonment, but this must be ensured...

Have there been cases in your practice when only after the execution of the sentence it became known that an innocent person had been executed?

Mine didn't have it. In general, I have never heard of this in Azerbaijan. There were judicial errors or falsification of cases. I read about Chikatilo that an innocent man was shot there first. I recently heard on TV about the electric chair in the United States: over a hundred years of its use, twenty-five people were executed by mistake. No, it is better to let a hundred guilty people go free than to condemn an innocent person.

Can a person sentenced to death be granted amnesty?

No, our system is different.

In literary works and films, before the sentence is carried out, the convicted person is given the opportunity to meet with a mullah or priest who instructs him and absolves him of his sins. Was this practiced?

What are you talking about? In those days, when there was a wedding or funeral, people were afraid to call the mullah and could be expelled from the party.

And as for literature... In the same article in “Arguments and Facts” they wrote: “Executioners are also losing their minds. Psychiatrists say that a rare person can remain sane after the fourth murder. So the executor of the sentence will also face severe punishment.” But I had thirty-five.

They also write that those who must carry out the sentence are not allowed to communicate with death row prisoners, lest they develop some friendly feelings towards them. This is true?

No, I communicated, but as expected. I monitored the conditions in which they were kept. The prisoner could tell that he was in pain, I had to call a doctor, he is a man. But there was no other communication; I did not invite him to the office to drink tea.

Is it possible to determine the average age category of those executed?

I haven't kept track of it, but on average it's probably about thirty to forty years. Young people came across twice. The oldest was sixty-three years old. He left his family and married another woman. This woman had a daughter, whom he first raped and then strangled. When the girl's mother - his wife - came, he killed her too.

Are the conditions of detention for death row prisoners different from those of other prisoners?

Yes, they do a lot differently. They are not allowed parcels, there is no communication with the outside world, they are not allowed to go for walks, they only go to the toilet once a day. That's all.

You said that you agree to give your last name for publication. Don't you think that maybe your children won't want anyone to know about this?

Children, as they say, are not responsible for their father, and the father is not responsible for his children. This is mine, I have already gone through this school, I have already lived this life, no one can take it away from me. You see, it happened! Why should I hide? I believe that every normal person knows where and what is being done, or at least should know. Why deceive people, let them know the truth.

Did this work affect pay?

Yes. They paid more. 100 rubles for group members and 150 rubles for the direct performer once a quarter.

You probably don’t believe in the existence of the afterlife, the immortality of the soul, because you saw thirty-five deaths. Did your attitude towards human life change after that?

You see, when you read a death sentence before execution, you find out what he did, it clouds your consciousness. I imagined that he could do this to my brother. And such a reptile should walk the earth?..

And the price of life... He determined the price of life for himself... As for my life, I realized that I simply had a hard fate. I knew that people were in worse positions and knew less than me, maybe worse than me, but they were lucky. But I got dirty work.

War is a terrible time, and it is very difficult to remain human when the lifeless bodies of your comrades are nearby. Only one thought pulsates in my temples: to be able to survive! This is how monsters are born from good people with good goals. Three women were officially executed in the USSR for terrible acts in the post-war years. And everyone assumed that they would be pardoned, but no one could forget the toughness that the weaker sex showed...

History of the crimes of Antonina Makarova (1920 - 1979)

And perhaps Antonina’s fate would have turned out differently, but only in the first grade there was an unexpected change in her last name, which foreshadowed a new round in the girl’s life. On the first day of school, due to shyness, she could not say her last name - Parfenova. Classmates began shouting “Yes, she’s Makarova!”, meaning that Tony’s father’s name is Makar. So she became Antonina Makarova, who already at that time had her own revolutionary heroine - Anka the Machine Gunner. Even this, years later, does not seem like a strange coincidence, but rather a sign of fate.
The Great Patriotic War found Antonina in Moscow, where she went to study after school. The girl could not remain indifferent to the misfortune that happened to her country, so she immediately signed up to volunteer for the front.
Hoping to help the victims, 19-year-old Komsomol member Makarova experienced all the horrors of the infamous “Vyazma Cauldron.” After the hardest battles, completely surrounded, of the entire unit, only soldier Nikolai Fedchuk found himself next to the young nurse Tonya. She wandered through the local forests with him, he made her his “camping wife,” but this was not the worst thing she had to endure while they tried to survive.

In January 1942, they went to the village of Krasny Kolodets, and then Fedchuk admitted that he was married and his family lived nearby. He left Tonya alone

Tonya decided to stay in the village, but her desire to start a family with a local man quickly turned everyone against her, so she had to leave. Tonya Makarova’s wanderings ended in the area of the village of Lokot in the Bryansk region. The notorious “Lokot Republic”, an administrative-territorial formation of Russian collaborators, operated here. In essence, these were the same German lackeys as in other places, only more clearly formalized. A police patrol spotted a new girl, detained her, gave her food, drink and rape. Compared to the horrors of war, this did not seem to the girl something shameful; then she desperately wanted to live.
In fact, the police immediately noticed the girl, but not for the purpose discussed above, but for more dirty work. One day, a drunken Tonya was put behind a Maxim machine gun. There were people standing in front of the machine gun - men, women, old people, children. She was ordered to shoot. For Tony, who had completed not only nursing courses, but also machine gunners, this was not difficult; even being very drunk, she coped with the task. Then she didn’t think about why and why - she was guided by only one thought that pulsated in her head throughout the war: “Live!”

The next day Makarova found out that she was now an official - an executioner with a salary of 30 German marks and with her own bed

In the Lokot Republic they mercilessly fought against the enemies of the new order - partisans, underground fighters, communists, other unreliable elements, as well as members of their families. The barn, which served as a prison, was not designed for a large number of prisoners, so every day those arrested were shot, and new ones were driven in their place. No one wanted to take on such work: neither the Germans nor the local police, so the appearance of a girl who could successfully handle a machine gun was to everyone’s advantage. And Tonya herself was happy: she didn’t know who she was killing, for her it was ordinary work, a daily routine that helped her survive.
Antonina Makarova’s work schedule looked something like this: execution in the morning, finishing off survivors with a pistol, cleaning weapons, schnapps and dancing in a German club in the evening, and love with some cute German at night. Life seemed like a dream to the girl: she had money, everything was fine, even her wardrobe was regularly updated, even though she had to sew up holes every time after being killed.
Sometimes it’s true that Tonya left her children alive. She fired bullets above their heads, and later local residents took the children along with the corpses from the village to transfer the living ones to the partisan ranks. This scheme may have appeared because Tonya was tormented by her conscience. Rumors about a female executioner, “Tonka the machine gunner,” and “Tonka the Muscovite” spread throughout the area. Local partisans even announced a hunt for the executioner, but were unable to reach her. In 1943, the girl’s life changed dramatically.

Photo shows confrontation: witness identifies Makarova

The Red Army began to liberate the Bryansk region. Antonina realized what awaited her if Soviet soldiers found her and found out what she was doing. The Germans evacuated their own, but they did not care about accomplices like Tonya. The girl escaped and found herself surrounded, but in a Soviet environment. During the time that she was in the German rear, Tonya learned a lot, now she knew how to survive. The girl managed to get documents confirming that all this time Makarova was a nurse in a Soviet hospital. Then there were not enough people, and she managed to get a job in a hospital. There she met a real war hero who fell desperately in love with her. So the female executioner Antonina Makarova disappeared, and her place was taken by the honored veteran Antonina Ginzburg. After the end of the war, the young people left for the Belarusian city of Lepel, their husband’s homeland.
While Antonina was living her new correct life, the remains of about one and a half thousand people were found in mass graves in the Bryansk region. Soviet investigators took the investigation seriously, but only 200 people were identified. The KGB was never able to get on the trail of the punisher, until one day a certain Parfenov decided to cross the border... In his documents, Tonya Makarova was listed as his sister, so the teacher’s mistake helped the woman hide from justice for more than 30 years.
The KGB could not accuse a person with an ideal reputation, the wife of a brave front-line soldier, an exemplary mother of two children, of horrific atrocities, so they began to act very carefully. They brought witnesses to Lepel, even a policeman-lover, they all recognized Antonina Ginzburg as Tonka the Machine Gunner. She was arrested, and she did not deny it.
The front-line husband ran through the authorities, threatened Brezhnev and the UN, but only until the investigators told him the truth. The family renounced Antonina and left Lepel.

Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg was tried in Bryansk in the fall of 1978

Berta Borodkina (1927 - 1983)

Berta Borodkina began building her career as a waitress in a Gelendzhik public catering establishment in 1951. She did not even have a secondary education, but she rose first to a barmaid, then to a manager, and later became the head of three hundred restaurants and canteens. It was not by chance that she was appointed; it could not have happened without the participation of the first secretary of the city committee of the CPSU Nikolai Pogodin. Borodkina was not afraid of any audits; from 1974 to 1982, she received assistance from high-ranking officials, and she, in turn, took bribes from her subordinates and transferred them to patrons. The total amount was about 15,000 rubles, which was a lot of money at that time. The workers of the Gelendzhik catering industry were subject to a “tribute”, everyone knew how much money he had to transfer along the chain, as well as what awaited him in case of refusal - the loss of a “grain” position.
The source of illegal income was various frauds that Borodkina put into practice, receiving at least 100,000 rubles from it, for example: sour cream was diluted with water, bread and cereals were added to minced meat, the strength of vodka and other alcohol was reduced. But it was considered especially profitable to mix cheaper “starka” (rye vodka infused with apple or pear leaves) into expensive Armenian cognac. According to the investigator, even an examination could not establish that the cognac was diluted. There was also the usual miscalculation; the holiday season became a real breeding ground for scammers.

They were nicknamed the resort mafia, it was impossible to join their ranks, everyone else suffered losses, knowing about all the fraud. The leftist income Olympus was strengthening, tourists were arriving, but not everyone was so hopelessly blind, so complaints about “underfilling” and shortchanges regularly entered the guest book, but no one cared. The City Committee's "roof" in the person of the first secretary, as well as inspectors of the OBKhSS, the head of the region Medunov, made it invulnerable to the discontent of the mass consumer.
Borodkina demonstrated a completely different attitude towards high-ranking party and government officials who came to Gelendzhik during the holiday season from Moscow and the Union republics, but even here she pursued primarily her own interests - the acquisition of future influential patrons. Among her “friends” is the Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Fyodor Kulakov. Borodkin provided the highest ranks not only with rare delicacies, but also with young girls, and in general did everything possible to make the officials’ stay comfortable.
Borodkina did not like her name, she wanted to be called Bella, and she was nicknamed “Iron Bella”. Lack of education did not prevent her from skillfully hiding the tails of her expenses and writing off shortcomings. All her work was as transparent as possible from the outside. But this could not go on forever, even those in power could not cover her for so long, although they made good money thanks to Bella’s machinations.

Most likely, Borodkina’s trail was not discovered by chance, and everything was set up by those same top officials, but Bella was arrested not for fraud, but for distributing pornography. The prosecutor's office received a statement from a local resident that in one of the cafes, pornographic films were secretly shown to selected guests. The organizers of the clandestine screenings admitted during interrogations that the director of the trust gave her consent, and part of the money from the proceeds went to her. Thus, Borodkina herself was accused of complicity in this offense and receiving a bribe.
During the search in Bella’s apartment, various precious jewelry, furs, crystal items, sets of then-scarce bed linen were found, in addition, large sums of money were unsuccessfully hidden in different places: radiators, bricks, etc. The total amount seized during the search amounted to more than 500,000 rubles.

“Iron Bella” kept threatening the investigation and waited for release, but high officials never intervened...

In the early 1980s, investigations began in the Krasnodar region into numerous criminal cases related to large-scale manifestations of bribery and theft, which received the general name of the Sochi-Krasnodar case. The owner of Kuban Medunov, a close friend of the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Leonid Brezhnev and the Secretary of the Central Committee Konstantin Chernenko, interfered with the investigation, however, with the election of KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov, the fight against corruption took a completely different turn. Many were shot for embezzlement, and Medunov was simply fired. The head of the Gelendzhik party organization, Pogodin, disappeared. No one could help her anymore, and she began to confess...
Bella's testimony took up 20 volumes, another 30 criminal cases were initiated, and she named difficult names. During the investigation, Borodkina tried to feign schizophrenia. But a forensic examination recognized her acting as talented, and Borodkina was found guilty of repeatedly accepting bribes totaling 561,834 rubles. 89 kopecks
Thus ended the case of the director of three hundred restaurants and canteens in the city of Gelendzhik, Honored Worker of Trade and Public Catering of the RSFSR Berta Borodkina, who knew too much about high-ranking people and flaunted it. Then she fell silent forever.

Tamara Ivanyutina (1941 - 1987)

In 1986, Tamara got a job in a school canteen in Kyiv using a fake work book. She wanted to live well, so she looked for ways to take food home to feed herself and the livestock she raised. Tamara worked as a dishwasher, and began to punish those who, in her opinion, behaved badly, and especially those who made comments to her or suspected her of stealing food. Both adults and children fell under her wrath. The victims were a school party organizer (died) and a chemistry teacher (survived). They prevented Ivanyutina from stealing food from the catering department. Pupils of the 1st and 5th grades who asked her for leftover cutlets for their pets were also poisoned. This story became known quite quickly.
How did it all turn out? One day, 4 people ended up in intensive care. Everyone was diagnosed with an intestinal infection and flu after lunch in the same school cafeteria. Everything would be fine, but only after some time the patients’ hair began to fall out, and later death occurred. Investigators interviewed survivors and quickly determined who was involved. During searches of the canteen workers at Tamara’s house, Clerici liquid was discovered, which was the cause of the death of the visitors. Tamara Ivanyutina explained that she committed such a crime because the sixth-graders who were having lunch refused to arrange chairs and tables. She decided to punish them and poisoned them. However, she subsequently stated that the confession was made under pressure from investigators. She refused to testify.

Everyone knew about Tamara’s case at that time. It horrified visitors to all the canteens of the union. It turned out that not only Tamara, but also all members of her family had been using the highly toxic solution to deal with unwanted people for 11 years. Serial poisoners remained unpunished for a long time.
Tamara began her murderous activities when she realized that she could get rid of a person without attracting attention at all. So she got an apartment from her first husband, who died suddenly. She did not want to kill her second husband, but only gave him poison to reduce sexual activity. The victims were the husband's parents: Tamara wanted to live on their plot of land.
Tamara's sister, Nina Matsibora, used the same liquid to get an apartment from her husband. And the girls’ parents killed relatives, communal neighbors, and animals that did not please them.

At the trial, the family was charged with numerous poisonings, including fatal ones.
The court found that for 11 years, the criminal family, for mercenary reasons, as well as out of personal enmity, committed murders and attempted intentional deprivation of life of various individuals using the so-called Clerici liquid - a highly toxic solution based on a potent toxic substance - thallium. The total number of victims reached 40 people, 13 of which were fatal, and these are only the recorded cases about which the investigation managed to find out something. The process dragged on for a year, during which time they managed to attribute about 20 assassination attempts to Tamara.
In her last word, Ivanyutina did not admit her guilt in any of the episodes. While still in pre-trial detention, she stated: in order to achieve what you want, you don’t need to write any complaints. It is necessary to be friends with everyone and treat them. And add poison to especially evil people. Ivanyutin was declared sane and sentenced to death. The accomplices were given different prison terms. So, sister Nina was sentenced to 15 years. Her subsequent fate is unknown. The mother received 13, and the father - 10 years in prison. Parents died in prison.