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Tuesday, 30.10.2007
Chessboard killer gets lifelong jail
Moscow. The so-called chessboard murderer from Moscow’s Bizevsky Park, Alexander Pitshushkin, has been sentenced to life imprisonment – and compulsory psychotherapy. Pitshushkin was found guilty on 48 counts of murder.
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Investigations are continuing into eleven further murders to which Pitshushkin confessed during his trial, to the amazement of the public. Pitshushkin behaved brazenly and aggressively throughout the entire trial.
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“Cops, judges and lawyers have taken 500 days to decide my fate while I decided the fate of 60 people all on my own,” the killer boasted. Russian media have dubbed him the chessboard killer because he claims to have wanted a kill for each square on a chessboard. He declined the chance to speak a final word “because it would be unfair on the deaf and dumb.”
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He was driven by a craving for recognition
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Even his lawyer said he craved recognition. That was why he confessed to more murders than he had committed, argued defence lawyer Pavel Ivannikov. The jury did not share his opinion and found him guilty on all counts of murder.
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Judge Vladimir Usov accepted proof that Pitshushkin was mentally disturbed, but did not regard him as being of diminished responsibility.
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Prosecutor called the verdict just
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Usov sentenced the accused to lifelong jail and compulsory psychiatric treatment. The prosecutor welcomed the verdict. The death sentence has not been used in Russia since 1996.
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Russia’s Hannibal Lecter is not greatly similar to the highly intelligent Hollywood psychopath. The 33 year old, like most of his victims, was an alcoholic and manual labourer.
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First murder at the age of 18
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Pitshushkin committed his first murder at the age of 18, killing a friend who refused to commit a murder with him together. He killed him in Moscow’s Bizevsky Park after having got him drunk.
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He always killed the same way – luring his victims, usually old men, with an invitation to drink to the memory of his dead dog. Then he got them drunk and killed them, usually by simply pushing them into a drainage pit where they drowned. Later he started to use a hammer to brain his victims.
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Pitshushkin in the footsteps of Tschikatilo
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He knew at least 20 of his victims personally, “because then it means more emotionally,” Pitshushkin explained during the trial. He placed a cork from a bottle on a square of his chessboard for each of his victims.
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The total would have been more than the notorious Russian serial killer Andrei Tschikatilo had managed. The teacher from Rostov killed 53 people between 1978 – 1990. Tschikatilo was executed in 1994.
(ab/.rufo/Moskau)
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