Rostov gang of fat-cats. The Fantomas gang: the Tolstopyatov brothers terrified Rostov-on-Don

In 1974, the Rostov Regional Court considered the case of the Tolstopyatov brothers. The uniqueness of this case was that the Tolstopyatov gang was “advanced” in the criminal world and was armed with homemade machine guns and revolvers - at that time it was easier to make weapons yourself than to buy them on the black market.

“Gangsterism is not a phenomenon for our soil!”

For two decades in the USSR, the courts did not consider cases of “banditry.” It was believed that the gangs were destroyed and could no longer be revived. However, there were criminal groups that carried out attacks, but their cases were classified as armed robbery - after all, there could be no bandits in the country of victorious socialism. In the 70s, prosecutors liked to repeat: “gangsterism is not a phenomenon for our soil!”

From 1968 to 1973, for 5 years, the Tolstopyatov gang kept Rostov-on-Don in suspense. They were called "phantomas" because they disguised themselves by pulling women's black stockings over their heads for camouflage. Over 5 years, the Tolstopyatov gang carried out 14 armed attacks: on cashiers of government agencies and enterprises, on collectors, on stores and stole 150 thousand rubles. Today these figures seem insignificant, but then the number of attacks and the amount taken was amazing.

Who was part of the criminal group

The Tolstopyatov gang consisted of 4 people: Vladimir and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Vladimir Gorshkov and Sergey Samasyuk. They received the nickname “Fantômas” not only because they put women’s stockings on their heads, but also because the premiere of the 3rd part of the film about Fantômas occurred during the group’s activities.

The founder of the gang, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, was born in 1940 in Bryansk. As a child, he loved to draw, design, especially sketch, ensuring that his copy of the drawing did not differ from the original. At the age of 15, he learned to draw banknotes and exchanged them in wine and vodka stores. I threw away the alcohol and used the change to buy myself sweets, books, and pencils. Over time, he began selling copied banknotes to taxi drivers.

He saw that the taxi drivers did not unfold the banknotes, and began to copy the money on only one side. This was his undoing: one of the taxi drivers unfolded the bill and saw that there was nothing on the other side! Vyacheslav was sent to prison for 4 years in a colony general regime.

In prison he met Sergei Samasyuk, and there they began to develop a gang plan. Upon his release, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov enlisted the support of his older brother, Vladimir Tolstopyatov. The fourth member of the gang was Vladimir Gorshkov, who was an old acquaintance of the brothers.

The Tolstopyatov gang: the beginning

Rostov “found out” about the gang in October 1968, when the Tolstopyatovs and their accomplices seized a car from the Rostov watch factory. Dzeron Arutyunov was driving. The Tolstopyatovs needed a car to attack the cashier of the Regional Office of the State Bank. But the attack did not take place: Arutyunov jumped out of the car, and the bandits realized that it was better not to use this car for their insidious purposes. Failure spurred on the bandits.

In October 1968, they tried to attack store No. 46 in the village of Mirny. But the cashiers were able to hide the proceeds, and the bandits were able to take away only 526 rubles. In November, a gang robbed a woman near the Oktyabrsky branch of the State Bank. They took the woman’s bag, which contained 2,700 rubles. In December, the Tolstopyatovs robbed a grocery store on Mechnikov Street in Rostov and “enriched themselves” by as much as 1,498 rubles.

After three not very successful attacks, the bandits realized that they were poorly prepared. It was decided to rob the Chemical Plant. The Tolstopyatovites approached the preparation of the case scrupulously: Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov tried to get a job at the plant, found out the days when salaries were paid, watched the cashiers, the car that brought the money... And again they missed: on the “X-day” the bag with the money was carried not by the cashier, but by the security guard. The man was not afraid, he ran into the factory building, pulled out his revolver and drove away the bandits. After this, the Tolstopyatovs “lay low” for a year and a half.
In 1971, the Tolstopyatov gang attacked the construction organization UNR-112 and were able to take away 17 thousand rubles. In December 1971, they also robbed collectors near the savings bank and were able to “earn” 20 thousand rubles. There were 14 attacks in total, the total amount of loot was 150 thousand rubles.

Homemade weapons

Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was responsible for arming the gang. The weapons were manufactured in semi-industrial conditions: blanks were made in the workshop, parts were ordered to milling machine operators at the factory “through connections.” Before the series of attacks began, 4 revolvers, 2 pistols of a unique design, 11 grenades and even body armor were manufactured.

Developed bandit tactics

Despite the initial failures, the attack tactics were at that time advanced for the world of criminals. The Tolstoy Pyatovites had 2 options for robbery: first, one of the bandits stops the car asking for a ride. After he managed to catch the car, the bandit asked him to be taken to the designated place, where other gang members were waiting for him. The driver was tied up and placed in the back seat or trunk. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was always the “driver”, and Samasyuk and Gorshkov carried out the attack. After that, the car drove away at great speed, the driver and the car were left somewhere in an inconspicuous place.

In another case, a collector's car was seized at the scene of the attack. Then they committed a crime in this car and disappeared.

Vladimir Tolstopyatov did not participate in the “active phase” of the crime. Usually he worked in the rear: he ideologically inspired the group, observed the situation after the crime was committed, monitored the police and listened to the stories of witnesses.

Detention

To detain the bandits, the operational headquarters of the Ministry of Internal Affairs created mobile response teams and equipped several police cars with radios. In the early summer of 1973, the Tolstopyatov gang was caught: they were trying to rob the cash desk of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz Research Institute. During the arrest, Sergei Samasyuk was killed and Gorshkov was injured.

Sentence

On July 1, 1974, the brothers Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Gorshkov were sentenced to death. 8 accomplices received different prison terms for complicity or failure to report. All complaints were rejected, and on March 6, 1975, the brothers Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov were shot.

“Gangsterism is not a phenomenon for our soil!”

Who was part of the criminal group

The Tolstopyatov gang: the beginning

Homemade weapons

Developed bandit tactics

In another case, a collector's car was seized at the scene of the attack. Then they committed a crime in this car and disappeared.

Detention

Sentence

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, first in Rostov region and then throughout Soviet Union Rumors spread about an elusive gang of robbers in black masks raiding banks and stores. At that time, French films about Fantômas were very popular in the USSR. Louis de Funes And Jean Marais, that’s why the newly-minted Soviet gangsters were also called “phantomas.”

Of course, the rumors greatly distorted reality, but the gang of “phantomas” really operated in Rostov for several years. Desperate efforts of the Soviets law enforcement to neutralize it did not lead to success until June 7, 1973.

On this day, the bandits' raid on the cash desk of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz Research Institute ended in failure, and a chase began after the criminals' car. During it, one of the criminals was killed, the rest were detained.

The gang's history, which ended in the summer of 1973, began many years before the criminals first took up arms.

Criminal talent

Vladimir and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, the creators of the “gang of phantomas”, were born in the Bryansk region, and moved to the Don, to distant relatives, with their mother at the beginning of the war, along with columns of other refugees. The eldest, Vladimir, was 15 years old at that time, and the youngest, Vyacheslav, was one year old.

The father of the Tolstopyatov brothers was the head of the police department and died in the first days of the war.

In childhood, Vladimir and Vyacheslav were not noticed to have bad inclinations - they studied well, helped their mother, were fond of design, and Vyacheslav also showed talent as an artist.

This talent brought him to the dock for the first time. One of Vyacheslav’s hobbies was the careful redrawing of various pictures and illustrations, down to the smallest detail. Having achieved success with book drawings, at the age of 15 Slava took up something more difficult - he began to redraw 50- and 100-ruble bills.

At first it was just, so to speak, a sporting interest, and then Vyacheslav decided to try to benefit from his hobby. He took the drawn bill to the store and successfully exchanged it for real money - the seller did not notice the trick.

Vyacheslav decided that this way he could earn money for books, sweets, various tools, etc. Taxi drivers became the young counterfeiter’s favorite “clients”: he would get into the car, drive a short distance, hand the driver a bill folded into a rectangle, take the change and leave.

Soviet ruble. Photo: www.russianlook.com

Humane sentence

Tolstopyatov Jr.'s self-confidence let him down - noticing that taxi drivers did not unfold the bill, he began to draw it only on one side. But on February 23, 1960 young man I came across an incredulous taxi driver who unwrapped the bill and... Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov ended up in the police station.

There he honestly admitted everything, during an investigative experiment he perfectly drew a 100-ruble bill, and surprised the investigator with his modesty and erudition.

Law enforcement officers found themselves in predicament: on the one hand, in front of them was a talented guy who could bring great benefit to the country, and on the other hand, counterfeiting banknotes in the USSR was punished very strictly. Moreover, Tolstopyatov had not one, but a whole series of similar episodes.

As a result, 20-year-old Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov received 4 years in a general regime colony - an extremely lenient sentence for this type of crime.

"Take a million"

But Tolstopyatov Jr. believed that he had become a victim of state tyranny. Once in the colony, Vyacheslav began to hatch a plan for revenge. There, in the colony, he found his first like-minded person - convicted of malicious hooliganism Sergey Samasyuk.

After leaving the colony, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov proceeded to implement his plan - creating an armed gang for raids on banks, shops and enterprises.

Vyacheslav was 14 years younger than his brother Vladimir, but in this pair he was the leader. Vladimir, who until that moment had not shown any criminal inclinations, supported his brother’s idea and provided him with premises for a workshop and the headquarters of the future gang.

The third member of the gang was Sergei Samasyuk, who was released from prison, and the fourth was a childhood friend of the Tolstopyatov brothers, whom the aspiring gangsters initiated into their plans.

Vladimir Gorshkov. Photo: Shot from NTV channel

The “strategic goal” of the gang was defined by Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov - “to take a million and stop criminal activities.” A million rubles after the monetary reform of 1961 was simply a gigantic sum, but Tolstopyatov Jr. was determined to see his plan through to completion.

Vyacheslav was the brain of the group, and Vladimir was his “ right hand" They solved the issue with weapons on their own: they developed unique folding machine guns own design, as well as revolvers.

Shaped parts for weapons were ordered from familiar factory milling operators under the guise of spare parts for household appliances, and the brothers carried out the final assembly themselves, in their own workshop. In total, four small-caliber seven-round revolvers, three small-caliber folding submachine guns, hand grenades and even body armor.

Bandits could get caught right away

Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov dealt not only with weapons: he carefully developed the tactics of the bandits during raids, distributing tasks of observation, capture, covering and leaving the crime scene among the gang members. Since getting your own car in those years was unrealistic, Tolstopyatov developed a plan to seize cars to quickly leave the robbery scene.

The gang's tactics included two main attack options.

Option one. One of the bandits stops a car in the city asking for a ride. In the place named by him, under the guise of his friends, the rest of the gang are waiting. Once they get into the car, the driver is tied up and placed in the back seat or trunk. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov gets behind the wheel and drives the car to the scene of the attack. The attack itself is carried out by Samasyuk and Gorshkov. After seizing the money, they leave the crime scene at high speed, abandoning the car and driver in an inconspicuous place.

Option two. The collector's or cashier's car is seized directly at the scene of the attack. They all carry out the attack together and hide in the same car.

After careful preparation The criminals first took action on October 7, 1968, intending to rob a cashier at the Regional Office of the State Bank of the USSR.

But the raid went wrong - the driver of the car in which they were going to commit the robbery, seeing the gun pointed at him, jumped out of the car and ran away. The criminals had to retreat empty-handed.

However, no one took the incident seriously, especially since the bandits left the car near the site of the failed raid.

First murder

On October 10, an attempt to rob the cashier of the Rostov shoe factory was foiled - the woman was saved by the fact that the bandits were late, and the driver carrying the cashier drove into the gate of the enterprise, grossly violating traffic rules.

On October 22, 1968, “Phantomas” burst into store No. 46 in the village of Mirny, opening indiscriminate fire. But here, too, everything went wrong - the women who worked in the store managed to hide from the criminals in a utility room with for the most part revenue. The raiders got only 526 rubles.

When the bandits jumped out of the store, a pensioner stood in their way Guriy Chumakov. The war veteran, hearing the screams of the saleswomen, realized what was happening and tried to stop the bandits. One of the “phantomas” shot him with a machine gun.

After this first murder of the gang members, panic set in, but the eldest of the Tolstopyatovs, Vladimir, intervened. He told his accomplices that they had been “baptized by fire” and there was now no turning back. After that speech, other gang members nicknamed Vladimir “political officer.”

“Fantômas” continued what they started. On October 25, 1968, near the building of the Oktyabrsky branch of the State Bank, a female cashier was robbed with 2,700 rubles in her bag. On December 29, 1968, the Tolstopyatov gang attacked a grocery store on Mechnikov Street; production amounted to 1,498 rubles.

But a raid on the cashier of the Chemical Plant named after October revolution broke thanks to a security guard who entered into battle with the criminals. As a result, the bandits retreated, and Vladimir Gorshkov was wounded.

For some time, the gang chose to go into the shadows, especially since the violent Samasyuk was again in prison, receiving a year and a half for a fight in a pub.

Big jackpot

But in August 1971, the “Phantomas” made their presence known loudly, raiding the construction organization UNR-112 - the loot amounted to 17 thousand rubles.

On December 16, 1971, a gang attacked collectors near savings bank No. 0299. The driver of the collection vehicle, not accustomed to attacks by gangsters, submitted to them meekly, but senior collector Ivan Zyuba entered the battle, wounding Gorshkov in the arm. The bandits shot the collector with machine guns and fled with 20,000 rubles.

In total, during their career, the “phantomas” carried out 14 armed attacks, and their total loot amounted to 150,000 rubles.

Tostopyatov Jr. was, however, dissatisfied - time passed, and the planned million remained still an unattainable goal.

The raid, which was the last for the Phantomas, was their biggest undertaking. They intended to rob the cashier of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz design institute on payday, when, according to the gangsters’ calculations, they were supposed to bring 250-300 thousand rubles to the enterprise.

The raid was extremely daring - Samasyuk and Gorshkov entered directly into the territory of the enterprise, approached the cash register, where the workers who were waiting for their salaries had gathered, threatened with revolvers, took the money and tried to escape.

Die on a bag of money

But then the unexpected happened: the workers began to pursue the raiders, not paying attention to their threats. Already on the street, a 27-year-old man entered into a fight with bandits store loader Vladimir Martovitsky. The enraged Gorshkov and Tolstopyatov Jr., who came to his aid, shot the daredevil.

Screams and gunshots attracted attention senior police sergeant Alexey Rusov, who rushed in pursuit of the bandits. In a shootout, he wounded two bandits - Gorshkov and Samasyuk, for whom this wound turned out to be fatal.

While Rusov was reloading his weapon, the bandits managed to seize a Moskvich car, in which they tried to escape.

In the back seat of this car, lying on a bag with stolen 125 thousand rubles, Sergei Samasyuk died. As his accomplices said during interrogations, dying drunk on a bag of money was his dream, so we can assume that the gangster died happy.

Murdered Sergei Samasyuk. Photo: Shot from NTV channel

This time the “phantomas” did not manage to escape. Rusov was picked up by the fire department's gas car, which contained those who joined the chase. Sergeant Gennady Doroshenko And Captain Viktor Salyutin. Another policeman joined the chase - a local inspector from the Oktyabrsky District Department of Internal Affairs. junior lieutenant Evgeniy Kubyshta who stopped a UAZ minibus. Through joint efforts, the criminals were captured.

Myths and truth

During interrogations, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov willingly talked about the weapons he had developed and shared new design ideas. Just like 13 years before, he seemed not to understand the seriousness of what he had done, and was convinced that instead of being punished, he would be sent to work in a secret design bureau.

Decades later, already in new Russia, recalling the “case of the phantoms,” some will say that Tolstopyatov Jr. became a victim of the Soviet system, which did not give talent the opportunity to realize itself. Researchers of the case, however, both then and now claim that this is a lie. Unlike many designers and engineers who achieved worldwide recognition in an honest way, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov wanted recognition here and now, believing that talent is allowed more than “mere mortals.”

This conviction pushed him onto the path of crime, onto which he also enticed his older brother. As for the other gang members, they were driven by a thirst for profit and a desire to feel power over others.

It is also a myth that the “phantomas” acted almost as people’s avengers who decided to settle scores with the Soviet system for the execution of workers in Novocherkassk in 1962. The “phantomas” had nothing to do with those events.

And such motivation crumbles at the first encounter with real facts. Gangsters did not hesitate to rob cashiers of enterprises, leaving workers without their hard-earned money. During the last raid they threatened to shoot ordinary people who demanded a refund.

And if the deceased collector Ivan Zyuba can, at least with a stretch, be called a “servant of the regime,” then the murdered war veteran Guriy Chumakov and Vladimir Martovitsky one hundred percent belonged to the same working class, for whose violated honor the “phantomas” allegedly took revenge.

Unlike the bandits, Ivan Zyuba, Guriy Chumakov and Vladimir Martovitsky were real citizens of their country who did not want to put up with lawlessness even under the threat of death.

On July 1, 1974, the court pronounced a verdict in the case of the “fantomas gang” - Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Vladimir Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Gorshkov were sentenced to death, and eight of their accomplices, who performed auxiliary functions in the gang, received different prison terms for complicity and failure to report.

The Tolstopyatovs and Gorshkov filed appeals and asked for pardon, but the sentence was left unchanged.

For many years, there were rumors in Rostov that Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was nevertheless sent to a closed research institute to work on new types of weapons. The truth, however, is more prosaic - on March 6, 1975, the death sentence against the “Phantomas” was carried out.

Founded

Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Vladimir Tolstopyatov, Sergey Samasyuk, Vladimir Gorshkov

Years of activity Territory Criminal activity

Gang of Tolstopyatov brothers- a criminal group operating in Rostov-on-Don in 1973.

The scale, technical equipment, preparedness and the very fact of the emergence and successful long-term existence of this criminal gang unique to the USSR in the 1960s - 1970s, which gave the gang a legendary character and made it part of the folklore of the city of Rostov-on-Don and the USSR/Russia.

Structure and weapons

The founder and leader of the gang, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov Jr., was born in a village in the vicinity of Bryansk in 1940. Since childhood, he has been interested in designing, drawing and drawing. The first attempt to put his abilities into practice for personal gain ended in failure: Tolstopyatov was sentenced to four years in prison for counterfeiting paper money. In prison, Tolstopyatov met Sergei Samasyuk and the gang’s plan emerged. Upon his release, Tolstopyatov Jr. enlisted the support of his older brother Vladimir, who provided him with premises adapted for the gang’s headquarters and workshop. The fourth member of the gang was an old acquaintance of the brothers, Vladimir Gorshkov.

All the gang’s weapons were manufactured by the Tolstopyatov brothers themselves in semi-industrial conditions: the blanks were made in an underground workshop, the secret entrance to which was hidden using a specially rotating mirror, and the shaped parts were ordered from familiar factory milling workers under the guise of spare parts for household appliances. In total, four small-caliber seven-round revolvers, three small-caliber folding submachine guns of a unique design, hand grenades and even improvised body armor were manufactured.

Since the acquisition of personal vehicles was virtually an impossible and unnecessary task (a personal vehicle in those conditions would instantly unmask and expose the group), the Tolstopyatovs worked out the tactics of seizing other people’s cars and taking the driver hostage.

Information about an alleged attempt to assemble a helicopter for air raids should most likely be classified as an urban legend, but such a legend best characterizes the degree of technical ambitions of the gang’s militants.

Robbery tactics

In general, it should be recognized that the gang’s tactics were at that time advanced for the criminal world of the USSR, and the degree of its development inevitably provokes comparison with the actions of Chicago gangsters, urban partisans and intelligence services (many Rostov residents suspected the gang of collaborating with Western intelligence services). These tactics included the “correct” bank robbery, hostage taking, surveillance and collection of information after the action, evasion, conspiracy, alibi preparation, retraining, conspiratorial treatment and disguise. For personal disguise, the gang members used black stockings, which is why they received the nickname “Fantômas”.

The bandits developed two main robbery tactics:

One of the bandits stops a car in the city asking for a ride. In the place named by him, under the guise of his friends, the rest of the gang are waiting. Once they get into the car, the driver is tied up and placed in the back seat or trunk. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov gets behind the wheel and drives the car to the scene of the attack. The attack itself is carried out by Samasyuk and Gorshkov. After seizing the money, they leave the crime scene at high speed, abandoning the car and driver in an inconspicuous place.

The collector's or cashier's car is seized directly at the scene of the attack. They all carry out the attack together and hide in the same car.

Vladimir Tolstopyatov’s responsibilities included monitoring the situation after the crime, the actions of the police, and the stories of witnesses.

It is worth noting the gang’s independence from government services: when Vladimir Gorshkov was wounded during one of the robberies, he was treated by a doctor bribed by the gang, but the treatment was unsuccessful, and then Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov independently performed a surgical operation, guided by a diagram in a medical textbook.

The gang carried out several successful robberies, leaving human victims and stealing a total of 150 thousand rubles (for comparison: a three-room cooperative apartment cost 5 thousand rubles in those years, a Volga GAZ-24 car - 9 thousand), and more than once evaded prosecution.

Attacks

The gang attempted its first attack on October 7, 1968. On this day, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Samasyuk and Gorshkov seized a car from the Rostov Watch Factory with the aim of robbing a cashier at the building of the Regional Office of the State Bank of the USSR on the corner of Engels Street (now Bolshaya Sadovaya) and Sokolov Avenue. The attack was preceded by a long preparation: the bandits monitored the process of cashiers receiving money and established on what days and hours the most intensive issuance of money occurs. However, the driver D. Arutyunov managed to leave the car after the seizure. Then the bandits decided not to attack that day, realizing that he would report the capture to the police. The car was abandoned in the courtyard of the House of Actors.

Three days later, an attempt was made to attack the cashier of the Rostov shoe factory in the car of the Tolstopyatovs’ accomplice Srybny. To prevent Srybny from being suspected of complicity, his hands were first tied. But even here the Fantomas were unlucky: first they did not have time to attack the cashier before she got into the car, and then this car unexpectedly, in violation of traffic rules, turned into the factory gates.

If at first I was overcome by the passion for design, then later the question only came down to money. The injury of one of us unsettled us, continuous nervous tension, our nerves were triple tested - this had a detrimental effect on the mind. I could no longer think creatively, as before, any event caused trauma, I was haunted by the nightmare of what was happening, its meaninglessness. You can’t blame me for envy and greed, I’m used to being content with little, I shouldn’t live for the sake of sweetness. I was surrounded by people, I alone had to think for everyone. But nothing goes unpunished, especially meanness. With my will, I could have become what I wanted, but I became a criminal and am responsible for this before the court.

Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov (from the last word)

All cassation appeals were rejected, and on March 6, 1975, the sentence was carried out.

In culture

Mentions of “Fantômas” can be found in the novels of the modern Russian writer Danil Koretsky, who lives and works in Rostov.
“Fantômas” are also the heroes of the novel “Rostov-Papa” by the famous Don writer Anton Gerashchenko.

Other

In Rostov, one of the streets bears the name of the worker Martavitsky, who tried to detain the bandits and was killed by them.

Links

N. I. Buslenko The end of the “phantomas” (the case of Tolstopyatov and others) // Prosecutor’s Office of the Rostov Region at the turn of the century. - Rostov-on-Don: Expert Bureau, 2000. - P. 269-277.
Kostanov Yu.A. The case of “Fantomas” // Judicial speeches. And not only.(speech by the public prosecutor at the trial)
Ionova L.

The modest young man Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov did not know where to apply his talent. He could copy any illustration from a book with amazing accuracy - and he spent hours at this task, showing extraordinary perseverance. Once during the next artistic session (Slavik was just reproducing the fancy curls depicted on a hundred-ruble bill), the thought struck him: why not try to make money on this?

ON THIS TOPIC

Vyacheslav began paying taxi drivers with banknotes of his own production. He folded the “money” in four (before the 1961 reform, banknotes were big size) - and received change from a hundred square meters in real money. Sometimes he performed the same operation in a liquor store. The artist only threw the purchased bottle into the nearest bushes - he basically did not drink, not a drop.

This continued until one of the taxi drivers unwrapped the hundred-ruble note handed to him for some reason. Tolstopyatov by that time had become so convinced of his impunity that he began to paint the paper on only one side. For which he paid: the taxi driver delivered creative personality to the nearest police station.

“Vyacheslav admitted everything at once. During the investigative experiment, using colored pencils, watercolors, BF-2 glue, a compass, a ruler and a blade, Vyacheslav drew an absolutely exact copy of a 100-ruble bill in four hours. We all gasped,” he later said investigator in the first case of Tostopyatov Granovsky.

“Even in the police, even while under investigation, Vyacheslav won everyone’s sympathy with his politeness, modesty, and erudition. It was a pleasure to talk with him. I petitioned the court for a mitigation of the sentence - given his young age, complete repentance, assistance provided to the investigation,” - noted the lawyer.

However, the young talent did not live up to the investigator's hopes. During four years in the colony, Vyacheslav planned his life, setting a goal: to loot a million and get involved with crime. Upon his release in the winter of 1964, he shared his grandiose plans with his older brother Vladimir, who fully supported him.

On October 22, 1968, three men burst into the Gastronom store in the Pervomaisky district of Rostov-on-Don. Two of them had black nylon stockings on their heads. The third one had a green stocking. One of the “Soviet gangsters” stood in the doorway with a homemade machine gun in his hands. Another, armed with a pistol, rushed to the cash registers. Having taken the small proceeds, the bandits ran out of the store.

Great Patriotic War veteran Guriy Chumakov tried to stop the criminals. A man in a green stocking shot him point-blank with a machine gun. The raid on the grocery store was the first serious case for the group, which went down in the history of Russian crime as the “gang of phantomas”, or “gang of the Tolstopyatov brothers”.

The uniqueness of the “Fantômas case” is that the gang was armed with homemade machine guns and pistols. It took the Tolstopyatovs about four years to develop drawings for a weapon chambered for a small-caliber sports cartridge (5.6 mm) and to manufacture it. The ammunition was obtained by Vyacheslav, who for some time got a job as the head of the DOSAAF shooting range. The blanks were made in an underground workshop. The Tolstopyatovs ordered complex parts that required high tolerances from familiar milling and turners at the Legmash plant - under the guise of spare parts for household appliances. In total, by the fall of 1968, four seven-round revolvers, three folding submachine guns, several hand grenades and improvised body armor were manufactured. And in 1972, the gang’s arsenal was replenished with the brothers’ most famous “know-how” - a smooth-bore machine gun for 9-mm steel balls, which they named “saxophone”.

As specialists from the All-Russian Research Institute of Forensic Expertise later concluded, “not one of the known examples of manual firearms was not the model on which submachine guns were made... This weapon, when fired from short distances, has excessive lethal force... The kinetic energy of the smooth-bore machine gun created by Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov exceeds the kinetic energy of a conventional weapon bullet by 4.5 times." Experts also noted that this weapon didn't have sighting devices- which made it useless for anything except one thing - a point-blank shot.

The closest accomplices of the Tolstopyatov brothers were Sergei Samosyuk and Vladimir Gorshkov. Vyacheslav knew Samosyuk from the “zone”. Having been released a little later than Tolstopyatov, Sergei immediately expressed a desire to join the gang. Vyacheslav accidentally met Samosyuk at a wine barrel. The drunken “sidekick” then uttered a prophetic phrase: “It’s better to die on a bag of money than by a wine barrel.”

Vladimir Gorshkov was a childhood friend and neighbor of the Tolstopyatov brothers. He - also, however, like Sergei - was not distinguished by either great abilities or courage. Gorshkov provided part of his house to organize an underground workshop there, in which Vladimir and Vyacheslav constructed homemade weapons.

After the attack on the grocery store, rumors about a “gang of phantomas” spread across Rostov-on-Don. In the fall and winter of 1968, the gang made two more successful raids - on store No. 21 of Gorpromtorg and on a car cashier. In August 1971, “phantomas” attacked the cashier of the UNR-112 and the unarmed engineer and driver accompanying her. One shot in the air was enough - and they had a bag with 17,000 rubles in their hands (the average salary at that time did not exceed 200 rubles per month).

The same amount - 17,000 rubles - went to the bandits as a result of a raid on collectors near savings bank No. 0299 on December 16, 1971. In the shootout, Gorshkov, whom Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov had already nicknamed the “bullet catcher,” was wounded twice. Tolstopyatov Sr. watched the raid from afar - for subsequent analysis and adjustment of further plans.

The last case of the “Fantomas” was an attack on the cashier of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz design institute on June 7, 1973. The perpetrators were Samosyuk and Gorshkov, Tolstopyatov Jr. was supposed to cover the retreat of his accomplices near the institute building and ensure the capture of the car for leaving. Not far from the building, the older brother, Vladimir, watched what was happening as usual.

The performers coped with their task. However, the unarmed employees of the institute suddenly began to pursue the raiders. Samasyuk decided to shoot at them as a distraction, but the revolver misfired. On the street, the pursuers were joined by Vladimir Martovitsky, a 27-year-old loader from the neighboring Gastronome, who was passing by and grabbed Gorshkov. The bandits shot the former marine at point-blank range.

Junior police sergeant Alexey Rusov was nearby. Samosyuk shot at the policeman, but the revolver misfired. And the junior sergeant opened fire to kill the fleeing trio. Samosyuk and Gorshkov were wounded by his shots. However, Tolstopyatov grabbed a Moskvich that was standing near the sidewalk, helped his accomplices get into the car, and drove away from the design institute at high speed.

Unfortunately for the bandits, a gas car from the regional fire department was passing by. Sergeant Gennady Doroshenko and captain Viktor Salyutin picked up Rusov and began pursuing him. Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov were detained when they abandoned the car and tried to leave. Samosyuk was found dead in the Muscovite. His dream came true: he was lying on a bag containing more than 120 thousand rubles. Two revolvers, a machine gun and three homemade grenades were also found here.

The trial of the "gang of phantomas" began in April 1974. There were 11 people in the dock: in addition to the Tolstopyatov brothers and Vladimir Gorshkov, there were also minor characters who helped the bandits. The court's verdict was read out on July 1. Vladimir and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, as well as Vladimir Gorshkov, were sentenced to capital punishment - execution. Accomplices received from 5 to 12 years in prison.

The prosecution demanded that the doctor Konstantin Dudnikov be given five years in a general regime colony. The medic repeatedly provided assistance to the wounded Gorshkov for considerable money. However, the court reclassified the charge against the doctor from harboring a criminal to failure to report a crime.

In Rostov-on-Don, the participants in the heroic detention of the “Phantomas” were not forgotten. A street in the Voroshilovsky district of the city is named after the deceased marine loader Vladimir Martovitsky. Another street and alley bear the names of policeman Alexei Rusov and firefighter Viktor Salyutin.

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