Rostov phantomas. Once upon a time in the USSR

Only four people, who made up the backbone of the Fantomas gang, kept the whole city in fear for five long years. During this time they carried out 14 daring robberies and killed several people.

The organizer of the gang, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, had a remarkable mind. He developed folding machine guns, which had no analogues in the USSR.

Faktrum tells about the gang of Tolstopyatov brothers - in their own way brilliant gangsters of the USSR.

Vladimir and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov

Fatal hand drawn bill

The youngest of the Tolstopyatov brothers, Vyacheslav, showed a talent for drawing and drawing from childhood. What he did best was to redraw various illustrations from books. One day he drew several fifty- and hundred-ruble bills and managed to pay with them in a store. This outcome of the case inspired the young counterfeiter, and he began to act more boldly.

Later, he realized that local taxi drivers practically do not check the money given to them. Vyacheslav slipped them his painted fakes, and took the change with real money. At some point, he became so bold that he gave the taxi driver a bill with only one side drawn on it. This was a fatal mistake: Tolstopyatov was sentenced to four years for counterfeiting banknotes. In prison, he became friends with Sergei Samasyuk, and he had the idea of forming his own gang.

The appearance of masked bandits in Rostov-on-Don

Once free, Vyacheslav told his older brother Vladimir about his plans. He, without thinking twice, agreed, and later Vladimir Gorshkov, a childhood friend of the Tolstopyatov brothers, joined the gang. The gang's first case took place in 1968, but was unsuccessful. The Tolstopyatovs and their accomplices tried to seize the car in order to use it to rob a state bank teller, but the driver managed to escape and left the bandits without the keys. However, such a failure only added enthusiasm to the robbers, who went out on business wearing thick nylon stockings on their heads. By the way, because of this and because of the popularity of the film “Fantômas,” which had just been released, the gang received such a name.

The other three subsequent robberies were also unsuccessful. After them, the Tolstopyatov gang decided to go on a big deal and rob the cashier of a local chemical plant on the day the salary was paid. The younger Tolstopyatov even got a job at this plant to find out everything thoroughly, but on the day of the robbery the gang was unlucky again. They ran into a security guard, who managed to drive them away with his personal weapon.

Then the masked bandits decided to rob a cash-in-transit vehicle, and they succeeded; their loot was 20,000 rubles - a huge amount at that time. In all their attacks, the Fantomas gang used homemade weapon. Vyacheslav was responsible for its creation, ordering parts for weapons from craftsmen under the guise of spare parts for household appliances. The gang's arsenal included two pistols, four revolvers and 11 grenades - along with three folding machine guns Tolstopyatov designed himself.

One of the gang's homemade weapons

The unjustified cruelty of the Tolstopyatovs

During one of the robberies in 1968, war veteran Chumakov became a victim of the Fantomas. He found himself next to the store where the robbery was taking place and tried to stop the attackers, but one of the bandits shot him. During one of the subsequent robberies, another person was killed.

In 1971, the Tolstopyatov brothers, together with their accomplices, attacked a cash-in-transit vehicle, and a shootout ensued between the bandits and the collectors. As a result, one of the Fantomas was wounded.

The last case of "Fantomas"

In 1973, a gang of Tolstopyatov brothers tried to rob the cash register of one of the research institutes in Rostov-on-Don. Two bandits approached the cash register, where workers were crowded waiting for their salaries to be paid, and, threatening the cashier with pistols, they took a bag of money and prepared to escape. But the angry workers did not allow them to do this and began to pursue the robbers. The “Fantômas” got into trouble with a loader from a nearby store, who tried to stop them and received a bullet for it.

Policeman Rusov, who was nearby, managed to wound two people - Samasyuk and Gorshkov. Later, Samasyuk died in a car stolen by the Tolstopyatovs, lying on a bag of stolen money. They managed to catch up with the surviving bandits and detain them. Both Vyacheslav and Vladimir Tolstopyatov, as well as Gorshkov, who participated in the last robbery, were sentenced to death. The remaining accomplices of the Tolstopyatov gang, and there were only eight of them, received various prison terms.

Photo from telegrafua.com

The case of the Tolstopyatov brothers gang, which operated in Rostov-on-Don in 1968-1973, has no analogues in the history of Russian crime. She was armed with machine guns own design, superior in destructive power to the weapons known at that time. Western media announced that the first gangsters had appeared in the USSR, and the Soviet press called them “Rostov phantoms.” The brothers, sentenced to death and on death row, continued to work on small arms and a fantastic "energy transformer" in the hope that their lives would be kept secret.

In 2010, a new excursion route around the city was developed in Rostov-on-Don - “Rostov-Papa”. At one time, this regional center was considered one of the most criminal cities in Russia, which shared an unattractive status for most citizens with “Mama Odessa.” During the bus and walking tour, tourists are shown places associated with sensational crimes and are offered to explore the area where thieves' "raspberries" were once located. Among the tourist sites, for example, was a courtyard preserved from pre-revolutionary years on Stanislavsky Street, where, as the publication wrote, in particular, the Black Mask gang gathered in 1909 and robbed large stores in the city. “It was in this courtyard that the events that formed the basis of some episodes of the film “The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed” unfolded. In the cinema - “Black Cat”, in life - “Black Mask”,” the newspaper reported Rostov region. (Read the version of "Pravo.Ru" about "Black Cat" as the main brand of post-war criminal rampant.) Also included in the route is a visit to the place where the Mutual Trust Credit Society was once located. The “robbery of the century” was committed here: the criminals dug a 36-meter tunnel under the building and stole from the safe several tens of millions of full-fledged Nikolaev rubles that belonged to the richest and most influential people in the south of Russia.

Modern Rostov has long lost its dubious reputation as one of the centers of the country's criminal community. When in 2008 the magazine "Russian Newsweek" based on the results sociological research compiled a rating of the 50 most dangerous cities in the Russian Federation (based on the number of crimes per 1000 inhabitants), Rostov-on-Don was not among them. The last trial, the defendants of which attracted widespread attention not only in the USSR but also abroad, took place in this city in 1974. The case of the Tolstopyatov brothers and other members of the gang operating in Rostov-on-Don in 1968-1973 occupied a special place in the history of Russian crime. For almost the previous two decades, the USSR did not use such classification of actions of defendants as banditry.

“... The actions of the Tolstopyatov brothers, Gorshkov and Samasyuk were registered precisely as banditry,” Daniil Koretsky, doctor of legal sciences, retired police colonel, author of crime novels, who worked in Rostov-on-Don in 1971, told Rossiyskaya Gazeta. an investigator at the district prosecutor's office, and in 1975 - a senior researcher at the country's first criminological research department of the Central North Caucasus Forensic Laboratory of the Ministry of Justice of the RSFSR. - They were distinguished by their exceptional audacity: in those years, open attacks on savings banks, collectors, shops, carried out in broad daylight in large crowds of people, were a great rarity. Moreover, the attackers were armed with revolvers, machine guns and grenades, which was also considered an extraordinary fact in those calm times."

Schemes and projects of the Tolstopyatov brothers

The organizer of the gang and its leader was the younger of the two Tolstopyatov brothers. “Undoubtedly, the main character of this protracted story is Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov,” emphasized at the trial the state prosecutor, prosecutor of the department for supervision of the consideration of criminal cases by the courts of the Rostov Region Prosecutor’s Office Yuri Kostanov, now a famous lawyer, member of the Presidential Council for Development civil society and human rights. “It’s impossible not to admit that he is an extraordinary person...” ( Kostanov Yu.A.Judicial speeches... and more. 2nd ed., additional - M.: R. Valent, 2003. - 280 s.)

Tolstopyatov Jr. showed an early penchant for drawing and design. And at the age of 15, he began to copy banknotes in denominations of 50 and 100 rubles and exchange them, paying in wine departments and taxis, where they, as a rule, were not unrolled (before the 1961 reform, banknotes were of an impressive size and were rolled into a tube or folded into quarters). This went on for several years, until Tolstopyatov began to draw banknotes on only one side for payments in taxis. That's where he got caught - the driver, contrary to usual, turned around the "five" handed to him...

“Vyacheslav confessed to everything at once,” Rostov journalist Alexander Olenev quotes the investigator in the first Tolstopyatov case, A. Granovsky. “In an investigative experiment, using colored pencils, watercolors, BF-2 glue, a compass, a ruler and a blade, Vyacheslav in four hours (!) drew absolutely exact copy 100-ruble bill. We all gasped. 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 my young age, complete repentance, and assistance provided to the investigation.”

However, the investigator, who fell under the charm of the defendant, as it turned out, was mistaken about the degree of his repentance. While serving a four-year sentence in a correctional labor colony general regime Tolstopyatov began to carefully develop plans to put together an armed group to rob the bank. Upon his release in the winter of 1964, he shared them with his older brother Vladimir and enlisted his support.

State prosecutor Kostanov, characterizing the gang members before the court, said about Tolstopyatov Sr.: “When after the first murder [...] the “militants” were confused and wavered in spirit, none other than Vladimir began to raise their “fighting spirit”, saying that "They were baptized in blood, that there is no turning back, that shootouts on city streets are the lot of a real man. Gorshkov [one of the gang members] was three times right when he called him the spiritual father of bandits!" (Vladimir Gorshkov figuratively called Vladimir Tolstopyatov also the “political officer” of the gang).

Tolstopyatov Sr. was also endowed with the gift of a draftsman and even worked for some time as an artist in the Rostov zoo. The family's passion for design was also passed on to him. He, for example, hatched the idea of developing an “energy transformer”, consisting, in his opinion, of a battery for a flashlight, connected to it a chain of electric motors with successively increasing power, which, in turn, should rotate electric generators and provide lighting for half the city. “It’s like some kind of Dnieper hydroelectric power station from a battery!” - the prosecutor exclaimed sarcastically in his speech at the trial, debunking the Tolstopyatovs’ assertion that they robbed out of the need to obtain funds to implement their technical ideas. And he emphasized that the brothers “did not want to learn anything, drawing their technical ideas from the popular magazine Tekhnika Youth.”

However, the inventive ambitions of the self-taught brothers, the youngest of whom did not even finish high school, were most fully manifested not in these projects. There was a feature in the criminal case that in itself made it unique for the USSR: all the gang’s weapons (automatic and semi-automatic firearms, grenades and body armor) were designed and manufactured by the brothers themselves.

You don't need a scope to shoot point-blank

It took the Tolstopyatovs, starting in 1964, about four years to develop drawings for pistols and submachine guns chambered for a small-caliber sports cartridge (5.6 mm) and to produce handicraft weapons. To make the barrels, the brothers used two TOZ-8 small-caliber rifles that they had stored, and the ammunition was obtained by Vyacheslav, who for some time got a job as the head of the DOSAAF small-caliber shooting range. The blanks were made in an underground workshop, the premises for which were provided by Vladimir Gorshkov in his house. The Tolstopyatovs ordered complex parts that required high tolerances from familiar milling machine operators and turners, in particular from 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. (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”).

On the one hand, according to the conclusion of the forensic ballistic examination of the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise dated January 25, 1974, “not one of the known samples of handguns was the model on which the submachine guns brought in for examination were made... These weapons, when fired from short distances, have 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." On the other hand, as state prosecutor Kostanov said at the trial, “these are not some new independent developments. These are submachine guns based on designs known since the First World War, these are revolvers, the principle of operation of which was developed in the middle of the last century ". The weapon was manufactured according to schemes well known to gunsmiths, and the prosecutor explained the “special power of the shot” to the court by saying that the “designers” increased the powder charge in the cartridges. But Kostanov also drew attention to the excessive destructive power of weapons when fired from short distances, recorded by experts: “It (the weapon made by the Tolstopyatovs) does not have sighting devices, which makes it useless for anything except point-blank shooting."

The arsenal of the Tolstopyatov gang, which at the time of arrest already consisted of five machine guns and six pistols, was presented to the court along with the conclusions of ballistic examinations and testimony of witnesses as weapons of several murders (in addition, Article 218 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR provided for illegal carrying, storage, acquisition, production or sale of weapons, ammunition or explosives, punishable by imprisonment for a term of three to eight years).

"It's better to die on a bag of money than under a wine barrel"

There were 11 people in the dock of the Rostov Regional Court in 1974, but the core of the gang, besides the Tolstopyatov brothers, were Sergei Samasyuk and Vladimir Gorshkov.

Gorshkov was a childhood friend of Tolstopyatov Jr. The state prosecutor, revealing the motives that, in his opinion, motivated the gang members and their accomplices, said about him at the trial: “He [Gorshkov] said the best thing about the motives himself: “There must be a huge pile of money there.” What else is there to talk about? ". For a long time, Gorshkov remained the most unlucky member of the gang, and Tolstopyatov Jr. called him a “bullet catcher.” During the raids, he was wounded three times - in the spring of 1969, in the winter of 1971 and in the summer of 1973, becoming virtually disabled (doctor Konstantin Dudnikov, who helped him after one of the wounds, also ended up in the dock).

Tolstopyatov Jr. briefly became friends with Samasyuk in the colony, where he was serving a sentence for malicious hooliganism, but upon release their paths diverged for some time. Everything was decided by a chance meeting in line for bottled wine, during which the “recruitment” took place. Later, Tolstopyatov would write in his diary, excerpts from which were cited at trial, that Samasyuk accepted the offer without hesitation, noting: “It’s better to die on a bag of money than under a wine barrel” (his words turned out to be prophetic: a few years later he met his death, literally lying on a backpack with a huge sum for those times).

The leader has a difficult relationship with Samasyuk, who drinks and recklessly wastes money (once he even stole 360 rubles from the gangster’s common fund). Once Gorshkov informed him that Samasyuk, having gotten drunk, told his drinking buddies that he was “robbing cashiers with a machine gun.” Tolstopyatov dragged his accomplice home, put him against the wall and planted several bullets into it above Samasyuk’s head. However, “Center Gray,” as his accomplices called him, still led a riotous lifestyle and in the late 60s he was sent to prison for the second time for malicious hooliganism.

The role of Tolstopyatov Sr. in the gang deserves special mention. Practically, he never participated in the active phase of armed raids. However, as it turned out during the investigation, his duties, in addition to designing and manufacturing weapons, included monitoring the robbery from the outside - the actions of accomplices, cashiers, security guards and collectors, police and witnesses. During subsequent analysis, these data were used to develop tactics for new robbery attacks.

The first pancake is lumpy

The brothers avoided contact with the professional criminal world of the “Rostov-Papa” for fear of being “exposed” and sometimes involved in raids those whom they knew and who had not yet come to the attention of the police. When, in the absence of Samasyuk, the Tolstopyatovs targeted the cashier of a chemical plant, who was supposed to bring the team’s salary to the plant management (according to their calculations, more than 100,000 rubles), they involved a certain Boris Denskevich in the “case.” And although his role was limited to giving a signal when a car with a cashier approached, the prosecutor asked the court to regard his actions as the actions of a gang member and qualify him accordingly. And in 1973, they had to look for a replacement for the sick Gorshkov and trust Alexander Chernenko, an auxiliary worker at a vegetable store. In this case, the practical gang leader also took into account the fact that Chernenko was delivering vegetables to retail outlets on a cargo scooter, on which he could quickly leave the crime scene with the captured money.

The indictment charged gang members with a total of 14 proven armed attacks on cashiers, collectors and stores. Three people were killed and three more were wounded. To carry out raids, the gang usually seized a car, the driver of which was taken hostage. The exception was the case when we went to the “case” in a car provided by a certain Evgeniy Srybny, who was kept tied up in the back seat to maintain the legend about the hostage. For personal camouflage, gang members used women's stockings as masks, which gave the gang its name - "Rostov Fantomasses". In total, during the period from 1968 to 1973, the gang stole only about 150,000 rubles. (Tolstopyatov Jr.’s plans - to rob a bank, “take a million” and provide for himself for the rest of his life - were not destined to come true). Despite high level armament and careful planning of raids, some of them were ineffective.

The first test of strength was unsuccessful. On October 7, 1968, Tolstopyatov Jr., Samasyuk and Gorshkov decided to rob one of the cashiers (whose bag was larger) near the building of the regional office of the State Bank of the USSR. The bandits previously seized a car from the Rostov Watch Factory in the city, but the driver, Dzeron Arutyunov, who was about to be tied up at gunpoint and left in the back seat or trunk, jumped out of the car and ran away. The attack on the cashier had to be called off. Three days later, the attack on the cashier of the shoe factory failed (this time the Tolstopyatovs decided to use the car of their friend, Srybny). But the “phantomas” first missed the moment when the cashier was walking to the car, and then they were unable to attack the factory car on the way to the enterprise.

The next failure befell Tolstopyatov and Samasyuk on November 5, 1968. They stopped the car of the Rostov Main Gas Pipeline Department, while Samasyuk took a seat next to the driver Viktor Arutyunov (the last names of the drivers in the first and second episodes coincided by chance), and Tolstopyatov, opening the left front door, demanded that the driver get out of the car. Unlike his namesake from the watch factory, Arutyunov did not run, but abruptly jerked the car away, deciding to deliver the “passenger” to the police. Tolstopyatov managed to shout to his accomplice to shoot, and Samasyuk only hit the resisting driver with the third shot. The wounded man found the strength to turn onto the tram tracks in front of the approaching carriage and abruptly stopped the car. However, the passengers who poured out of the cabin did not dare to detain the armed man, and Samasyuk disappeared (Arutyunov recovered and subsequently testified in court).

The attempt to seize the salaries of the chemical plant team, undertaken on April 21, 1969, also ended in nothing (the “Phantomas” hoped to take 100,000 rubles here). Tolstopyatov Jr. came to the plant management several times under the guise of applying for a job and found out on what days wages were paid at the plant, what car they used to bring money from the bank, and who accompanied the cashier. According to the plan, Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov were supposed to wait at the checkpoint for the cashier and the security guard, take away, at gunpoint, the bank bag and the car keys and escape with it (Tolstopyatov Sr. and Denskevich were supposed to signal that the car was approaching the plant).

But things didn't go according to plan. The security guard, despite the fact that the bandits shot at the ground near his feet to intimidate him, did not let go of the bag from his hands and, retreating to the entrance, took out his service revolver from his holster. At this time, Gorshkov, trying to take the keys from the driver, shot at him. But the wounded man (as it turned out, lightly) managed to take away the machine gun from Gorshkov. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov ran up and shot the driver twice. The first bullet hit the chest pocket, where a metal part from the carburetor lay, which saved the driver’s life, and with the second bullet he was wounded in the arm and released the machine gun. The raiders, having picked up their weapons, jumped up to a truck stopped in front of a red traffic light, wounded the resisting driver in the arm and threw him out of the cab. Several security shots were fired after the car, one of which wounded Gorshkov in the back.

First murder

The third and first “successful” case was the robbery of a grocery store in the village of Mirny on October 22, 1968. Here bandits first used improvised masks made from women's stockings. A few years later, Tolstopyatov will tell you during interrogation that Samasyuk and Gorshkov were wearing black masks, while his were green. Samasyuk shot at the ceiling with a revolver to make an impression and went to the cash register, while his accomplices with machine guns remained for insurance at the entrance and in the center of the trading floor. The time of the attack was chosen in such a way as to take the proceeds just before the arrival of the collectors. However, in the confusion that arose after the shot, the cashier managed by some miracle to hide some of the money from the cash register. The extraction of the “phantomas”, together with the products that they hastily collected in the piece, dairy and bread departments, amounted to 526 rubles 48 kopecks (in Tolstopyatov’s testimony - “about 250 rubles”). War veteran Guriy Chumakov, armed with a piece of pipe, tried to detain Samasyuk and Gorshkov as they left the store. Tolstopyatov, who was the last to leave the grocery store, hit the pensioner from behind with a burst from a machine gun.

In the fall and winter of 1968, the gang made two more successful raids - on store No. 21 of Gorpromtorg and the cashier of the automobile industry (ATKh No. 5).

Raid on collectors at the savings bank. Second murder

In August 1971, the “phantomas” celebrated Samasyuk’s return from the colony by attacking the cashier of UNR-112 and the unarmed engineer and driver accompanying her. One shot upward was enough for a bag with 17,000 rubles. ended up in the hands of Tolstopyatov (the average salary at that time did not exceed 200 rubles per month). They left on a hijacked bus (nothing else came to hand). The bus was abandoned after several blocks, leaving a heavy bag with 500 rubles in the car. small change.

The Tolstopyatov gang made the loudest raid on December 16, 1971 near savings bank No. 0299. Before this, the “phantomas” spent about two months monitoring the work of the teams of State Bank collectors who served this area, and established that one of them invariably entered the premises, while two, including the driver, remained in the car. To neutralize them and leave with the money already collected from the area - that was the plan. Considering that the brigade members were armed, the bandits put on homemade bulletproof vests that protected the chest and stomach, and took several grenades. Samasyuk, who jumped up to the car first, ordered the collectors to leave the weapons on the seats and get out of the car. The driver obeyed, and senior collector Ivan Zyuba, who was sitting in the back seat, grabbed a revolver and wounded Gorshkov, who ran up, in the arm, but was then killed by machine-gun fire. The third collector, who ran out to hear the shots from the savings bank, opened fire in pursuit of the car and once again hit Gorshkov. The raiders took away, as it turned out, more than 17,000 rubles, as well as bonds and lotteries (the Volga with Zyuba’s body was found some time later in a city landfill). Later, the investigation established that Tolstopyatov Sr. observed the shootout and the arrival of the police and prosecutor’s office investigators for subsequent analysis of the raid.

The gang's latest case. Third murder

June 7, 1973 was the last day of the Tolstopyatov gang. The target of the attack was the cashier of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz design institute. The bandits, taking turns, visited the institute building several times to find out how many people there were in the team and the size of the average salary, study the location of the cash register and the approaches to it, and on what days the institution gives the team salaries. According to the brothers’ calculations, it turned out that on payday the cashier should bring approximately 250,000-300,000 rubles from the bank. Samasyuk and Gorshkov should have directly attacked the cashier at the entrance to the cash register. Chernenko’s role was to deliver the money bag given to him on a scooter to the appointed place. He was also armed with a revolver. 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.

Samasyuk and Gorshkov, armed with revolvers, coped with their task, despite the fact that the cashier was surrounded by institute employees who had lined up to receive money. They passed the watchman without hindrance, heading towards Chernenko, who was waiting for them. 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. He ran up to Gorshkov, who was carrying the money, and grabbed him by the shoulder. Gorshkov tried to free himself, but Martovitsky, who, as it turned out, was doing military service in Marine Corps, held him firmly. And then the bandits shot Martovitsky point-blank (the investigation established that the shooters were Gorshkov and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, who was insuring his accomplices).

It seemed that the “phantomas” would once again manage to escape. However, circumstances were against them. Firstly, junior police sergeant Alexey Rusov happened to be nearby (he was informed about the robbery by an employee of Yuzhgiprovodkhoz, who rushed to look for the police). As he walked, taking a pistol out of his holster, Rusov ran to the crime scene. Samasyuk shot at the policeman, but the revolver misfired again. After a warning shout and a shot in the air, the junior sergeant opened fire on the fleeing trio. His shots wounded Samasyuk, as it turned out a little later, mortally, and the “bullet catcher” Gorshkov in the buttock. However, while the policeman, hiding around the corner of the house, was reloading the pistol, Tolstopyatov seized the Muscovite standing by the sidewalk, throwing the owner out of it. The leader helped his accomplices get into the car and drove away from the design institute at high speed. But luck, which had been on the side of the bandits many times, finally turned away from them.

Suddenly, in the thick of things, a passing gas car of the regional fire department, in which were Sergeant Gennady Doroshenko and Captain Viktor Salyutin, found himself in the thick of events. They picked up Rusov and the cashier of the institute and began pursuing the “Muscovite.” Another policeman joined the chase - local inspector of the Oktyabrsky District Department of Internal Affairs, junior lieutenant Evgeniy Kubyshta, who stopped the UAZ minibus. After a long chase, they detained Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov, who at one point in the pursuit abandoned the car and tried to leave. And in the “Muscovite” Samasyuk was found dead, lying on a bag of money (it turned out to be 125,148 rubles), two revolvers, a machine gun and three homemade grenades. The fourth grenade was seized from the detained Tolstopyatov.

Junior Sergeant Rusov was awarded the rank of police lieutenant for the capture of the gang leader, he received from the hands of the Minister of Internal Affairs Nikolai Shchelokov a gold badge "Excellence in Police", a cash bonus and a valuable gift (transistor radio "VEF-204"), his name was entered in the Book of Honor Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. Shchelokov saw in Rusov a prototype of the policeman of the future, and journalists dubbed him “policeman of the Soviet Union No. 1.” The local and central press devoted many publications to Rusov, Salyutin, Kubyshta and Doroshenko, promoting the image of a Soviet police officer using the example of Rostovites. However, why for several years law enforcement agencies could not neutralize the dangerous gang" Rostov phantomas", the Soviet press, naturally, kept silent.

"Soviet people are about to see the last criminal on TV"

Only a few decades later, some participants and witnesses of those events were able to openly express their opinion in RG about why the “Phantomas” remained free for so long.

Vladimir Kucherenko, then head of the criminal investigation department of the city of Rostov-on-Don: “The human factor played a role - I almost got to the bottom of the invoice, almost checked it further. And now this factor is important. The Tolstopyatovs frolicked in a situation where in the police itself, instead of 40 employees, only 13, or even 8, worked for the department. And still, "As soon as special measures were carried out, the gang was destroyed at the very first serious clash with the police. Before that, it dealt only with defenseless citizens who, in principle, could not fight back."

Amir Sabitov, retired police colonel, criminal investigation veteran: “... In the 1960s, they suddenly started talking about the fact that the Soviet people were about to see the last criminal on TV. The idea about this arose in the highest party circles: organized crime had come to an end. And therefore we need to think about how to reduce the police staff. The prospects of the department were assessed pessimistically - a reduction in all allocations to the system began. The undisguised disdain of the party bosses for the police department gradually materialized in a series of measures that led to a deterioration in both the logistics and financial support for the activities of the internal affairs bodies. The personnel problem worsened.[...] The most terrible, in a number of places, diligent executors, in response to the slogan of relying on the public, managed to almost completely destroy the network of secret employees. The operational personnel were also reduced. […] Thus, by the beginning of the 1970s, when a gang of “phantomas” arose , the huge police network, still reeling from the consequences of such theories, was a rather vulnerable structure. To detain the gang, an operational headquarters of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was created, numbering over a hundred employees. Mobile response teams were deployed and partial radio coverage was carried out Vehicle police. The Tolstopyatov gang once and for all changed the face of the Soviet police...

Anatoly Evseev, former criminal investigation inspector: “In those days, there was intense competition between the KGB and the Ministry of Internal Affairs. There were many dissatisfied with Shchelokov (the new Minister of Internal Affairs), who, by the way, did a lot for the police. The gangster “successes” of the Tolstopyatovs pushed for the reorganization and creation of a modern police force. It was in Rostov- On-Don, for the first time in Russia, PMGs were created - mobile police groups, patrol cars with a driver and two employees. After the gang was detained with their help, the Rostov experience was spread throughout the country. An additional payment for the rank appeared: junior lieutenant plus 30 rubles , lieutenant - 40, senior officer - 50. We began to strengthen the duty units."

This is truly true: there would be no happiness, but misfortune would help!

The regional prosecutor's office conducted the investigation into the case of the Tolstopyatov gang for almost a year and in April 1974 the trial began (presiding - member of the regional court V. Levchenko, people's assessors S. Baltenkova and G. Lutokhin). The Voice of America radio station and other Western media immediately dubbed the main defendants in the criminal case “the first Soviet gangsters” and focused on the fact that the brothers’ father headed the district police department in the Bryansk region until 1941 (he died in the first days of the war).

The court hearings were held in a large hall filled to capacity, Olenev wrote in the Rostov Dictionary, with heavy security (the investigation feared that the defendants might have undetected accomplices who would try to free them). One day during a meeting, a crash was heard in the hall and many of those present jumped up from their seats in fright: as it turned out, television workers had pulled a cable through a slightly open window and the window frame suddenly collapsed. At the same time, the court remained calm and restored order in the courtroom. However, despite the tense situation, the cry of the defendant Gorshkov after the announcement of the verdict caused laughter among those present: “Citizens of the judge! Mitigate the punishment! I am a disabled person of banditry!” And the main person involved, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, said in last word: “With my will, I could have become what I wanted, but I became a criminal and am responsible for this before the court.” Nevertheless, he asked the court to spare his life.

The court agreed with prosecutor Kostanov on all charges. The Tolstopyatovs and Gorshkov were sentenced to death in accordance with Article 77 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR. The remaining defendants received various sentences under Articles 17 and 77 of the Criminal Code (aiding and abetting banditry) and Article 88 1 (failure to report banditry) to serve their sentences in general, strict and enhanced regime colonies. In the case of Dudnikov, who provided medical care Gorshkov, the court reclassified concealment of banditry (Article 88 2) as failure to report (Article 88 1).

After the verdict was pronounced, the Tolstopyatovs and Gorshkov, who were denied a cassation appeal, waited about a year for the sentence to be carried out on death row in the Novocherkassk prison (ST-3). There is a version that the brothers, at their request, were given paper and drawing supplies: Vyacheslav was allegedly developing the design of an automatic 11-mm pistol, and Vladimir continued to persistently search for a “perpetual motion machine” scheme.

Three years ago, Natalya Perminova, director of the documentary film “By the Law of Courage,” filmed in 1974 at the Rostov newsreel studio about the crimes of the gang and those who opposed it, told the regional newspaper that the then chief prosecutor of the Rostov region suggested filming it “for the edification of posterity.” ...execution of the "phantomas". However, the exotic proposal of the prosecutor did not find a response. Therefore, we can only guess about the last minutes of the life of the “Soviet gangsters”.

BROTHERS TOLSTOPYATOVS

Dozen reliable facts from the life of the “Rostov phantoms”

The surname of the Tolstopyatov brothers is known far beyond the borders of “Rostov-Papa”. Despite the years, the memory of the brothers lives on. There are still so many different, sometimes incredible rumors about them that the Tolstopyatov brothers have long turned into one of the legends of Old Rostov.

I. The famous “Rostov gangsters”, “Fantomas” - the Tolstopyatov brothers were not native Rostovites. Before the war, their family lived in the Bryansk region. The Tolstopyatov family had two children: Vladimir, born in 1929, and Vyacheslav, born a year before the war, in 1940. The Tolstopyatovs’ father worked as the head of the district police department, and died in the first days of the war. The Bolshevik’s family was threatened with imminent death in the occupied territory, and the Tolstopyatovs’ mother, with two children (!), managed to get to Rostov, where their distant relatives lived. In a small outbuilding on Pyramidnaya Street in Nakhalovka, they survived the occupation.

The family was in dire need. Mother worked as a cleaner, then as a postman, and received pennies. It also happened that in winter the brothers had nothing to wear to go outside. When Vyacheslav was tried for the first time, his mother said in court: “My sons never ate their fill.”

The brothers - Vyacheslav and Vladimir - both loved to design. We read a lot. Vladimir played the button accordion well, and Vyacheslav showed amazing drawing abilities very early on. In the winter of 1945, Vladimir's older brother was drafted into the army. He went to fight, and was even awarded the medal “For the Capture of Koenigsberg.”

2. Vyacheslav especially loved to sketch. He could pore over some book for hours, redrawing an illustration, and achieving absolute similarity - down to the smallest detail. At about 15 years old, Vyacheslav became adept at drawing banknotes. He drew 50 and 100 ruble banknotes (this was before the monetary reform of 1961).

At first, Slava exchanged them in wine and vodka stores. He threw the purchased bottle into the bushes (Vyacheslav almost never drank alcohol all his life), and spent real money on sweets, books, and tools. Over time, Vyacheslav got used to selling the drawn money to taxi drivers: he drove a short distance in a car, handed the driver a bill folded into a quadrangle (it should be noted that the “pre-reform” post-war banknotes were much larger than the current ones), took the change and disappeared.

Seeing that taxi drivers never unfold banknotes, Vyacheslav became bolder to such an extent that he began to draw money on only one side. This is what destroyed him. On February 23, 1960, a taxi driver named Metelitsa, having given Vyacheslav a ride to the Suburban Station, nevertheless unfolded the bill offered to him - and was stunned when he saw reverse side Blank sheet paper!..

“Vyacheslav confessed to everything at once,” recalled the investigator in Tolstopyatov’s first case, A. Granovsky. “In the investigative experiment, using colored pencils, watercolors, BF-2 glue, a compass, a ruler and a blade, Vyacheslav drew in four hours (!) an absolutely exact copy of a 100-ruble bill. We all gasped. 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 reduced sentence - given his young age , complete repentance, assistance provided to the investigation." Counterfeiting banknotes is classified as a serious crime against the state, but the court sentence was unusually lenient; four years of imprisonment in a general regime colony.

3. Vyacheslav began to put together his gang “in the zone.” He perceived the court’s verdict, even such a mild one, as a personal insult inflicted on him by the state (Vyacheslav expected that he would be given a “suspended” sentence). The convicts made fun of him: “Well, artist, will you still draw money?” Vyacheslav replied that he would do something else - better. In his free time, before lights out, he sketched some drawings. He didn’t tell anyone what he was drawing. However, he became friends with Sergei Samasyuk, who was serving a sentence for malicious hooliganism. Having been released in February 1964, Vyacheslav arrived in Rostov and shared his plans with his brother Vladimir: to make machine guns and rob a bank.

“We are people with a head,” Vyacheslav said. “And in our time you can’t honestly earn a comfortable life.” Sergei Samasyuk, who was released after Vyacheslav, also joined the gang. They say that Slava Tolstopyatov met his old “Kent” when he was standing in line for wine. He immediately agreed to Vyacheslav’s proposal, noting: “It is better to die on a bag of money than under a wine barrel.” His words later turned out to be prophetic: Samasyuk accepted his death literally lying on a bag of money.

Another member of the gang was Vladimir Gorshkov - the brothers' neighbor and childhood friend, a gray personality with low intelligence - who was completely under the influence of Vyacheslav. Vyacheslav and Vladimir Tolstopyatov completed the weapon drawings in 1964-1965. Automatic machines and pistols of the original design were designed for a small-caliber (5.6 mm) sports cartridge. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov undertook to obtain ammunition: he headed the sports shooting section in ATX-3 (where he worked as a driver). To make the barrels, the brothers used two TOZ-8 small-caliber rifles that they kept. Most The parts were made by familiar workers at the Legmash plant.

By the fall of 1968, the gang had 4 self-loading pistol and 3 machine guns. Vyacheslav formulated his main goal as follows: to “earn” a million and stop criminal activities. He planned to “take” a million in one fell swoop - by robbing a regional bank.

4. Robbing a bank turned out to be not such an easy task: the brothers were convinced of this immediately. Then they decided to act differently: to snatch the bag from the hands of some cashier right near the entrance to the bank. For a whole month, the Tolstopyatovs, Samasyuk and Gorshkov took turns on duty opposite the bank, on Sokolov Avenue, watching cashiers of various enterprises carry out bags of money. They found out on which days the largest payments occur. They even got the hang of identifying appearance cashier - he received a large amount, or not so much. The brothers' plan was simple: scare the cashier with a machine gun and escape in a previously seized car.

On October 7, 1968, they decided to try their luck as a bandit for the first time, but fate turned out to be unkind to them. The driver of the Volga, which they got into on Engels Street (now Bolshaya Sadovaya), saw the pistol, sharply pressed the brake and jumped out of the car screaming. Having driven around the city in a captured Volga, the newly-minted raiders did not dare to go to the bank that day and abandoned the car in one of the courtyards on Gorky Street. In order not to give unnecessary noise to this matter, Vyacheslav himself called the police from a pay phone and reported where the car was, adding that he and his friends decided to play a prank on the driver, but he did not understand the joke and was afraid of the water pistol.

Three days later, Vyacheslav agreed with a driver he knew, Evgeny Rybny, and the bandits in his Moskvich-407 were on duty opposite the Oktyabrsky branch of the State Bank. They herded the cashier of a shoe factory, who received a large sum of money. ... Elderly woman with a heavy bag in her hands she appeared on the street. The Moskvich rushed forward, but... its path was blocked by a GAZ-51 truck, into which the cashier quickly got into. The driver of the GAZ turned out to be a reckless driver: having rushed along Kozlov Street to Ostrovsky Lane, he, contrary to the traffic rules, made a left turn and drove into the gates of the factory, which closed in front of the Moskvich’s nose. The reckless driver, without knowing it, saved the money of his enterprise, and, possibly, two lives: his own and the cashier’s.

They began to be called “Fantomas” after their first successful case - October 22, 1968. They “took” the “Gastronom” store in the village of Mirny. This is how Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov himself recalled this case (during the investigation after the arrest): “...After the failure with the car, they decided to take a store, although they understood that there would not be much money there. While working as a driver, I looked at the “Gastronom” on Mirny; convenient place, near a grove, far from the police... They cut off women's nylon stockings. They (Samasyuk and Gorshkov - author's note) had black ones, mine were green. They took two machine guns and a pistol. We arrived by tram. It was evening, It was already getting dark. They put on masks around the corner of the house where the store is located. Then they walked in. A lot of people. Gorshkov stood on the door with a machine gun, I stood in the center with a machine gun, Samasyuk with a pistol went to the cash registers. There was not enough money: the cashier managed to hide it. Together with the proceeds from the departments they took about 250 rubles. We went out. There were a lot of people on the street. Let's go. First Samasyuk, then Gorshkov and me. Some man took a swing at Gorshkov. I shouted: “Don't interfere in someone else's business!” He fired 4 rounds. We reached the grove. Gorshkov lost his beret. We calmed down, came to our senses. We took a tram to Budyonnovsky and went home."

In their first case, the Fantomas "took 526 rubles 84 kopecks - a significant amount for those times. The man who took a swing at Gorshkov was an elderly man, a war participant - Guriy Semenovich Chumakov. Vyacheslav shot him in cold blood at point-blank range with a machine gun.

5. Vyacheslav loved to make beautiful gestures. His favorite film (besides the cult series about the adventures of Fantômas) was the popular film of the Italian director Domiano Domiani, “Confession of a Police Commissioner to the Prosecutor of the Republic,” which was popular in those years. Lush speeches, beautiful life, risky actions... Vyacheslav watched this film twenty times and knew it by heart. I took my “comrades” to see it, but they perceived the film differently. “Cattle,” - this is how Vyacheslav characterized Samasyuk and Gorshkov. Here is an excerpt from the diary of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov (March 20, 1972): “... the rest of the people who surround me are no better. What is sacred about them? Then they count every ruble and think that they have done much more than someone else. Gray (Samasyuk - author's note) takes without asking, and they know exactly their worth, and their amount is equal. So go ahead, act categorically..."

Diary of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. General notebook in brown leatherette binding. Neat, clear handwriting. Some words are highlighted with ticks. One feels that this diary was written for a reason - Vyacheslav himself re-read it several times. For what? Did you try to understand or analyze something? On the very first page of the diary is written the address of the Committee for Inventions and Discoveries under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, and next to it is the police telephone number; 6-56-30. In the same notebook, the “Dictionary of Foreign Words” was rewritten to letter 3: “zone-probe.” And then - a personal note. "May 26. Shop. Small change, paid off debts. 50 rubles left... May 28. Sery and Valya drank every penny..."

Vyacheslav's relationship with Samasyuk deserves special mention. The cocky, wayward Samasyuk did not like the intellectual superiority that Vyacheslav demonstrated over the rest of the gang. Samasyuk gradually began to express his claims to leadership. Vyacheslav kept the whole gang “in his fist”: he did not drink alcohol himself, and did not allow anyone to get drunk - a drunk would sell everyone out. After successful business, he put aside half of the money - “for a big deal.” Samasyuk brazenly stole money from Tolstopyatov and got drunk. Here is just one episode from the spring of 1972, reflected in Vyacheslav’s diary: “March 5... At the bus stop, Sergei admitted that he took money in the amount of 360 rubles and that he sent it to his father... Only a boor can lie so unskilledly. Yes, it is revealed gradually all his petty nature. He is not capable of anything. Inventions, designs, and especially the purpose for which I organized this business - all this does not touch him at all. He goes to work only because there is nowhere to escape (his tail is long ), and also because he’s used to throwing money around (he’s a man, after all), and has no prospects beyond tomorrow. Someone did a lot with him during his second term. Okay, we’ll see.”

Difficult relationships in the gang, they were probably one of the reasons - why Vyacheslav in every possible way supported his reputation as a “risky guy”, who costs nothing to shed blood - be it his own or someone else’s. Here's just one episode: one day Gorshkov ran to Vyacheslav and reported that Samasyuk, drunk to smithereens, was telling near a wine barrel that he was robbing cashiers with a machine gun. Vyacheslav dragged Samasyuk home. Here both grabbed their weapons and... Samasyuk could not stand it and threw the pistol. Vyacheslav put him against the wall and began to “knock the crap out”: he planted bullet after bullet into the wall - a centimeter from his head. Samasyuk howled with fear. Another noteworthy case was when, during the hunt for cashiers, in a seized car (the driver was tied up in the back seat), Vyacheslav drove along Khalturinsky Lane, past the city police department. “It’s boring to live without risk,” this is how he explained his action. Another “nice gesture”: when the cashier of motor vehicle service number 5, Matveeva, had her bag containing the salary of the entire enterprise (2,744 rubles) taken away, Vyacheslav calculated that 44 rubles were Matveeva’s personal money. The next day he found her house (using her passport) and dropped a bag with documents and 75 rubles on the doorstep of the house. “Why?..” - they asked Vyacheslav during the investigation. “They just felt sorry for the woman and to at least somehow compensate for the trouble caused,” he answered.

Vyacheslav loved romance and despised people who were not romantic. He had an affair with his older brother's wife. Vladimir knew about this - and was silent. Were you afraid? The role of Vladimir Tolstopyatov in the gang was never fully understood. Vyacheslav did not take his brother on any business. Vladimir usually watched the robbery from the sidelines, used a stopwatch to time how long it would take, from which side the police would arrive, and then watched the actions of the policemen. It was believed that he analyzed the actions of the phantoms." But maybe he was "covering Vyacheslav's rear? Or did the younger brother have some kind of sense of responsibility for the elder?

6. The “big money” never came. Neither the robbery of the ATX-5 cashier, nor the attack on store 21 of Gorpromtorg (Mechnikov St., 144) yielded large profits. Vyacheslav was waiting for a serious business in which he would hit a big jackpot. “Take” a lot of money, enough to last a lifetime, and “give up”: this was Vyacheslav’s plan. He understood that you can’t rob endlessly: sooner or later, you’ll get caught. “God is not a fraer, he sees everything!”

The right opportunity soon turned up. The gang received information that on April 21, 1969, the cashiers of the chemical plant named after the October Revolution would receive a large sum - over 100 thousand rubles. By that time, Samasyuk had been convicted of hooliganism, and for the “Fantomas” to take cashiers without the “center Gray” was a matter of principle: could they do it without him? Instead of Samasyuk, Vyacheslav’s acquaintance Boris Denskevich agreed to go “to the job.” They decided to attack in a new way - not near the bank, but near the entrance of the chemical plant and escape in the cashiers' car.

As soon as the gray Volga stopped near the plant management building, two people jumped up to it - in gray raincoats, with machine guns. But the Volga driver managed to lock himself inside the car. And the cashier, clutching a bag of money to himself, jumped out of the opposite door and shouted “They’re robbing!” rushed to the factory management building. The guards were already running out from there. "Fantomas" opened fire. The first bullet hit the Volga driver Kovalenko. But a rare case occurred: the bullet hit the forehead tangentially, flattened, and remained under the skin. Kovalenko survived. In a shootout with the guards, the “Phantomas” constantly jammed their homemade machine guns. The security began to press them, but Vyacheslav and Gorshkov, running across the road, seized a truck in which they escaped. Shot after, Gorshkov, already in the car, was wounded in the lower back.

The gang drew three conclusions from this failure. First: they can’t do without Samasyuk. Second: the ammunition was no good. Third: you must shoot immediately - to kill.

Forced to “retire”, the brothers hesitated in further development of weapons. Vyacheslav made a cartridge of his own design. Its caliber remained the same - 5.6 mm, but the size was significantly increased. The brothers produced two new-design machine guns for this cartridge. This weapon was distinguished by increased power compared to earlier models of Tolstopyatov machine guns. With the help of familiar Legmash workers, the brothers set up production of hand grenades with duralumin casings right at the factory. Hunting gunpowder mixed with aluminum powder was used as a bursting charge - which ensured high temperature and the force of the explosion.

In July 1971, Sergei Samasyuk was released from prison, and on August 25, with new weapons in their hands, the “Fantomas” attacked the UHP-II2 cashier, seizing 17 thousand rubles.”

7. The whole city started talking about “phantomas”. Rumors gave birth to rumors: rumors multiplied their “exploits.” Small punks began to work “under the phantoms”: they pulled nylon stockings over their heads and snatched bags from the hands of women in dark gateways. The police were not inactive, but what was confusing was the fact that the “phantomas” had a completely professional style. They were looked for among the “professionals” of the criminal world. Well, who could have imagined that simple “hard workers”, “men” who regularly work at their own enterprises and do not seem to stand out in any way, can act so boldly and so skillfully?

The “phantomas” themselves once discussed a question: is it worth making contact with the local underworld? We decided to “work” on our own because there was less risk of getting exposed. But the search for new gangsters was active, and in 1970 Rostov detectives picked up the trail of a certain Kirakosyan. He was arrested in Lvov. He and his accomplices carried out several daring raids with murders in Rostov, Yerevan, Lvov and other cities of the Union. They were armed, including small-caliber weapons. Kirakosyan’s “handwriting” was close to Tolstoy Pyatov’s. Kirakosyan was brought to Rostov and several witnesses identified him: yes, it was he who took the store on Mirny! It turned out that the “Phantomas” raids temporarily stopped during this period. And the Internal Affairs Directorate breathed a sigh of relief: yes , it’s them!.. A victorious report flew to Moscow. Kirakosyan was tried in Yerevan. He was charged with several “Phantomas” episodes. And after a while, “Phantomas” who emerged from God knows where, robbed the cashier of UNR-112 on Budennovsky.

8. The most brutal crime that shocked the whole of Rostov was committed by the “Fantomas” on December 16, 197I near the savings bank number 0299, on Pushkinskaya Street. In November, Vyacheslav hatched a plan to attack the collectors. Having chosen a quiet corner on Pushkinskaya Street, the gang members spent almost two months monitoring the work of the State Bank collection teams that serviced this area. They established that one collector always enters the savings bank, and two remain in the car. They decided to use this moment for an attack. Considering that the collectors were armed, the bandits put on homemade body armor: specially curved steel plates that protected the chest and abdomen. They took several grenades with them.

Samasyuk jumped up to the car first and disarmed the driver. But senior collector Ivan Pavlovich Zyuba, who was sitting in the back seat, pulled out his revolver and began to shoot. He shot even when he was hit by machine gun fire. I.P. Zyuba was killed on the spot. The cylinder of his revolver was empty; The collector fired until the last cartridge. Having thrown out Zyuba's corpse, the "Fantomas" in the collection "Volga" rushed to Dolomanovsky Lane on Nakhalovka. The third collector who jumped out of the savings bank fired after them. The bag contained over 17 thousand rubles, bonds and lottery tickets. Gorshkov, who received two bullets in this case, was secretly treated by a surgeon at the S.-K.zh.d. hospital. Konstantin Dudnikov, asking for two thousand rubles.

9. The Tolstopyatovs were no longer going to “give up” with the raids; they never managed to “take” a large sum, and it is always difficult to give up a good life. So one crime leads to another. Have the “phantomas” experienced remorse? No! They liked to feel important, they liked to hear conversations on trams - about unprecedented daring raiders...Can an artist refuse fame? Could the "phantomas" throw away their machine guns?

Meanwhile, the brothers continued to develop new designs of small arms, and by the fall of 1972 they created the most famous “gangster” machine gun, shooting 9-mm balls. The rate of fire and penetration ability of this terrible weapon were amazing. From three meters away, a shot from such a machine gun pierced a railway rail! The barrel of the machine gun was made to break, and this feature made it possible to carry the weapon unnoticed under clothing. From the conclusion of the forensic ballistic examination of the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise (01/25/1974): “Not one of the known samples of handguns was the model on which the submachine guns brought for examination 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."

After several minor episodes, the "Fantomas", already having a ball machine, in the fall of 1972 they decided to attack collectors near the Strela store, located not far from the entrance of the steam locomotive repair plant. The Strela store was one of the last points on the route of the collection team, and there should have been a very large sum of money in the car. Vyacheslav had previously made fake numbers of the ROF series from adhesive tape (police cars then drove under this series in Rostov). The plan was to seize the car in advance, shoot the collection team with a ball machine gun, reload the bags of money and escape.

On November 4, 1972, they seized a Volga car near the 2nd brick factory. The tied driver was locked in the trunk, and at about half past seven in the evening they drove up to the store. It turned out that, fortunately, that evening the collectors were delayed somewhere along the route. It was boring to wait, and Samasyuk suggested going for wine. They took wine all the way from “The Three Little Pigs” (a well-known store on the main street of Engels in past years) and when we returned to “Strela”, it turned out that the collectors had already passed. After drinking wine, the “phantomas” decided to intercept the collectors at the entrance to the regional bank. But this attempt also ended in failure. Then Vyacheslav decided to just drive around the city, and in Gvardeysky Lane, opposite the yeast plant, the Volga crashed into a tree at high speed. Vyacheslav and Samasyuk were injured, but managed to escape. The driver in the trunk was also seriously injured.

10. The latest case of the “Fantomas” is an attack on the cashiers of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz Institute. The idea of the robbery was born in Vyacheslav’s head at the moment when he came to the institute’s cash desk to get a job and, walking along the second floor corridor, saw the “Cashier” sign. The Fantomas learned that about four thousand people work at the institute. They calculated that with an average salary of 70-75 rubles, the total amount received from the State Bank should have been within 300 thousand rubles. This was the biggest jackpot in all the gang's activities. They prepared for the crime for several months - from March to June 1973. Every 7th and 22nd, “phantomas” with weapons under their clothes approached the institute and watched the cashiers. They decided to “take” on June 7th.

At first, everything went well for the “Phantomas”. On the second floor of the institute, Samasyuk and Gorshkov, pointing their revolvers at the cashier, snatched his bag with 125 thousand I48 rubles and, running down the stairs, jumped out into the street. All this happened in front of the institute’s employees, who rushed in pursuit. On the street, Samasyuk pointed the revolver towards his pursuers and pulled the trigger. There was a dry click: misfire! But this was enough for the people running after the “phantomas” to stop. Samasyuk and Gorshkov were joined by Slava Tolstopyatov, who was on duty on the street, holding a machine gun at the ready... And at that moment, loader Vladimir Martovitsky rushed at the criminals.

To this day, many explain Martovitsky’s desperately brave act by the fact that he was supposedly drunk that day. These rumors are not worthy of mention: it is unlikely that even drunken courage will force one to go to the gun barrel. Vladimir was a truly brave man. He rushed to defend state money only because that’s how he was raised. He died. One of the streets in Rostov is named after him. Gorshkov shot at Martovitsky from a revolver. And then Tolstopyatov pierced him with a machine gun burst.

This was the decisive moment. The shots near the institute were heard by a nearby police squad. The criminals went to Lenin Avenue - past the construction site of the Palace of Culture of the helicopter plant. And junior police sergeant Alexey Rusov jumped out right at them. Samasyuk was the first to raise his revolver - and it misfired again! Rusov was not at a loss, and offhand, as he was taught in border troops, released the entire clip after the Phantoms. It was like being in a cool action movie. The sergeant shot as a sniper: Samasyuk was wounded in the chest and both legs, Gorshkov - in the right buttock. The cartridges in the clip have run out. Rusov took cover behind the wall of building 105 to reload his pistol, and meanwhile the “phantomas” jumped out onto Lenin Avenue, seized an old Moskvich-402 standing by the side of the road, and rushed at full speed along Lenin towards Selmash.

Rusov jumped out onto the pavement. It seemed that the bandits had left. But at that time, a GAZ-69 of the regional fire department was passing by, in which were Sergeant Gennady Doroshenko and Captain Viktor Salyutin. The firefighters were unarmed. But they quickly got their bearings in the situation and without hesitation made the decision to pursue the armed criminals. -Sit down, sergeant! - Salyutin shouted to Rusov, opening the door of the gas car. Turning on the siren, they rushed in pursuit. Rusov’s partner, policeman Evgeniy Kubyshta, also joined her: he stopped a passing UAZ minibus and ordered the driver to catch up with the Moskvich. Near the building materials plant, the pursued Moskvich suddenly stopped. As it turned out later, Vyacheslav decided to throw grenades at his pursuers. But... in the front seat, the half-mad Gorshkov was groaning in pain and fear; in the back, lying on a bag of money, (the prophetic words came true!) Samasyuk, who had received a bullet in the heart, was dying. The pursuers were also cautious and did not come close. But they weren’t going to lose sight of the bandits... In general, after standing for a minute, Vyacheslav rushed off in the Moskvich further along Lenin Street.

Driving through the Square of the Land of Soviets, on the roundabout, Vyacheslav very impolitely “cut off” a brand new GAZ-24 Volga. This car was used by taxi drivers for the economic needs of their taxi fleet. They were infuriated by the impudence of the Moskvich, and they also rushed in pursuit - just to punch the lout driver in the face. The taxi drivers had no idea who they were pursuing... Then events took an even more exciting turn. Before turning onto Trolleybusnaya Street, the engine of the firefighting GAZ truck suddenly stalled, and the Moskvich with the Phantomas disappeared around the bend. Salyutin and Rusov, in the excitement of pursuit, jumped out of the car and rushed to run after him, and - lo and behold! - just around the bend they saw a stuck Moskvich! It turned out that the taxi drivers on the Volga, in turn, having caught up with the Moskvich, cut it off so much that it flew onto a high curb and got stuck on it, sitting tightly on the rear axle. The taxi drivers got out of their Volga to hit the lout driver in the face, but they recoiled when they saw a grenade in Tolstopyatov’s hand.

11. Then, in the heat of the moment, the police had not yet realized that they had detained the very “phantomas” whom they had been chasing unsuccessfully for several years in a row. The wounded Gorshkov was taken from the place of detention to the Central City Hospital, Tolstopyatov to the Oktyabrsky district police department. Samasyuk was already dead. Vyacheslav immediately, at the very first interrogation, quite frankly began to list episodes of the activities of his gang. Those present were stunned...

Investigators went to Tolstopyatov’s house, on Pyramidnaya Street, 66-a. A search was ordered there. At first, nothing criminal was found in the house. But they discovered a cable underground: Tolstopyatov was quietly stealing electricity (not his biggest sin!). The cable led to an outbuilding in the courtyard, where there was both a home and a workshop of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. At first they were very afraid that the outbuilding was mined. We went inside with caution. Measurements showed that the internal volume of the room is much smaller than the external parameters of the building. This means there is a hiding place in the outbuilding! By tapping, they determined that behind one of the walls, into which a large wall mirror was mounted, there was emptiness. At first glance, the mirror was bolted in place. However, the bolts did not unscrew! They were just camouflage. One of the assistants, having climbed onto a stool, began to twist the top bolt in the middle of the wall, when suddenly the mirror moved right towards him! This was the entrance to the hiding place. There were shelves behind the mirror. And on them are stacked machine guns, pistols, grenades, boxes of ammunition...

Alexey Rusov was summoned to Moscow for a reception with the USSR Minister of Internal Affairs N.A. Shchelokov. Nikolai Anisimovich personally presented Rusov with the “Excellence in Police” badge, a cash prize and a valuable gift - a “VEF-204” radio receiver. Rusov's name was included in the Book of Honor of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, his photograph was hung on the Board of Honor in the ministry. The other three employees of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov Region - Salyutin, Kubyshta and Doroshenko - were not forgotten either.

The investigation, headed by the most experienced employee of the regional prosecutor's office A. Sokolov, lasted almost a year. In April 1974, the trial began in the “Phantomas case.” The process (chaired by V.F. Levchenko) aroused the interest of not only central, but also foreign funds mass media. “Finally, gangsters have appeared in Russia,” the Western press spoke in this spirit. Eleven people appeared before the court: the Tolstopyatov brothers, Gorshkov, as well as all those who in one way or another contributed to the many years of successful activity of the “phantomas”...

The large hall of the regional court was filled to capacity. The situation was nervous. The possibility of a terrorist attack was not excluded (there was a suspicion that some of Vyacheslav’s friends would try to free him). Member of the regional court V.F. Levchenko recalls an incident that is memorable to many. During the hearing, one of the upper windows was open - almost under the high ceiling of the courtroom: television crews had pulled some kind of cable through it. And suddenly, in the midst of the silence reigning in the meeting, a roar was heard. It was the window frame that collapsed, falling off from above (probably it was removed and poorly secured). Everyone jumped up from their seats. “Calm down!” said the presiding officer. “This is not at all the case that is being talked about in the city.” “What are they talking about in the city?” - Vyacheslav immediately became wary. Was he hoping for something?

Gorshkov was a pitiful and comical sight. "Citizens judges! Mitigate the punishment! I am a disabled person of banditry!" - he addressed the court quite seriously, causing laughter in the hall. He wanted to save his life at any cost, and blamed all the sins on his brothers. Vyacheslav was noticeably angry about this, and he treated his former friend with pointed contempt. He called him “bullet catcher” - after all, Gorshkov was wounded three times during various raids. Vladimir remained silent during the trial. Vyacheslav acted out the fun, tried to make fun. In their last word, the brothers asked the court to spare their lives.

The Tolstopyatov brothers and Vladimir Gorshkov were sentenced to death with confiscation of property. The remaining accomplices of the “phantomas” were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.

12. For another year after the verdict was passed, the Tolstopya tovs were on death row in the Novocherkassk strict prison ST-3. They were given paper and drawing supplies. The brothers designed. They still hoped to invent something for which they would be given life.

From the cassation appeal of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov (dated July 15, 1974). Written in beautiful, neat handwriting on ten pages: “I ask you for life, since it is given once and cannot be neglected. It is a pity, of course, that we realize the value of life late, but it is better to feel it late than never.. " Gorshkov was more succinct: "Save my life, I will atone for my guilt throughout my life." Vyacheslav, while on death row, developed a new design for an automatic 11mm pistol. Vladimir invented the “perpetum mobile” - a perpetual motion machine. He claimed that he knew how to build it: “...for about 20 years I was engaged in the invention of an engine without fuel, which I started, and I saw with my own eyes its endless movement...”

There are still persistent rumors in Rostov that the Tolstopyatovs were left to live and locked up in some secret design bureau - for the sake of their design abilities. However, there is a certificate in the file: “The verdict of the Rostov Regional Court dated July 1, 1974 in the case of Vyacheslav Pavlovich Tolstopyatov, Vladimir Pavlovich Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Nikolaevich Gorshkov in relation to all three was executed on March 6, 1975.”

From a reliable source, I heard the following story about their execution. The sentence was carried out in a special soundproof chamber equipped with a bullet trap. All three were told that their request for clemency had been rejected. The Tolstopyatov brothers greeted this news in silence. Gorshkov cried and begged for mercy. First, the sentence was carried out against Vladimir Tolstopyatov. Gorshkov came second, fully showing his cowardice before his death. Third - Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. He only said: “Put me where this scum was not shot (he meant Gorshkov). I don’t want to get dirty with his blood.”

These were his last words.

A dozen reliable facts from the life of the “Rostov phantomas” The surname of the Tolstopyatov brothers is known far beyond the borders of “Rostov-Papa”. Despite the years, the memory of the brothers lives on. There are still so many different, sometimes incredible rumors about them that the Tolstopyatov brothers have long turned into one of the legends of Old Rostov. I. The famous “Rostov gangsters”, “Fantomas” - the Tolstopyatov brothers were not native Rostovites. Before the war, their family lived in the Bryansk region. The Tolstopyatov family had two children: Vladimir, born in 1929, and Vyacheslav, born a year before the war, in 1940. The Tolstopyatovs’ father worked as the head of the district police department, and died in the first days of the war. The Bolshevik’s family was threatened with imminent death in the occupied territory, and the Tolstopyatovs’ mother, with two children (!), managed to get to Rostov, where their distant relatives lived. In a small outbuilding on Pyramidnaya Street in Nakhalovka, they survived the occupation. The family was in dire need. Mother worked as a cleaner, then as a postman, and received pennies. It also happened that in winter the brothers had nothing to wear to go outside. When Vyacheslav was tried for the first time, his mother said in court: “My sons never ate their fill.” The brothers - Vyacheslav and Vladimir - both loved to design. We read a lot. Vladimir played the button accordion well, and Vyacheslav showed amazing drawing abilities very early on. In the winter of 1945, Vladimir's older brother was drafted into the army. He went to fight, and was even awarded the medal “For the Capture of Koenigsberg.” 2. Vyacheslav especially loved to sketch. He could pore over some book for hours, redrawing an illustration, and achieving absolute similarity - down to the smallest detail. At about 15 years old, Vyacheslav became adept at drawing banknotes. He drew 50 and 100 ruble banknotes (this was before the monetary reform of 1961). At first, Slava exchanged them in wine and vodka stores. He threw the purchased bottle into the bushes (Vyacheslav almost never drank alcohol all his life), and spent real money on sweets, books, and tools. Over time, Vyacheslav got used to selling the drawn money to taxi drivers: he drove a short distance in a car, handed the driver a bill folded into a quadrangle (it should be noted that the “pre-reform” post-war banknotes were much larger than the current ones), took the change and disappeared. Seeing that taxi drivers never unfold banknotes, Vyacheslav became bolder to such an extent that he began to draw money on only one side. This is what destroyed him. On February 23, 1960, a taxi driver named Metelitsa, having given Vyacheslav a ride to the Suburban Station, nevertheless unfolded the bill offered to him - and was stunned when he saw a blank sheet of paper on the reverse side!.. “Vyacheslav confessed to everything at once,” recalled the investigator in Tolstopyatov’s first case, A. Granovsky. “In the investigative experiment, using colored pencils, watercolors, BF-2 glue, a compass, a ruler and a blade, Vyacheslav drew in four hours (!) an absolutely exact copy of a 100-ruble bill. We all gasped. 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 reduced sentence - given his young age , complete repentance, assistance provided to the investigation." Counterfeiting banknotes is classified as a serious crime against the state, but the court sentence was unusually lenient; four years of imprisonment in a general regime colony. 3. Vyacheslav began to put together his gang “in the zone.” He perceived the court’s verdict, even such a mild one, as a personal insult inflicted on him by the state (Vyacheslav expected that he would be given a “suspended” sentence). The convicts made fun of him: “Well, artist, will you still draw money?” Vyacheslav replied that he would do something else - better. In his free time, before lights out, he sketched some drawings. He didn’t tell anyone what he was drawing. However, he became friends with Sergei Samasyuk, who was serving a sentence for malicious hooliganism. Having been released in February 1964, Vyacheslav arrived in Rostov and shared his plans with his brother Vladimir: to make machine guns and rob a bank. “We are people with a head,” Vyacheslav said. “And in our time you can’t honestly earn a comfortable life.” Sergei Samasyuk, who was released after Vyacheslav, also joined the gang. They say that Slava Tolstopyatov met his old “Kent” when he was standing in line for wine. He immediately agreed to Vyacheslav’s proposal, noting: “It is better to die on a bag of money than under a wine barrel.” His words later turned out to be prophetic: Samasyuk accepted his death literally lying on a bag of money. Another member of the gang was Vladimir Gorshkov - the brothers' neighbor and childhood friend, a gray personality with low intelligence - who was completely under the influence of Vyacheslav. Vyacheslav and Vladimir Tolstopyatov completed the weapon drawings in 1964-1965. Automatic machines and pistols of the original design were designed for a small-caliber (5.6 mm) sports cartridge. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov undertook to obtain ammunition: he headed the sports shooting section in ATX-3 (where he worked as a driver). To make the barrels, the brothers used two TOZ-8 small-caliber rifles that they kept. Most of the parts were made by familiar workers at the Legmash plant. By the fall of 1968, the gang had 4 self-loading pistols and 3 machine guns. Vyacheslav formulated his main goal as follows: to “earn” a million and stop criminal activities. He planned to “take” a million in one fell swoop - by robbing a regional bank. 4. Robbing a bank turned out to be not such an easy task: the brothers were convinced of this immediately. Then they decided to act differently: to snatch the bag from the hands of some cashier right near the entrance to the bank. For a whole month, the Tolstopyatovs, Samasyuk and Gorshkov took turns on duty opposite the bank, on Sokolov Avenue, watching cashiers of various enterprises carry out bags of money. They found out on which days the largest payments occur. They even got the hang of determining by the cashier’s appearance whether he received a large sum or not. The brothers' plan was simple: scare the cashier with a machine gun and escape in a previously seized car. On October 7, 1968, they decided to try their luck as a bandit for the first time, but fate turned out to be unkind to them. The driver of the Volga, which they got into on Engels Street (now it is), saw the gun, sharply pressed the brake and jumped out of the car screaming. Having driven around the city in a captured Volga, the newly minted raiders did not dare to go to the bank that day and abandoned the car in one of the courtyards. In order not to give unnecessary noise to this matter, Vyacheslav himself called the police from a pay phone and reported where the car was, adding that he and his friends decided to play a prank on the driver, but he did not understand the joke and was afraid of a water pistol. Three days later, Vyacheslav agreed with a driver he knew, Evgeny Rybny, and the bandits in his Moskvich-407 were on duty opposite the Oktyabrsky branch of the State Bank. They herded the cashier of a shoe factory, who received a large sum of money. ...An elderly woman with a heavy bag in her hands appeared on the street. The Moskvich rushed forward, but... its path was blocked by a GAZ-51 truck, into which the cashier quickly got into. The GAZ driver turned out to be a reckless driver: having rushed along Kozlov Street to Ostrovsky Lane, he, contrary to the traffic rules, made a left turn and drove into the factory gates, which closed in front of the Moskvich’s nose. The reckless driver, without knowing it, saved the money of his enterprise, and, possibly, two lives: his own and the cashier’s. They began to be called “Fantomas” after their first successful case - October 22, 1968. They “took” the “Gastronom” store in the village of Mirny. This is how Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov himself recalled this case (during the investigation after the arrest): "... After the failure with the car, we decided to take a store, although we understood that there would not be much money there. While working as a driver, I looked at the "Gastronom" on Mirny; a convenient place, near a grove, far from the police... They cut off women's nylon stockings. From them (Samasyuk and Gorshkov - approx. author) - black, from me - green. They took two machine guns and a pistol. We arrived by tram. It was evening, it was already getting dark. They put on masks around the corner of the house where the store is located. Then - they entered . A lot of people. Gorshkov stood at the door with a machine gun, I was in the center with a machine gun, Samasyuk with a pistol went to the cash registers. There was not enough money: the cashier managed to hide it. Together with the proceeds from the departments, they took about 250 rubles. They went out. On the street - a lot of people. Let's go. First - Samasyuk, then Gorshkov and I. Some man swung at Gorshkov. I shouted: “Don't interfere in something that's not your own business!” He fired 4 rounds. We reached the grove. Gorshkov lost his beret. We calmed down, came to our senses. We took a tram to Budyonnovsky and went home." In their first case, the Fantomas "took 526 rubles 84 kopecks - a significant amount for those times. The man who took a swing at Gorshkov was an elderly man, a war participant - Guriy Semenovich Chumakov. Vyacheslav shot him point-blank in cold blood with a machine gun. 5. Vyacheslav loved to make beautiful gestures. His favorite film (besides the cult series about the adventures of Fantômas) was the popular film of the Italian director Domiano Domiani, “Confession of a Police Commissioner to the Prosecutor of the Republic,” which was popular in those years. Lush speeches, beautiful life, risky actions... Vyacheslav watched this film twenty times and knew it by heart. I took my “comrades” to see it, but they perceived the film differently. “Cattle,” - this is how Vyacheslav characterized Samasyuk and Gorshkov. Here is an excerpt from the diary of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov (March 20, 1972): “... the rest of the people who surround me are no better. What is sacred about them? Then they count every ruble and think that they have done much more than someone else. Gray (Samasyuk - author's note) takes without asking, and they know exactly their worth, and their amount is equal. So go ahead, act categorically..." Diary of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. General notebook in brown leatherette binding. Neat, clear handwriting. Some words are highlighted with ticks. One feels that this diary was written for a reason - Vyacheslav himself re-read it several times. For what? Did you try to understand or analyze something? On the very first page of the diary is written the address of the Committee for Inventions and Discoveries under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, and next to it is the police telephone number; 6-56-30. In the same notebook, the “Dictionary of Foreign Words” was rewritten to letter 3: “zone-probe.” And then - a personal note. "May 26. Shop. Small change, paid off debts. 50 rubles left... May 28. Sery and Valya drank every penny..." Vyacheslav's relationship with Samasyuk deserves special mention. The cocky, wayward Samasyuk did not like the intellectual superiority that Vyacheslav demonstrated over the rest of the gang. Samasyuk gradually began to express his claims to leadership. Vyacheslav kept the whole gang “in his fist”: he did not drink alcohol himself, and did not allow anyone to get drunk - a drunk would sell everyone out. After successful business, he put aside half of the money - “for a big deal.” Samasyuk brazenly stole money from Tolstopyatov and got drunk. Here is just one episode of the spring of 1972, reflected in Vyacheslav’s diary: “March 5... At the bus stop, Sergei admitted that he took money in the amount of 360 rubles and that he sent it to his father... Only a boor would lie so unskilledly. Yes, his petty nature is gradually revealed. He is not capable of anything. ". Inventions, designs, and especially the purpose for which I organized this business - all this does not touch him at all. He goes to work only because there is nowhere to escape (the tail is long), and even because he is used to throwing money around (like - "No man at all), but has no prospects for the future. Someone did a lot with him during his second term. Okay, we'll see." Difficult relationships in the gang were probably one of the reasons why Vyacheslav in every possible way supported his reputation as a “risky guy” who doesn’t mind shedding blood, be it his own or someone else’s. Here's just one episode: one day Gorshkov ran to Vyacheslav and reported that Samasyuk, drunk to smithereens, was telling near a wine barrel that he was robbing cashiers with a machine gun. Vyacheslav dragged Samasyuk home. Here both grabbed their weapons and... Samasyuk could not stand it and threw the pistol. Vyacheslav put him against the wall and began to “knock the crap out”: he planted bullet after bullet into the wall - a centimeter from his head. Samasyuk howled with fear. Another noteworthy case was when, during the hunt for cashiers, in a seized car (the driver was tied up in the back seat), Vyacheslav drove along Khalturinsky Lane, past the city police department. “It’s boring to live without risk,” this is how he explained his action. Another “nice gesture”: when the cashier of motor vehicle service number 5, Matveeva, had her bag containing the salary of the entire enterprise (2,744 rubles) taken away, Vyacheslav calculated that 44 rubles were Matveeva’s personal money. The next day he found her house (using her passport) and dropped a bag with documents and 75 rubles on the doorstep of the house. “Why?..” - they asked Vyacheslav during the investigation. “They just felt sorry for the woman and to at least somehow compensate for the trouble caused,” he answered. Vyacheslav loved romance and despised people who were not romantic. He had an affair with his older brother's wife. Vladimir knew about this - and was silent. Were you afraid? The role of Vladimir Tolstopyatov in the gang was never fully understood. Vyacheslav did not take his brother on any business. Vladimir usually watched the robbery from the sidelines, used a stopwatch to time how long it would take, from which side the police would arrive, and then watched the actions of the policemen. It was believed that he analyzed the actions of the phantoms." But maybe he was "covering Vyacheslav's rear? Or did the younger brother have some kind of sense of responsibility for the elder? 6. The “big money” never came. Neither the robbery of the ATX-5 cashier, nor the attack on store 21 of Gorpromtorg (Mechnikov St., 144) yielded large profits. Vyacheslav was waiting for a serious business in which he would hit a big jackpot. “Take” a lot of money, enough to last a lifetime, and “give up”: this was Vyacheslav’s plan. He understood that you can’t rob endlessly: sooner or later, you’ll get caught. “God is not a fraer, he sees everything!” The right opportunity soon turned up. The gang received information that on April 21, 1969, the cashiers of the chemical plant named after the October Revolution would receive a large sum - over 100 thousand rubles. By that time, Samasyuk had been convicted of hooliganism, and for the “Fantomas” to take cashiers without the “center Gray” was a matter of principle: could they do it without him? Instead of Samasyuk, Vyacheslav’s acquaintance Boris Denskevich agreed to go “to the job.” They decided to attack in a new way - not near the bank, but near the entrance of the chemical plant and escape in the cashiers' car. ...As soon as the gray Volga stopped near the plant management building, two people jumped up to it - in gray raincoats, with machine guns. But the Volga driver managed to lock himself inside the car. And the cashier, clutching a bag of money to himself, jumped out of the opposite door and shouted “They’re robbing!” rushed to the factory management building. The guards were already running out from there. "Fantomas" opened fire. The first bullet hit the Volga driver Kovalenko. But a rare case occurred: the bullet hit the forehead tangentially, flattened, and remained under the skin. Kovalenko survived. In a shootout with the guards, the “Phantomas” constantly jammed their homemade machine guns. The security began to press them, but Vyacheslav and Gorshkov, running across the road, seized a truck in which they escaped. Shot after, Gorshkov, already in the car, was wounded in the lower back. The gang drew three conclusions from this failure. First: they can’t do without Samasyuk. Second: the ammunition was no good. Third: you must shoot immediately - to kill. Forced to “retire”, the brothers hesitated in further development of weapons. Vyacheslav made a cartridge of his own design. Its caliber remained the same - 5.6 mm, but the size was significantly increased. The brothers produced two new-design machine guns for this cartridge. This weapon was distinguished by increased power compared to earlier models of Tolstopyatov machine guns. With the help of familiar Legmash workers, the brothers set up production of hand grenades with duralumin casings right at the factory. Hunting gunpowder mixed with aluminum powder was used as a bursting charge, which ensured high temperature and explosive force. In July 1971, Sergei Samasyuk was released from prison, and on August 25, with new weapons in their hands, the “Fantomas” attacked the UHP-II2 cashier, seizing 17 thousand rubles.” 7. The whole city started talking about “phantomas”. Rumors gave birth to rumors: rumors multiplied their “exploits.” Small punks began to work “under the phantoms”: they pulled nylon stockings over their heads and snatched bags from the hands of women in dark gateways. The police were not inactive, but what was confusing was the fact that the “phantomas” had a completely professional style. They were looked for among the “professionals” of the criminal world. Well, who could have imagined that simple “hard workers”, “men” who regularly work at their own enterprises and do not seem to stand out in any way, can act so boldly and so skillfully? The “phantomas” themselves once discussed a question: is it worth making contact with the local underworld? We decided to “work” on our own because there was less risk of getting exposed. But the search for new gangsters was active, and in 1970 Rostov detectives picked up the trail of a certain Kirakosyan. He was arrested in Lvov. He and his accomplices carried out several daring raids with murders in Rostov, Yerevan, Lvov and other cities of the Union. They were armed, including small-caliber weapons. Kirakosyan’s “handwriting” was close to Tolstoy Pyatov’s. Kirakosyan was brought to Rostov and several witnesses identified him: yes, it was he who took over the store on Mirny! It turned out that the “Phantomas” raids temporarily stopped during this period. And the police department breathed a sigh of relief: yes, it’s them!.. A victorious report flew to Moscow. Kirakosyan was tried in Yerevan. He was accused of several “Fantômas” episodes. And after some time, “phantomas” emerged from nowhere and robbed the UNR-112 cashier on Budennovsky. 8. The most brutal crime that shocked the whole of Rostov was committed by the “Fantomas” on December 16, 197I near the savings bank number 0299, on Pushkinskaya Street. In November, Vyacheslav hatched a plan to attack the collectors. Having chosen a quiet corner on Pushkinskaya Street, the gang members spent almost two months monitoring the work of the State Bank collection teams that serviced this area. They established that one collector always enters the savings bank, and two remain in the car. They decided to use this moment for an attack. Considering that the collectors were armed, the bandits put on homemade body armor: specially curved steel plates that protected the chest and abdomen. They took several grenades with them. ...Samasyuk jumped up to the car first and disarmed the driver. But senior collector Ivan Pavlovich Zyuba, who was sitting in the back seat, pulled out his revolver and began to shoot. He shot even when he was hit by machine gun fire. I.P. Zyuba was killed on the spot. The cylinder of his revolver was empty; The collector fired until the last cartridge. Having thrown out Zyuba's corpse, the "Fantomas" in the collection "Volga" rushed to Dolomanovsky Lane. The third collector who jumped out of the savings bank fired after them. The bag contained over 17 thousand rubles, bonds and lottery tickets. Gorshkov, who received two bullets in this case, was secretly treated by a surgeon at the S.-K.zh.d. hospital. Konstantin Dudnikov, asking for two thousand rubles. 9. The Tolstopyatovs were no longer going to “give up” with the raids; they never managed to “take” a large sum, and it is always difficult to give up a good life. So one crime leads to another. Have the “phantomas” experienced remorse? No! They liked to feel significant, they liked to hear conversations on trams about unprecedentedly daring raiders... Can an artist refuse fame? Could the "phantomas" throw away their machine guns? Meanwhile, the brothers continued to develop new designs of small arms, and by the fall of 1972 they created the most famous “gangster” machine gun, shooting 9-mm balls. The rate of fire and penetration of this terrible weapon were amazing. From three meters away, a shot from such a machine gun pierced a railway rail! The barrel of the machine gun was made to break, and this feature made it possible to carry the weapon unnoticed under clothing. From the conclusion of the forensic ballistic examination of the All-Russian Research Institute of Forensic Expertise (01/25/1974): “Not one of the known samples of hand-held firearms was the model on which the submachine guns brought for examination were made... These weapons, when fired from short distances, have excessive lethal force... The kinetic energy of the smooth-bore machine gun created by Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov exceeds the kinetic energy of a bullet conventional weapons by 4.5 times". After several minor episodes, the "Fantomas", already having a ball machine, in the fall of 1972 they decided to attack collectors near the Strela store, located not far from the entrance of the steam locomotive repair plant. The Strela store was one of the last points on the route of the collection team, and there should have been a very large sum of money in the car. Vyacheslav had previously made fake numbers of the ROF series from adhesive tape (police cars then drove under this series in Rostov). The plan was to seize the car in advance, shoot the collection team with a ball machine gun, reload the bags of money and escape. On November 4, 1972, they seized a Volga car near the 2nd brick factory. The tied driver was locked in the trunk, and at about half past seven in the evening they drove up to the store. It turned out that, fortunately, that evening the collectors were delayed somewhere along the route. It was boring to wait, and Samasyuk suggested going for wine. They took wine all the way from “The Three Little Pigs” (a well-known store on the main street of Engels in past years) and when we returned to “Strela”, it turned out that the collectors had already passed. After drinking wine, the “phantomas” decided to intercept the collectors at the entrance to the regional bank. But this attempt also ended in failure. Then Vyacheslav decided to just drive around the city, and in Gvardeysky Lane, opposite the yeast plant, the Volga crashed into a tree at high speed. Vyacheslav and Samasyuk were injured, but managed to escape. The driver in the trunk was also seriously injured. 10. The latest case of the “Fantomas” is an attack on the cashiers of the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz Institute. The idea of the robbery was born in Vyacheslav’s head at the moment when he came to the institute’s cash desk to get a job and, walking along the second floor corridor, saw the “Cashier” sign. The Fantomas learned that about four thousand people work at the institute. They calculated that with an average salary of 70-75 rubles, the total amount received from the State Bank should have been within 300 thousand rubles. This was the biggest jackpot in all the gang's activities. They prepared for the crime for several months - from March to June 1973. Every 7th and 22nd, “phantomas” with weapons under their clothes approached the institute and watched the cashiers. They decided to “take” on June 7th. ...At first everything went well for the “Phantomas”. On the second floor of the institute, Samasyuk and Gorshkov, pointing their revolvers at the cashier, snatched his bag with 125 thousand I48 rubles and, running down the stairs, jumped out into the street. All this happened in front of the institute’s employees, who rushed in pursuit. On the street, Samasyuk pointed the revolver towards his pursuers and pulled the trigger. There was a dry click: misfire! But this was enough for the people running after the “phantomas” to stop. Slava Tolstopyatov, who was on duty on the street, joined Samasyuk and Gorshkov, holding a machine gun at the ready... And at that moment he rushed at the criminals. To this day, many explain Martovitsky’s desperately brave act by the fact that he was supposedly drunk that day. These rumors are not worthy of mention: it is unlikely that even drunken courage will force one to go to the gun barrel. Vladimir was a truly brave man. He rushed to defend state money only because that’s how he was raised. He died. One of the streets in Rostov is named after him. Gorshkov shot at Martovitsky from a revolver. And then Tolstopyatov pierced him with a machine gun burst. This was the decisive moment. The shots near the institute were heard by a nearby police squad. The criminals went to Lenin Avenue - past the construction site of the Palace of Culture of the helicopter plant. And a junior police sergeant jumped out right at them. Samasyuk was the first to raise his revolver - and it misfired again! Rusov was not taken aback, and offhand, as he was taught in the border troops, released the entire clip after the “Phantomas”. It was like being in a cool action movie. The sergeant shot as a sniper: Samasyuk was wounded in the chest and both legs, Gorshkov - in the right buttock. The cartridges in the clip have run out. Rusov took cover behind the wall of building 105 to reload his pistol, and meanwhile the “phantomas” jumped out onto Lenin Avenue, seized an old Moskvich-402 standing by the side of the road, and rushed at full speed along Lenin towards Selmash. Rusov jumped out onto the pavement. It seemed that the bandits had left. But at that time, a GAZ-69 of the regional fire department was passing by, in which were Sergeant Gennady Doroshenko and Captain Viktor Salyutin. The firefighters were unarmed. But they quickly got their bearings in the situation and without hesitation made the decision to pursue the armed criminals. - Sit down, sergeant! - Salyutin shouted to Rusov, opening the door of the gas car. Turning on the siren, they rushed in pursuit. Rusov’s partner, policeman Evgeniy Kubyshta, also joined her: he stopped a passing UAZ minibus and ordered the driver to catch up with the Moskvich. Near the building materials plant, the pursued Moskvich suddenly stopped. As it turned out later, Vyacheslav decided to throw grenades at his pursuers. But... in the front seat, the half-mad Gorshkov was groaning in pain and fear; in the back, lying on a bag of money, (the prophetic words came true!) Samasyuk, who had received a bullet in the heart, was dying. The pursuers were also cautious and did not come close. But they weren’t going to lose sight of the bandits... In general, after standing for a minute, Vyacheslav rushed off in the Moskvich further along Lenin Street. Driving through the Square of the Land of Soviets, on the roundabout, Vyacheslav very impolitely “cut off” a brand new GAZ-24 Volga. This car was used by taxi drivers for the economic needs of their taxi fleet. They were infuriated by the impudence of the Moskvich, and they also rushed in pursuit - just to punch the lout driver in the face. The taxi drivers had no idea who they were pursuing... Then events took an even more exciting turn. Before turning onto Trolleybusnaya Street, the engine of the firefighting GAZ truck suddenly stalled, and the Moskvich with the Phantomas disappeared around the bend. Salyutin and Rusov, in the excitement of pursuit, jumped out of the car and rushed to run after him, and - lo and behold! - just around the bend they saw a stuck Moskvich! It turned out that the taxi drivers on the Volga, in turn, having caught up with the Moskvich, cut it off so much that it flew onto a high curb and got stuck on it, sitting tightly on the rear axle. The taxi drivers got out of their Volga to hit the lout driver in the face, but they recoiled when they saw a grenade in Tolstopyatov’s hand.

And here Vyacheslav made a fatal mistake, the second of that fateful day. If he had captured the taxi driver's Volga, he would have had a chance to escape. But instead, he, picking up the wounded Gorshkov and a bag of money, rushed to the brick wall of Rostselmash, hoping to climb over it and hide on the territory of the giant plant. But Rusov was already running towards him with a pistol in his hands, and Salutin, unarmed but full of determination. Vyacheslav threw the money bag and the wounded Gorshkov, and reluctantly raised his hands up. And more and more police cars drove up to the wall of Rostselmash: the entire garrison was alerted. 11. Then, in the heat of the moment, the police had not yet realized that they had detained the very “phantomas” whom they had been chasing unsuccessfully for several years in a row. The wounded Gorshkov was taken from the place of detention to the Central City Hospital, Tolstopyatov to the Oktyabrsky district police department. Samasyuk was already dead. Vyacheslav immediately, at the very first interrogation, quite frankly began to list episodes of the activities of his gang. Those present were stunned... Investigators went to Tolstopyatov’s house, on Pyramidnaya Street, 66-a. A search was ordered there. At first, nothing criminal was found in the house. But they discovered a cable underground: Tolstopyatov was quietly stealing electricity (not his biggest sin!). The cable led to an outbuilding in the courtyard, where there was both a home and a workshop of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. At first they were very afraid that the outbuilding was mined. We went inside with caution. Measurements showed that the internal volume of the room is much smaller than the external parameters of the building. This means there is a hiding place in the outbuilding! By tapping, they determined that behind one of the walls, into which a large wall mirror was mounted, there was emptiness. At first glance, the mirror was bolted in place. However, the bolts did not unscrew! They were just camouflage. One of the assistants, having climbed onto a stool, began to twist the top bolt in the middle of the wall, when suddenly the mirror moved right towards him! This was the entrance to the hiding place. There were shelves behind the mirror. And on them are stacked machine guns, pistols, grenades, boxes of ammunition... Alexey Rusov was summoned to Moscow for a reception with the USSR Minister of Internal Affairs N.A. Shchelokov. Nikolai Anisimovich personally presented Rusov with the “Excellence in Police” badge, a cash prize and a valuable gift - a “VEF-204” radio receiver. Rusov's name was included in the Book of Honor of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, his photograph was hung on the Board of Honor in the ministry. The other three employees of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov Region - Salyutin, Kubyshta and Doroshenko - were not forgotten either. The investigation, headed by the most experienced employee of the regional prosecutor's office A. Sokolov, lasted almost a year. In April 1974, the trial began in the “Phantomas case.” The trial (chaired by V.F. Levchenko) aroused the interest of not only central but also foreign media. “Finally, gangsters have appeared in Russia,” the Western press spoke in this spirit. Eleven people appeared before the court: the Tolstopyatov brothers, Gorshkov, as well as all those who in one way or another contributed to the many years of successful activity of the “phantomas”... The large hall of the Rostov Regional Court was filled to capacity. The situation was nervous. The possibility of a terrorist attack was not excluded (there was a suspicion that some of Vyacheslav’s friends would try to free him). Member of the regional court V.F. Levchenko recalls an incident that is memorable to many. During the hearing, one of the upper windows was open - almost under the high ceiling of the courtroom: television crews had pulled some kind of cable through it. And suddenly, in the midst of the silence reigning in the meeting, a roar was heard. It was the window frame that collapsed, falling off from above (probably it was removed and poorly secured). Everyone jumped up from their seats. “Calm down!” said the presiding officer. “This is not at all the case that is being talked about in the city.” “What are they talking about in the city?” - Vyacheslav immediately became wary. Was he hoping for something? Gorshkov was a pitiful and comical sight. "Citizens judges! Mitigate the punishment! I am a disabled person of banditry!" - he addressed the court quite seriously, causing laughter in the hall. He wanted to save his life at any cost, and blamed all the sins on his brothers. Vyacheslav was noticeably angry about this, and he treated his former friend with pointed contempt. He called him “bullet catcher” - after all, Gorshkov was wounded three times during various raids. Vladimir remained silent during the trial. Vyacheslav acted out the fun, tried to make fun. In their last word, the brothers asked the court to spare their lives. “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 me, continuous nervous tension, my nerves were subjected to a triple test - this had a detrimental effect on the mind. I could no longer think as before creatively, any event caused trauma, I was haunted by the nightmare of what was happening, its meaninglessness. You cannot blame me for envy and greed, I am used to being content with little, I should not live for the sake of sweetness. I was surrounded by people, I alone must 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" (from the last word of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov). The Tolstopyatov brothers and Vladimir Gorshkov were sentenced to death with confiscation of property. The remaining accomplices of the “phantomas” were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. 12. For another year, after the verdict was passed, the Tolstopyatovs were on death row in the Novocherkassk strict prison ST-3. They were given paper and drawing supplies. The brothers designed. They still hoped to invent something for which they would be given life. From the cassation appeal of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov (dated July 15, 1974). Written in beautiful, neat handwriting on ten pages: “I ask you for life, since it is given once and cannot be neglected. It is a pity, of course, that we realize the value of life late, but it is better to feel it late than never.. " Gorshkov was more succinct: "Save my life, I will atone for my guilt throughout my life." Vyacheslav, while on death row, developed a new design for an automatic 11mm pistol. Vladimir invented the “perpetum mobile” - a perpetual motion machine. He claimed that he knew how to build it: “...for about 20 years I was engaged in the invention of an engine without fuel, which I started, and I saw with my own eyes its endless movement...” There are still persistent rumors in Rostov that the Tolstopyatovs were left to live and locked up in some secret design bureau - for the sake of their design abilities. However, there is a certificate in the file: “The verdict of the Rostov Regional Court dated July 1, 1974 in the case of Vyacheslav Pavlovich Tolstopyatov, Vladimir Pavlovich Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Nikolaevich Gorshkov in relation to all three was executed on March 6, 1975.” From a reliable source, I heard the following story about their execution. The sentence was carried out in a special soundproof chamber equipped with a bullet trap. All three were told that their request for clemency had been rejected. The Tolstopyatov brothers greeted this news in silence. Gorshkov cried and begged for mercy. First, the sentence was carried out against Vladimir Tolstopyatov. Gorshkov came second, fully showing his cowardice before his death. Third - Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. He only said: “Put me where this scum was not shot (he meant Gorshkov). I don’t want to get dirty with his blood.” These were his last words. Alexander OLENEV.

When the first part of the French trilogy about Fantômas was released in Soviet cinemas in 1967, few of the viewers of the film, which was an unprecedented success for the audience, could have imagined that around the same time a gang would appear in the Soviet Union, which the people would call only “Fantômas” . For the two peaceful decades that have passed since the defeat of the post-war criminal gangs, the appearance of Soviet “phantomas” was a shocking event.

Brothers Tolstopyatov

On October 22, 1968, three men burst into the Gastronom store in the village of Mirny in the Pervomaisky district of Rostov-on-Don. Two of them had black women's nylon stockings on their heads, the third had green ones. Soviet gangsters arrived at the store on a tram. One of the bandits stood in the doorway, clutching a homemade machine gun. A man in a green stocking on his head walked into the center of the store, also with a machine gun at the ready, and a third criminal, armed with a pistol, rushed to the cash registers. But there was little money in the cash register. Having taken the proceeds, the bandits ran out of the store. Here the criminals encountered an elderly man. Guriy Semenovich Chumakov, a veteran of the Great Patriotic War, could not pass by when a crime was openly committed before his eyes. He tried to grab one of the bandits. A man in a green stocking mask shot Guriy Semenovich with four shots from a machine gun. The victorious warrior died 23 years after the victory on a Rostov street in a village with the characteristic name “Mirny”. The bandits successfully escaped. True, the jackpot at the Gastronom store was small - some 526 rubles 84 kopecks. There's not much to go around, but it seemed enough to the organizer of the gang - the same man in the green stocking. After all, the raid on the grocery store was the first serious “case” of the gang, which entered Russian crime as the “gang of Phantomas”, or “gang of the Tolstopyatov brothers”.

Nakhalovsky “universities” of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov

One of the brothers was the man in the green stocking who killed war veteran Guriy Chumakov in cold blood. The bandit's name was Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov. At the time of the events described, he was 28 years old. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was born in 1940 in the Bryansk region, into an ordinary Soviet family of middle income. Besides him, the mother had another son - an older brother, Vladimir Tolstopyatov, born in 1929. The brothers' father, by a cruel irony of fate, served in the police - and not just as an ordinary policeman, but as the head of a district department. When did the Great Patriotic War, the head of the family almost immediately found himself at the front and soon died. The Tolstopyatov family fled from the Bryansk region to the east and settled in Rostov-on-Don. Here the mother managed to get a job and find housing. In a small outbuilding on Pyramidnaya Street, in house No. 66A, they spent their childhood and early years brothers Tolstopyatov.

Outbuilding of the Tolstopyatov brothers.

Pyramidnaya Street is Nakhalovka. Officially, Nakhalovka was called the New Settlement, but among Rostovites the area was better known by its first name. Back in the second half of the 19th century, areas on the outskirts of the city began to be populated by workers and artisans, who unauthorizedly erected houses and small houses on empty plots. This is how Nakhalovka appeared. Later, after the revolution, Nakhalovka began to grow to the north quite officially - the city authorities allocated land for private construction. This is how a “new” New settlement appeared, to which Pyramidnaya Street geographically belongs. The people who lived here were always dashing, different from the inhabitants of the apartment buildings in the city center. Nakhalovka had its own customs, which were strongly influenced by the criminal world and its subculture. Many of the “nakhalovites” themselves had been in prison, and almost every second inhabitant of the village was not a fool to drink. It was in this atmosphere that the Tolstopyatov brothers spent their youth. The mother earned little, and the family lived in poverty, denying themselves many things. Perhaps this is why the Tolstopyatov brothers dreamed throughout their youth of a good life, in which they would not have to count every penny and save on the essentials. But almost all Soviet people in those years lived poorly and only a few thought that their financial situation could be improved through criminal means, especially through robberies and murders of innocent citizens.

However, the Tolstopyatov brothers did not immediately take the path of committing violent crimes. Younger brother, Vyacheslav, was a man not deprived of artistic talents. Since childhood, he loved to draw, and he was especially good at drawing pictures and reproducing their details almost identically. Having started by copying illustrations in children's books, by the age of fifteen, Slava Tolstopyatov switched to banknotes. He produced counterfeit banknotes in denominations of 50 and 100 rubles that were almost identical to Soviet money. However, the question arose - how to sell the drawn banknotes. Slava came up with his own method - he got into a taxi, drove some distance and then handed the driver a bill, receiving change. Vyacheslav held out the folded bill and gradually became insolent to such an extent that he began to draw money on only one side. This is where the popular saying “greed ruined the fratern” came into play. On February 23, 1960, he once again got into a taxi and asked to be taken to the Suburban Station. However, the taxi driver still unfolded the bill and saw that a blank sheet of paper was looking at him on the other side.

Pyramidnaya Street, like other streets of the New Settlement, has noticeably improved these days

Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was arrested. He was only twenty years old at the time of his arrest. The boy's youth and artistic abilities misled investigators. They thought that the young man had made a mistake in life and, having received a small punishment, would correct himself and become an ordinary citizen, a law-abiding member of society. The well-known Rostov journalist Alexander Olenev quotes the words of investigator A. Granovsky, who just happened to handle the first case of Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov - about counterfeiting. Granovsky recalled that during an investigative experiment, Slava Tolstopyatov, “using colored pencils, watercolors, BF-2 glue, a compass, a ruler and a blade, in four hours (!) drew an absolutely exact copy of a 100-ruble bill.” This is about the artistic abilities of Tolstopyatov Jr. Another point is related to the personal charm of the young man. “Even while under investigation,” recalled A. Granovsky, “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 my young age, complete repentance, and assistance provided to the investigation.” Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was sentenced to four years in prison. But the zone, as often happens, did not reform the young man, but only worsened his criminal tendencies. It was in the colony that Tolstopyatov finally realized that instead of grueling work at an enterprise or somewhere else, good money could be obtained through criminal means. Having been burned by counterfeiting, he decided immediately after his release to move on to more decisive action. Namely, to rob a bank.

The goal is to rob a bank

In the winter of 1964, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was released after serving his sentence. He told his older brother Vladimir about his plans, who also liked the younger brother’s idea. Tolstopyatov Sr. was also a man not without talents. He had pronounced artistic abilities and even worked at one time as an artist at the city zoo of Rostov-on-Don. In addition, Vladimir Tolstopyatov was fond of technology and design. It was he who actually became the “gunsmith” of the gang and its ideological inspirer. Almost immediately after the release of the younger Tolstopyatov, the brothers began preparing crimes. They took the matter seriously. Firstly, the brothers decided to refuse to communicate with representatives of the traditional criminal world of Rostov. From his experience in prison, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov knew that the criminal world is “stuffed” with police agents and those who pose as the most “thieves” of crime bosses may well turn out to be police informants. Therefore, the brothers preferred to communicate with those who were not exposed to the professional criminal world.

Secondly, the Tolstopyatovs decided to arm themselves with firearms. Since getting a ready-made firearm in those years was problematic and risky, they decided to make the weapon themselves. For almost four years, the brothers made weapons and prepared morally and organizationally to commit crimes. The Tolstopyatovs independently developed drawings for pistols and submachine guns. Two small-caliber TOZ-8 rifles were used to make the barrels. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, despite his criminal record, was able to get a job as the head of the DOSAAF small-caliber shooting range and obtained small-caliber cartridges there. Having reached an agreement with familiar factory workers, the brothers gave them orders for the production of complex parts, of course, hiding their true purpose and claiming that the parts were needed as spare parts for household appliances. By the time they committed their first crimes, the Tolstopyatovs had acquired four seven-round revolvers, three folding submachine guns, several hand grenades and even body armor made of steel plates.

The backbone of the Phantomas gang. Above are the Tolstopyatov brothers. Below - Vladimir Gorshkov, Sergey Samosyuk

The closest accomplices of the Tolstopyatov brothers were Sergei Samosyuk and Vladimir Gorshkov. Special mention should be made about them. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov knew Samosyuk from serving his sentence together in prison. Only Sergei got there for hooliganism - he was a rather primitive person, prone to alcohol abuse. Having been released a little later than Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Sergei Samosyuk immediately expressed a desire to join the gang as soon as he became acquainted with Slava’s idea of bank robbery. Vyacheslav met Samosyuk at the wine barrel. Drunk Samosyuk then uttered a prophetic phrase: “It is 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, too, was not distinguished by either great abilities or courage, but he wanted to live without doing anything. It was Gorshkov who provided part of his house for organizing an underground workshop there, in which Vladimir and Vyacheslav constructed homemade weapons.

The bandits were plagued by misfortunes

The Tolstopyatov brothers and their accomplices Samosyuk and Gorshkov decided to take the first case in 1968. On October 7, 1968, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Samosyuk and Gorshkov decided to rob a cashier near the State Bank building on the street. Engels. Here cashiers received money to pay employees. In order to quickly leave the crime scene, the bandits decided to seize a car. On Engels Street they got into Dzeron Arutyunov’s Volga. However, the driver, seeing a gun pointed at him, jumped out of the car screaming and ran away. The attack plan failed. Out of fear that the driver would contact the police and they would be detained for theft, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov decided to get out of the situation. He himself called the police and reported where the car was parked, and explained his behavior as a prank by the driver. Like, he and his friends decided to joke with the driver, but he didn’t appreciate the joke, got scared of the toy gun and ran away.

Three days later, on October 10, bandits tried to rob the cashier of a shoe factory. To do this, they agreed with a certain Evgeny Rybny, who provided them with his Moskvich-407 car. Rybny himself was in the car in the back seat, tied up - this was his condition, so that in case of anything it would appear that the car had been seized from him. In Rybny's Moskvich, the bandits were waiting for the cashier near the bank building, but she managed to quickly get into the GAZ-51. The GAZ driver rushed away from the bank at high speed and soon turned into an alley and drove into the gates of a shoe factory. The bandits were left with nothing. And on October 22, an attack took place on a grocery store in the village of Mirny - the gang’s first real case and the first murder of a person. It was after the first crime, in which Tolstopyatov and his accomplices used nylon stockings as masks, that rumors spread throughout Rostov about a certain gang of “phantomas” committing dashing robbery attacks.

Two weeks later, on November 5, 1968, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov and Sergei Samosyuk attacked the car of the Rostov Main Gas Pipelines Department. Opening the front door, Tolstopyatov demanded that the driver (his name was Viktor Arutyunov) get out of the car. At that moment, Sergei Samosyuk sat down on the other side next to the driver. But Arutyunov did not listen to the bandits and rushed off at high speed, deciding to take Samosyuk, who was sitting next to him, to the police. Samosyuk shot at the driver, but Arutyunov managed to turn onto the tram line and stop the car in front of the approaching tram. Samosyuk managed to jump out of the car and run. However, at the end of 1968, the bandits still managed to carry out two successful attacks - on the 21st store of Gorpromtorg and on the cashier of automobile industry No. 5.

Weapons of the Phantomas gang

The next failure awaited the “Phantomas” in the spring of 1969. By this time, Sergei Samosyuk had managed to get caught for another drunken hooliganism and received a second term of imprisonment. Therefore, the bandits went to the “case” without Samosyuk. He was replaced by his “temporary accomplice” Boris Denskevich. On April 21, 1969, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, Gorshkov and Denskevich set out to rob the cashier of the Rostov chemical plant. Having calculated the exact time when the cashier and the factory security guard brought money from the bank to pay wages to the factory workers, Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov waited with weapons in their hands at the factory entrance. According to the bandits' plan, they were supposed to take the bag of money from the cashier and the car keys from the security guard, and then flee the crime scene. Vladimir Tolstopyatov and Boris Denskevich, as they say, were “on the lookout.” They were supposed to watch the access roads and as soon as the collection vehicle appeared, signal Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov about this so that they would prepare for the attack. However, the bandits’ plan, which looked beautiful in words, immediately began to crack in practice. When Tolstopyatov Jr. pointed his weapon at the guard, he ran to the entrance and managed to take his service revolver out of his holster. Gorshkov shot at the driver of the car, but he managed to take the machine gun from Gorshkov. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, who came to the aid of his accomplice, also shot at the driver, wounding him in the arm. After being wounded, the driver let go of Gorshkov’s machine gun. The bandits ran to the first truck they came across, wounded the driver of the car in the arm and, throwing him out of the cab, rushed away from the plant. However, the enterprise's security guards managed to open fire on the fleeing criminals and wound Gorshkov in the back.

An unsuccessful attack on the cashier of a chemical plant, which almost ended in the arrest of the criminals, or even their liquidation by the enterprise’s security guards, forced the Tolstopyatov brothers to rethink their activities. Firstly, they realized that it was risky for the two of them to go on such attacks, and it was worth waiting until Sergei Samosyuk served his sentence in prison for hooliganism and was released. Despite the fact that Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov treated Sergei Samosyuk with a certain degree of contempt, considering him a primitive and unreliable person, and even dependent on alcohol and prone to senseless hooligan behavior, he understood perfectly well that Samosyuk, desperate and reckless, was a kind of , the “combat cell” of the criminal group. Without Samosyuk, with the cowardly Gorshkov, there was a risk of either falling into the hands of police officers or dying in a shootout. Secondly, the bandits decided that for their own safety and to prevent possible resistance from the guards and collectors, it was necessary to shoot first and to kill. In anticipation of the release of Samosyuk, they “lay low”, improving their weapons base and searching for targets for new attacks. Samosyuk was released in the summer of 1971 and, naturally, immediately expressed a desire to return to criminal activity.

The gang gets a taste

In August 1971, Tolstopyatov's comrades attacked the cashier of UNR-112, who was accompanied by an unarmed engineer and driver. Having fired into the air, the bandits frightened the UPR workers, who meekly gave them a bag containing 17,000 rubles. For that time, this was a huge amount - after all, a Soviet engineer received 120-200 rubles a month. The “phantomas” retreated from the crime scene on a UPR bus seized from the cashier, which was abandoned on the street along with a heavy bag - the bag contained 500 rubles in change and the bandits decided not to “fight for money”, leaving the inconvenient bag in the abandoned vehicle.
The captured jackpot whetted the appetites of the bandits. They began monitoring the next object - teams of State Bank collectors serving the savings bank area No. 0299. A plan was developed - to attack the collectors when two of them remained in the car, and one came out of the cash desk with money in a bag. The criminals watched the savings bank for almost two months and finally decided to attack. On December 16, 1971, they arrived at savings bank No. 0299, armed with machine guns and grenades and even wearing body armor. Sergei Samosyuk ordered the collectors sitting in the car to put service weapon on the seat and get out of the car.

The driver of the car got out, and senior collector Ivan Zyuba, who was sitting behind him, fired a revolver at Vladimir Gorshkov and wounded him in the arm. In response, the bandits shot Ivan Zyuba with a machine gun. The third collector who jumped out of the savings bank opened fire on the retreating car and wounded Vladimir Gorshkov again. This time the bandits also managed to seize a huge amount - 17,000 rubles. The Volga with the body of senior collector Ivan Zyuba, who died in a shootout, was later discovered by the police at the city landfill. However, after this raid, the bandits were faced with a certain problem - the twice-wounded Gorshkov needed medical attention, but taking him to the hospital meant definitely attracting the attention of the police. After all, doctors report any gunshot wounds, even without the patient’s consent, to law enforcement agencies. Therefore, two thousand rubles from the gang’s “common fund” were spent on Gorshkov’s treatment at home. For this purpose, the Tolstopyatovs brought a surgeon from the railway hospital, Konstantin Dudnikov, who provided medical assistance to Vladimir Gorshkov for a large fee.

Despite the fact that within a few months the gang managed to capture colossal, by Soviet standards, cash, the Tolstopyatov brothers decided to continue their criminal activities and transfer them to a qualitatively higher level. Moreover, the whole city was talking about the emerging gang of “phantomas”, and it is possible that the Tolstopyatov brothers felt proud when they heard the next “ horror stories"about the elusive "phantomas". In the fall of 1972, the Tolstopyatovs designed and assembled a unique machine gun that fired nine-millimeter balls and had amazing penetration ability (a shot from this machine gun pierced a railway rail from a three-meter distance).

In the fall of 1972, the Tolstopyatovs began to hatch a new attack plan - this time the bandits’ eyes fell on the Strela store in the area of the locomotive repair plant. According to the criminals, “Strela” was one of the final money collection points along the route of the cash-in-transit vehicle. Vyacheslav and Vladimir Tolstopyatov came up with the following plan of action. The criminals seize the car in advance, cover it with fake license plates made from adhesive tape, with the letters ROF, indicating that they belong to the police. Then they drive up to the collectors in a stolen car, shoot them with a machine gun and take away the bags of money. On November 4, 1972, in the area of the 2nd brick factory, bandits seized a Volga car. The driver was tied up and loaded into the trunk, and they drove to the Strela store. But the collectors were delayed that day. The bandits in a stolen Volga, with the driver tied up in the trunk, at the request of Sergei Samosyuk, rushed to buy wine - to the Three Little Pigs store on the street. Engels. This was the height of arrogance - after all, the bandits’ route lay past the building where the regional police department was located. In a drunken state, the “Phantomas” drove around Rostov until they crashed into a tree on Nakhalovka, on Gvardeysky Lane. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov and Sergei Samosyuk abandoned the car and disappeared. The driver, who was in the trunk, was rescued but was injured when the car collided with a tree.

The last case of the “phantomas”

The “phantomas” hatched the plan for their latest crime for several months. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov once went to the Yuzhgiprovodkhoz Institute for the purpose of employment. By chance, the cash register of the institution caught his eye and the bandit immediately had a thought in his head: “What if we rob the institute?” Tolstopyatov Jr. found out the number of workers at the institute - there were about four thousand people. Having summed up the average salary of employees at 70-75 rubles, the bandits received a fantastic figure - 300 thousand. For the Soviet Union of those years, this was unimaginable money, and in the history of the gang it could have become the largest profit. From that moment on, the criminals established surveillance of the institute, which lasted from March to June 1973. Twice a month - on the day of advance payment and payday, on the 7th and 22nd, criminals appeared at the institute building and observed what was happening. Finally they decided to commit a crime. On June 7, 1973, members of the “Fantomas” gang advanced to the institute. Roles were assigned. Sergei Samosyuk and Vladimir Gorshkov were supposed to directly attack the cashier at the entrance to the cash register. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was supposed to seize the car and ensure the unhindered departure of the bandits. Another new accomplice, Alexander Chernenko, who owned a service scooter, was supposed to take the bag with money given to him to the indicated place. Vladimir Tolstopyatov himself was at the crime scene, as always, observing what was happening for the purpose of subsequent analysis and analysis.

Sergei Samosyuk and Vladimir Gorshkov, armed with revolvers, burst into the institute building and took a bag with money from the cashier. They were able to leave the building and were already heading towards Chernenko, who was waiting for them on his scooter, when unarmed institute employees chased after them. In response to the cries of the institute workers, Vladimir Martovitsky, a loader from the nearby Gastronom store, rushed to help. He grabbed Gorshkov by the shoulder. Gorshkov failed to free himself from the capture of a strong twenty-seven-year-old guy who was serving in the Marine Corps, and then Gorshkov and Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov, who rushed to the rescue, shot Martovitsky. Meanwhile, one of the institute’s employees, who rushed to look for the police, called a nearby policeman for help. Junior police sergeant Alexey Rusov ran towards the criminals with a pistol in his hands. Sergei Samosyuk shot at the policeman, but his revolver misfired. Alexey Rusov turned out to be a sharp shooter and hit the fleeing Samosyuk and Gorshkov. But while Rusov was hiding from retaliatory shots around the corner of the nearest house, Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov seized a Moskvich car standing on the side of the road. The bandits got into the car and rushed towards Selmash. At this time, a fire department official vehicle was passing by, in which there were department employees, driver sergeant Gennady Doroshenko and captain Viktor Salyutin. Policeman Alexey Rusov jumped into their car, after which the three of them rushed in pursuit of the criminals’ “Muscovite.”

District inspector of the Oktyabrsky District Department of Internal Affairs, junior police lieutenant Evgeniy Kubyshta, stopped the minibus and also rushed after the fleeing criminals. Today Evgeniy Kubyshta is 69 years old. Fortunately, he is alive and even gives interviews to the press. In one of them, he told how in order to detain the “Phantomas” he had to seize the car of the deputy director of the Rostov Helicopter Plant: “I seized the car... at gunpoint. A civilian car, driver, deputy director of a helicopter plant. I just rushed to him, he was driving, in a hurry to take the boss to lunch. I tell him: “Stop!” He doesn’t understand, I then jumped out onto the car and threw myself at his window with a pistol. He slammed on the brakes and almost hit me. He shouts at me: “What are you doing, commander? I'm going to get the boss." I tell him, threatening him with a pistol: “If you don’t obey, you will feel bad.” After that, he slowed down, stopped, and let me into the car” (Quoted from: Evgeniy Kubyshta: To detain Tolstopyatov’s gang, I seized the car of the deputy director of the helicopter plant // Southern Region - Don).

Chance helped catch the criminals. On the Square of the Land of Soviets, “Phantomas” escaping from pursuit cut off the Volga of one of the city taxis. Taxi drivers, not knowing who they were contacting, also rushed after the impudent “Moskvich” in order to “talk like men.” In the end, the Volga taxi drivers were cut off by the Moskvich, and the latter flew onto the sidewalk and got stuck on the curb. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov jumped out of the Moskvich with a grenade, scaring off the taxi drivers. Grabbing the bag of money and taking the wounded Gorshkov by the arm, Tolstopyatov ran to the wall of the Rostselmash plant, hoping to climb over it and escape pursuit. Sergei Samosyuk had by this time died from a fatal wound received as a result of a shootout with policeman Rusov, in the back seat of a stolen Moskvich. But Aleksey Rusov and captain Salyutin, armed with a pistol, were already running towards Tolstopyatov and the wounded Gorshkov. Tolstopyatov lowered the bag of money to the ground. This was the end of his criminal career and the beginning of the end life path. Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Gorshkov were arrested. Moreover, the gang leader immediately began to confess. From what Vyacheslav Tolstopyatov was telling, the police officers were in a state of shock. It turned out that just like that, completely by accident, thanks to the heroically deceased loader Martovitsky and the young junior police sergeant Rusov, the legendary gang of “phantomas”, about which only the lazy had not spoken in Rostov for the last five years, was finally neutralized.

The court showed no leniency

The investigation into the case of the Tolstopyatov brothers lasted about a year. During a search in the outbuilding on Pyramidnaya, 66A, police officers discovered a cache where the criminals kept their arsenal - machine guns, pistols, grenades and ammunition. The cache was cleverly hidden behind a large wall mirror. The entire circle of people who assisted the bandits in their criminal activities was identified. Finally, in April 1974, the trial of the Phantomas gang began. There were 11 people in the dock. These were the Tolstopyatov brothers - Vyacheslav and Vladimir, Vladimir Gorshkov, as well as more minor and tertiary characters who provided all possible assistance to the gang. The Tolstopyatov brothers behaved with dignity, although in their last word they asked to spare their lives. Vladimir Gorshkov, who had never been particularly brave, cried and asked to commute the punishment, blaming the Tolstopyatov brothers as the initiators of criminal activity. He uttered absolutely comical phrases, asking the judges to show leniency towards him as a “disabled banditist.” However, the court's verdict was clear.

On July 1, 1974, Vladimir Pavlovich Tolstopyatov, Vyacheslav Pavlovich Tolstopyatov and Vladimir Nikolaevich Gorshkov were sentenced to capital punishment - the death penalty. However, after the verdict, they remained in the Novocherkassk investigative prison for about a year. Only on March 6, 1975, the sentence against the Tolstopyatov brothers and Vladimir Gorshkov was carried out. An accomplice of the “Fantomas” in the last case, Alexander Ivanovich Chernenko, was sentenced to 12 years in prison to be served in a maximum security colony on charges of banditry. The following were accused of aiding and abetting banditry: Denskevich Boris Konstantinovich - sentenced to 10 years in prison in a maximum security colony; Srybny Evgeniy Andreevich - sentenced to 5 years in prison in a maximum security colony; Zaritsky Viktor Nikolaevich - sentenced to six years in a maximum security colony; Nikolai Ivanovich Berestenev and Yuri Ivanovich Kozlitin were each sentenced to three years in prison in a general regime colony. The prosecution demanded that doctor Konstantin Matveevich Dudnikov, accused of harboring a bandit, be given five years in a general regime colony. However, the court reclassified the charge against the doctor from concealment to non-reporting.

Heroic participants in the arrest of the "Fantomas" gang

Heroes of gang arrest

As for the heroic participants in the arrest of the “Fantomas” gang, the memory of them is still alive in Rostov-on-Don. A street in the Voroshilovsky district of Rostov-on-Don is named after Vladimir Martovitsky, an ordinary guy, a loader who died, quite by accident. Alexey Aleksandrovich Rusov (1952-2000), who came to the police after military service in the border troops and was a policeman-driver of the PMG-16 (mobile police group) of the Oktyabrsky Department of Internal Affairs of Rostov-on-Don, was summoned to Moscow after the capture of a gang of “phantomas”. The Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, General Nikolai Shchelokov, personally promoted the young junior sergeant immediately to police lieutenant. The all-powerful Shchelokov then really liked the sincere and young police officer from Rostov-on-Don. Alexey Rusov worked in the criminal investigation department, then in the juvenile affairs department. In 1986, he was in Kyiv, attending advanced training courses for employees of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, from where he was sent to eliminate the consequences of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. There Alexey Alexandrovich received a dose of radiation. After Chernobyl, he worked for some time in the penitentiary authorities, then quit and worked as the head of the security service in a commercial organization. In 2000, being a 48-year-old man, Alexey Rusov died as a result of a second heart attack.

Viktor Afanasyevich Salyutin (1940-2000), the second direct participant in the detention of Tolstopyatov and Gorshkov, made a serious career in the fire department. He rose to the rank of major general internal service, served as head of the fire service department of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Rostov region. He died at the age of sixty after a long illness. A street and alley in Rostov-on-Don are named after Alexey Rusov and Victor Salyutin. Evgeniy Kubyshta worked for a long time in the internal affairs bodies of Rostov-on-Don, then retired.

The case of the “Fantômas” gang had an impact on the transformation of the very system of fighting crime in the Soviet Union. As former criminal investigation officer Anatoly Evseev recalls, “The Tolstopyatovs’ gangster “successes” prompted the reorganization and creation of a modern police force. It was in Rostov-on-Don that PMGs were created for the first time in Russia - mobile police groups, patrol cars with a driver and two employees. After the gang was detained with their help, the Rostov experience was spread throughout the country. An additional payment for the rank appeared: junior lieutenant plus 30 rubles, lieutenant - 40, senior officer - 50. They began to strengthen the duty units" (Quoted from: Pilipchuk A. "Citizens judges! Mitigate the punishment! I am a disabled person of banditry!"). Perhaps the gang of Tolstopyatov brothers became the first example of post-war organized crime of this level in Rostov-on-Don, and in the Soviet Union as a whole. Its uniqueness lies in its originality, the virtual absence of connections with the professional criminal world and the existence “outside the field” of the traditional criminal subculture. At the same time, the Soviet law enforcement agencies, which initially had no experience in fighting such criminal groups, began to modernize their organizational structure, improved the mechanisms of activity. In Rostov, both young and old still know about the gang of “phantomas”, retelling to each other rumors and tales born forty years ago.

Materials used:
1. Kasyanov V. Tolstopyatovs. Once upon a time in Rostov // http://samlib.ru/w/wladimir_kasxjanow/tolstopjatovi.shtml.
2. Olenev A. The Tolstopyatov Brothers. A dozen reliable facts from the life of the Rostov “phantomas”.
3. Pilipchuk A. “Citizens judges! Reduce the punishment! I am a disabled person of banditry!” // http://pravo.ru/.

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