Akhat (Alexander) Khafizovich Bragin: biography. Akhat (Alexander) Khafizovich Bragin: biography of the Bandit Greek

Akhat Khafizovich Bragin was born into a Tatar family on the outskirts of Donetsk near the airport, in the village of Oktyabrsky, Kuibyshevsky district. As a child, Bragin played football and was fond of boxing. Rinat Akhmetov and Viktor Yanukovych started with him in the ring.

In his youth, he received the nickname "Alik the Greek". He began his career as a butcher in the market near the Oktyabrskaya mine.

During the years of Perestroika, he took up business, gathered a group of like-minded people (Ryabin, Morozov, Bogdanov), was engaged in operations in the foreign exchange market and the games market. Bragin, thanks to the help of Shamil Ivankov, got a job as a director in Donetsk store number 41. This outlet was part of the structure of the Donetsk wholesale and retail trade base "Ukrtekstiltorg", which was headed by Shamil.

At the end of the 80s, Bragin was already spoken of as the largest entrepreneur in Donetsk. He began investing in various firms that bought and imported computers and VCRs from the West, and opened stores with cassettes and equipment.

When OBKHSS detained the driver-forwarding agent of the Ukrtekstiltorg base, he said that the goods from the base, intended for stores, were sold at inflated prices in the markets of Donetsk and the region, and accused Akhat Bragin of forging documents. Bragin, having learned about the charge, was forced to hide until the freight forwarder withdrew his testimony against him.

Until the early 1990s, a group of like-minded people led by Bragin was involved in providing security services to other entrepreneurs in the Donetsk region. His associates were such well-known entrepreneurs in Donetsk as Fishchuk, Dolidze, Dzhamalov, Galushkin, Dutko, Minayluk. In 1991, Bragin was hired in the meat department of a grocery store, located in the Administrative village of Donetsk.

At this time, entrepreneurial ties were developed with business people from Moscow. Akhat directed all his efforts to joint entrepreneurial activities with businessman Yanosh Efimovich Krantz, whom Boris Kolesnikov introduced him to. Janos Krantz was a major entrepreneur at that time, a partner of Evgeny Kushnir, one of the most famous Luhansk entrepreneurs. Upon arrival from Moldova, Krantz conducted his business in Luhansk, where he lived. In 1987, Krantz created in Lugansk one of the first large cooperatives in the city for the production of consumer goods, but was forced to leave for Donetsk due to disagreements with the entrepreneur Valery Dobroslavsky. Until mid-1992, Bragin also had fruitful cooperation with other large entrepreneurs of the Donetsk region - Frolov, Mazurkevich, Dribny, Avtsin, Braginsky.

Bragin also introduced the group of entrepreneur Givi Nemsadze into his business.

The Central Market of Donetsk, which was managed by his business partner Kolesnikov, brought a lot of income to Akhat's business.

Akhat Khafizovich settled in the Villa Lux mini-hotel on the territory of the Donetsk Botanical Garden.

He extended his influence to dozens of large enterprises in the region, including the Azovstal metallurgical plant and the Khartsyzsk pipe plant, controlled significant financial and business interests of Donetsk, and acquired the Shakhtar football club. Unofficially, he was considered the "master" of Donetsk.

In mid-1992, Akhat Khafizovich invited Janos Krantz to unite financially, to do business together. But Krantz refused, citing the fact that a real businessman should be independent. Thanks to his approach, by the end of 1992, Krantz had become one of the richest people in Ukraine. He owned several factories for the production of paints and varnishes in Donetsk and Lugansk, on which new capacities were built, a significant share in the authorized capital of the then flourishing Donuglekombank, a dry cargo ship of 3 thousand tons with a team of 16 people that had the right to enter foreign ports, two stores and also one of the best cafes in Donetsk at that time "Chervoniy Kut" on Pushkin Boulevard. He also owned a rich office in the Kalininsky district of Donetsk.

But Krantz was turned against the Greek Kushnir and Ryabin. Akhat decided to dot the "i", otherwise feuds and conflicts would still destroy the group, which the others would not fail to take advantage of. The Donetsk prosecutor's office found out that one of the co-founders of the communal enterprise "Lux" is an official from the regional executive committee. For this reason, the local authorities broke the hotel lease agreement with Krantz and handed over the facility to Akhat Bragin. Hotel "Lux" is a former government residence, built in the late 1980s on the day of Mikhail Gorbachev's arrival in Donetsk.

A quarrel between partners in October 1992 took place in a cafe "Chervonyi Kut" (Donetsk). After the incident with the hotel, Krantz ended his business relationship with Bragin. Akhat took the post of general director of the largest Donetsk company "Lux", and also took up publishing, financed the newspaper "Donetskie Novosti".

On December 15, the Donetsk newspaper Gorod published an interview with the then head of the Donetsk MIA Administration, Arkady Boldovsky. The interview was titled "Mafia Showdown: The Police Understand". In it, the chief police officer of the city said that several mafia clans operate in Donetsk, the most powerful of which is headed by a man named Alik the Greek. The general director of the firm "Lux" Bragin wrote a letter to the editorial office of "Gorod", in which he stated that he had been undeservedly recorded in the mafia, thereby insulting his honor and dignity. He argued that such statements hurt his business reputation. The next issue of the Gorod newspaper came out with a published letter from Bragin.

Bragin filed a civil suit in court, demanding the protection of his honor and dignity in the form of a public apology from the offending newspaper "Gorod". The Bragin case was accepted by the chairman of the Voroshilovsky court, Viktor Ivashura. He made a decision: to oblige A. A. Boldovsky to bring a public apology to Akhatia, and to the newspaper Gorod to publish a refutation on the same page on which the interview was published. The presidium of the regional court sent the case on the protection of Bragin's honor and dignity for review.

On August 4, 1995, a group of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Security Service of Ukraine arrived in Donetsk from Kiev. The repeated search in Bragin's residence, carried out with the sanction of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine V. Datsyuk, did not bring any results, and after three days of detention in the SBU pre-trial detention center, Bragin was released.

Assassination attempts

On March 19, 1994, an unsuccessful attempt was made on Akhata near his dovecote in the village of Peski, Yasinovatsky district.

On May 8, 1994, there was a second unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Bragin - already in Donetsk itself, using five grenade launchers. This assassination attempt had no precedents on the territory of the CIS in terms of technique and audacity of execution. Police officers found a GAZ-51 truck with five loaded grenade launchers fixed in the back on one of the streets. The weapon was to be activated by a homemade radio-controlled device made from a children's toy.

Attempt in the Sands

A citizen of Russia Vadim Bolotskikh, nicknamed Moskvich, according to one version, came to the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office himself, according to another, he was detained by the Russian police in Moscow and secretly transferred to Ukraine. However, during the investigation, Bolotskikh insisted that he himself came to the law enforcement agencies of Ukraine and wrote a confession.

It was after his surrender in the spring of 2000 and a similar appearance of another gang member, Sergei Kulev, who at the end of the 90s headed the Luhansk criminal group, that the investigation received a new round. Many versions were confirmed and new facts became known about the crimes committed by the gang since the beginning of the 90s.

reference: At the end of 1993 and beginning of 1994, two residents of Donetsk - the former "thimbler" Yevgeny Kushnir (in 1997 died in a pre-trial detention center, according to the official version, from a heart attack) and a small businessman Anatoly Ryabin (killed in 1996) organized a group of 16 Human. The main "role" of the gang was robbery and murder, including by order. Soon a certain Magamed Aliyev, nicknamed Magician, who was responsible for "useful contacts" with the foreign countries, entered its leadership: the gang received weapons from Chechnya and Yugoslavia. In rented apartments, the police found a large number of Kalashnikov assault rifles, various submachine guns, pistols, grenade launchers, grenades, explosives, etc. - it was possible to arm the regiment.

Soon, the gang became cramped within the framework of the controlled territory and its field of activity. However, the reason for the start of the war with competitors was the murder of one of the authorities in Donetsk, nicknamed Chirik, who was on friendly terms with Kushnir. In retaliation, another criminal authority named Drum was shot, who was friends with the general director of the company "Lux" Akhat Bragin (Alik the Greek). It was he, Grek, Ryabin and Kushnir who were accused of involvement in the murder of Chirik. In fact, the Kushnirovites did not like Bragin's authority and his influence in the region. The conflict, judging by the stories of Kushnir, began back in 1990 - because of Alik's unwillingness to cooperate with Ryabin

Kushnir and Ryabin said that the people of the Greek killed their friend - the thief in law Chirik, - Bolotskikh told at the investigation. - Moreover, they supposedly took money from the widow of Chirik and took his business into their own hands, thereby violating the laws of thieves. For this, they say, the Greek should be killed. Kushnir planned to lure Bragin to Drum's funeral and pay off there. But the idea failed. Then, having learned about Alik's addiction to pigeons and that he regularly visits his dovecote in the village of Peski, on the outskirts of Donetsk, Kushnir decides to remove Bragin there.

The Donetsk press wrote that on March 19, 1994, having driven up close to Grek's car, Kushnir's men began to shoot him from pistols with silencers. Bragin was rescued by his favorite pigeons: Alik managed to hide from the bullets in the dovecote and there he waited until the attackers disappeared. On that day, two of the Greek's guards were killed, and three of his "associates" were wounded.

Assassination attempt near a meat-packing plant

After the assassination attempt in Sands, Bragin became very careful, moved out of the apartment with his family and settled in the "Luxe", surrounded by strong guards. He began to drive only an armored Mercedes. Therefore, for the next attempt, it was decided to use a more powerful weapon than machine guns. On May 8, 1994, in Donetsk, there was a second attempt to assassinate Bragin - this time using grenade launchers. But the kids told the police that a GAZ-51 truck with five loaded grenade launchers in the back was parked near the meat-packing plant, past which the armored Mercedes was supposed to pass. The weapon was to be activated by a radio-controlled device, converted ... from a child's toy.

At the same time, one of Bragin's business associates was also hunted. Kushnir's group planted mine explosives in a passenger car on the street along which the businessman was supposed to pass. When his car caught up with the "mined" car, an explosion thundered. However, the alleged victim was not injured, only the jeep was damaged.

Elimination of the Samsonov brothers

Kushnir, who by that time had already solely dominated the gang, was also hindered by an authority named Samson (Bogdanov).

To develop plans to eliminate competitors, a Moskvich was needed - it was with Kushnir and Ryabin that he figured out how to more reliably eliminate the eldest of the Bogdanov brothers (Samson). However, he himself did not participate in the operation: on the eve of the murder, he flew to Moscow.

And the plan was simple and daring - Samson was having lunch at the same time in the Teatralnoye cafe on Artem Street. And on April 12, 1995, Kushnir, having received information that Samson was heading for lunch, gave the command to start the operation. A VAZ-2109 was stolen in advance, its license plates were replaced with fictitious ones. In this car, two members of the gang (who are no longer alive) drove up to the cafe and, seeing Samson on the threshold, shot him point-blank from pistols with silencers. At the same time, two of Samson's escorts were killed. Having driven off for a couple of kilometers, the “shooters” got into the car waiting for them, and the stolen “Zhiguli” were burned along with their weapons. This was the first of the successful attempts by the gang on competitors. But far from the last.

They decided to remove Samson Jr. when he left the entrance of the house on Ilyich Avenue in the morning. For this, someone from the gang was on duty for several days nearby and reported on the radio about all Bogdanov's movements. The murder was scheduled for August 10, 1995. Kushnir learned that a taxi had been ordered for the victim for a certain time, and ordered him to act. Having let the taxi drive away, the bandits cut his way and began to "water" Bogdanov Jr., who was sitting in the front seat, from machine guns. He died on the spot.

But the most important "enemy" for the gang was Bragin, who, as Kushnir and Ryabin assumed, could not forgive them for attempting to kill themselves and killing their people

Fatal attempt on the Shakhtar stadium

Before the start of new hostilities, Kushnir put pressure on the psyche of Bragin's business partners in every possible way: they say, it is not safe to deal with the Greek, you see, his people are being removed one by one. Along the way, rumors circulated about the presence in the region of a group capable of solving any issues, including the elimination of unwanted ones. Of course, this omnipotent group meant the "Kushnirovites".

In the second half of 1995, Kushnir and Ryabin decided that the time had come to kill the Greek. Knowing that Bragin, being the president and an ardent fan of FC Shakhtar, does not miss a single match of his favorite team, Kushnir suggested organizing the murder directly at the stadium. We decided to plant a bomb at the entrance to the guest tribune. For this, they needed a Moskvich.

Later, the Russians searched the Bolotskys' Moscow apartment. They found several notebooks in which he diligently kept notes on the explosive case.

For the operation, they purchased plastic explosives of increased power for special purposes - with a fuse and a remote control of industrial production with four additional fuses and a remote control in the form of a key fob. At first, it was planned to plant a bomb in the guest box, but it was locked, and it was risky to break the locks. And in mid-September, members of the group A. Akulov and I. Filipenko (both are no longer alive), for several nights, hollowed out a niche in the concrete base at the entrance to the guest box, right under a wooden step, and laid about 5 kilograms of explosives, installing a remote detonator in Standby mode.

The bomb recess, measuring approximately 40x30x20 centimeters, was cemented by the miners so that nothing was noticeable. In addition, the place of the bookmark was covered with a wooden step.

It was planned that Bragin would be killed at Shakhtar's match with some foreign team (against Belgian Brugge). But for some reason he didn’t come. Ryabin and Kushnir have already begun to worry, fearing that the batteries will run out and the device will not work.

Yes, as the experts explained, the batteries could well be discharged. In addition, both during and after the laying of the bomb in Donetsk it was damp, it rained (this was confirmed by the investigation and the hydrometeorological center). A carefully prepared operation could fail due to some kind of batteries. Therefore, we decided to repeat the attempt at the next game - such was the meeting between Shakhtar and Tavriya Simferopol on October 15, 1995.

About 10 gang members took part in the operation at the stadium. The rest of the "Kushnirovites" dispersed along the route of Bragin and reported on his movement by radio.

I. Filipenko, wearing the uniform of a militia captain, was in the immediate vicinity of the tribune in order to activate the bomb using a remote control. His candidacy was not chosen by chance: Filipenko, who had worked as a blaster in mines for several years, knew his job well. The imaginary captain at the stadium was covered by a real threat officer from one of the Donetsk regional police departments (he was missing).

The bomber pressed the button at about 17 o'clock, when Bragin and his entourage were walking to the box. Together with Alik the Greek, five were killed, three were seriously wounded. As the bandits had expected, in the panic that arose at the stadium, all the participants in the terrorist attack managed to calmly "disperse" around the cars that were already waiting for them.

At the request of the Ukrainian side, the Israelis found this resident of Haifa (formerly a Donetsk resident), who told about Kushnir's visit to him. The guest boasted that he had “flunked” the Greek, and demanded from the owner 300 thousand dollars, which he allegedly owed to Chirik (who was a racketeer). The money, according to Kushnir, should go to "a good war" with the remaining competitors: he was very eager to take control over the lucrative sectors of the economy and become "the most important" in the Donetsk region.

Kushnir's plans did not come true. After the explosion at Shakhtar, law enforcement agencies and business rivals forced the gang to go underground not for a month and a half, as Kushnir thought, but for a whole year. The Kushnirovites' entry into the arena became possible only in the spring of 1996

Investigation

Vyacheslav Sinenko

On December 10, 2009, the Donetsk Court of Appeal released from custody Major of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Vyacheslav Sinenko, who is suspected of murdering the president of FC Shakhtar Akhat Bragin in 1995.

The court decided to send the criminal case for additional investigation, and to change the measure of restraint to 60-year-old Sinenko not to leave the place. He suffers from coronary artery disease and is partially paralyzed.

Immediately after the announcement of this resolution, Sinenko was carried out from behind bars in his arms by his lawyer and a journalist of a local publication. After a stroke, Sinenko cannot move independently. For the relatives and the accused himself, the court's decision on release came as a complete surprise. With joy, Sinenko could not utter a word.

The Prosecutor General's Office considers Sinenko involved in the murder of the former owner of Shakhtar Akhat Bragin.

Sinenko's lawyer said that the witnesses were pressured to say that they had not seen Sinenko at this concert. Sinenko believes that the case against him was fabricated by the former Prosecutor General of Ukraine Gennady Vasilyev.

reference: In October 1995, as a result of an explosion during a football match, the president of the football team and 5 other people from his inner circle, including the SBU Colonel Viktor Dvoynykh, were killed. In the spring of 2004, Sinenko was arrested in Greece, where he fled because of an attempt on his life. A year later, the suspect was extradited to Ukraine. On February 12, 2007, the Donetsk Court of Appeal convicted Sinenko for participation in the murder of Akhat Bragin and his guards to life imprisonment. On September 4, 2008, the Supreme Court overturned this verdict as not motivated and not objective. The Donetsk Court of Appeal began to try Sinenko again on October 29, 2008 - already in the new composition of the panel of judges.

In this criminal case, dozens of high-ranking officials were summoned to court as witnesses. Including People's Deputy Rinat Akhmetov. But they never appeared in court.

Bragin Akhat Khafizovich (aka Alexander Sergeevich Bragin, aka Alik the Greek)

The president of the football club Shakhtar (until October 15, 1995), stood at the origins of the creation of the largest financial and industrial group in Ukraine, which, after his death, became the main part of the business conglomerate of Rinat Akhmetov.

Bragin was born into a Tatar family on the outskirts of Donetsk near the airport, in the village of Oktyabrsky, Kuibyshevsky district. In his youth, he received the nickname "Alik the Greek."

THE START OF THE WAR

Nevertheless, for some reason, many experts in the fight against organized crime believe that March 19, 1994, was the day of such a beginning - then there was an attempt on Alik Grek's life in the village of Peski, Yasinovatsky district. But, as we already know, the shooting of prominent businessmen and bandits began earlier.

After Bragin refuses financial cooperation to Anatoly Ryabin, the situation becomes especially tense. As Vadim Bolotskikh testified during the investigation, Kushnir and Ryabin believed that the people of the Greek also killed their friend, a thief in law nicknamed Chirik (this happened much later). In fact, the group that later became known as the Rowan-Kushnir-Aliyev gang, and even later the Kushnir gang, grew up on the ruins of Chirik's inheritance and gained its fame only because most of the crimes they committed were solved. Having learned that Alik the Greek regularly visits his beloved dovecote in Sands, they decided to remove Bragin there.

In Peski, near the reservoir, there is a children's pulmonological sanatorium. There were no children in the sanatorium at that time, and part of the building was rented for office by the firm "Lux" (the so-called "old" Lux ").

Half an hour before the assassination attempt, three masked submachine gunners stopped a white Moskvich traveling along Prospekt Mira. The raiders did not bother themselves with unnecessary conversations: they threw the driver out of the passenger compartment and drove off in an unknown direction.

In the recreation area, Bragin's car was ambushed - the exit from the sanatorium was blocked. Only thanks to a happy coincidence, Bragin remained alive then - due to unforeseen circumstances, those who were waiting prematurely opened fire from machine guns (according to another version - from pistols with silencers), used a combat grenade.

Bragin survived - he was rescued by pigeons: Alik the Greek took refuge from the bullets in the dovecote. Two employees of "Lux", acting as guards of the director, died on the spot, four people were seriously injured, one of them - the caretaker of the sanatorium - died in the hospital. Bragin was also taken to hospital No. 21. The doctor on duty reported the incident to the regional police department. When the riot police arrived at the hospital, the Lux guards were already stationed there. Both the police and the people of Bragin were on duty near the chamber itself.

After leaving the hospital, Alexander Sergeevich, as he was called in the world, moved to live in his office located in the Donetsk Botanical Garden. The former hotel of the Ministry of Coal Industry "Lux" became his residence. The hotel rooms have been seen by many celebrities, members of the government and parliament have stayed in them. While in Donetsk, the President of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife Raisa Maksimovna also used the services of Lux. Since 1989, the respectable three-storey building has become the property of Lux CJSC. Tourists Pugacheva, Kirkorov, Kobzon, Anastasia and other pop stars preferred to stay only in the Botanical Garden. "In" Luxe "- as in paradise", - Metropolitan Vladimir once remarked, blessing the hotel for many years. The hotel was guarded by a private security company "Kodon". It was armed with pump-action shotguns. The territory of the company was carefully guarded, Bragin himself moved around the city exclusively accompanied by reliable guards and in an armored Mercedes. The wife and children of the general director lived practically without leaving the territory of the "Lux".

I only remember his front door near some building, which is not far from the arbitration court on Chelyuskintsev Street, when a small bulldog jumped out of an anthracite Mercedes, and then a small frail man appeared, who immediately disappeared, as if by magic sticks - it was covered with about five umbrellas, painted to match the "gelding". "It's from the snipers on the rooftops." - explained a colleague who has become skilled in crime - from the memoirs of the author of the article.

Akhat Bragin was born on February 26. Donetsk people still remember who it is. Strange, he always seemed to me almost an old man, but in fact in the year of his death he was only 42 years old.

At the end of the eighties, active Donetsk residents began to master a new type of activity for society - private entrepreneurship, which was finally allowed in the USSR. Typically, the business consisted of mediation and trade, but over time, the activities of some entrepreneurs have acquired an impressive scale. It is worth remembering a few of the most iconic people who began their ascent around that time. The first in this galaxy was Akhat Bragin, a man who was engaged in various lucrative businesses back in Soviet times, for which in 1971 he was even put on trial. However, by the end of the eighties, he legalized his business and was considered one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the region. At the same time, evil tongues asserted that the Tatar from the Oktyabrsky settlement was, incidentally, a crime boss nicknamed Alik the Greek. However, throughout the USSR, most of the successful entrepreneurs of the late eighties - early nineties had a reputation as persons, in one way or another, associated with crime. At the same time, Yevgeny Shcherban, the deputy director of the Kirovskaya mine, began building his own business, soon becoming a landmark figure for the region.
Today it is difficult to distinguish fiction from the real biography of Bragin. He was considered a crime boss, his subordinates were credited with organizing the murders of several competitors, and together with Shcherban, he is considered one of the founders of the Industrial Union of Donbass. In 1994-95, several crime bosses were killed in Donetsk, which, according to some authors, was a consequence of the war between the groups of Bragin and Kushnir ...
It is only known for certain that under the leadership of Bragin, already in the early 90s, a strong and profitable financial and industrial group was formed, which grew stronger before our eyes, absorbing various markets, firms and enterprises of the region. In August 1994, Bragin also became the owner of the Shakhtar football team, which made him a public figure. Despite the criminal reputation of the businessman, the police have never been able to find facts of violation of the law by Akhat Khafizovich. Moreover, when the chief policeman of the city, Arkady Boldovsky, gave an interview in which he accused the businessman of creating a criminal group, he, offended, filed an honor claim in court and won the case.
The thin and short Tatar seemed indestructible, but on October 15, 1995, during the Shakhtar - Tavriya match, an explosion occurred at the Donetsk stadium, sending Akhat Bragin and his guard to the next world. The all-powerful businessman was simply torn to pieces, so it was possible to identify the body only by the clock. According to Donetsk journalist Yevgeniy Yasenov, “for Donetsk, the murder of Bragin was an outstanding event: it was not just a person who was leaving, but an entire era. His funeral turned out to be appropriate. “It was a terrible sight. I looked from the window of my apartment along Marshal Zhukov Street - and I saw a huge crowd of people in long leather cloaks moving towards the mosque, and gloomy guards on the sides. And all this - in complete silence, only foliage rustled under their feet and a helicopter quietly murmured in the sky, "one of the residents of the Oktyabrskaya mine village, where Bragin was born and lived, describes the funeral procession."
A year before his death, Bragin allocated money for the construction of the first mosque in the Donetsk region. After his death, she received the name "Akhat-Jami" in memory of its creator. (The mosque was completed and opened in 1999. In 2014, during the battles for the airport, Ukrainian artillery fired at Akhat-Jami, damaging its dome.)
The death of Bragin, Shcherban, Momot and a number of reputable businessmen of Donetsk, who laid down their heads in 95-96, opened the way to the Donbass Olympus for new people who had previously been in the shadow of the first wave of entrepreneurs.

Akhat Bragin- Donetsk crime boss Alik Grek, president of the Shakhtar football club until October 15, 1995, was at the origins of the creation of the largest financial and industrial group in Ukraine, which, after his death, became the main part of Rinat Akhmetov's business conglomerate.

Akhat Hafizovich Bragin
Occupation: crime boss Alik the Greek, entrepreneur Date of birth: February 26, 1953
Place of birth: Stalino, USSR
Citizenship: USSR, Ukraine
Died: October 15, 1995
Place of death: stadium "Shakhtar", Donetsk, Ukraine

Akhat Bragin was born into a Tatar family on the outskirts of Stalin near the airport, in the village of Oktyabrsky, Kuibyshevsky district. Brother - Rashid Evgenievich Bragin(born December 28, 1955), deputy of the Donetsk Regional Council. As a child, Bragin played football and was fond of boxing. Rinat Akhmetov and Viktor Yanukovych started with him in the ring. In young age Akhat Bragin received the nickname "Alik the Greek". He began his career as a butcher in the market near the Oktyabrskaya mine.

During the years of Perestroika Akhat Bragin went into business, gathered a group of like-minded people (Ryabin, Morozov, Bogdanov), was engaged in operations in the foreign exchange market and the games market. Akhat Bragin Thanks to the help of Shamil Ivankov, I got a job as a director in Donetsk store number 41. This outlet was part of the structure of the Donetsk wholesale and retail trade base "Ukrtekstiltorg", which was headed by Shamil.

On November 24, 1971, the Kuibyshevsky District Court sentenced Bragin to imprisonment conditionally with a correctional term of two years.
In the late 80s about Bragin have already been spoken of as the largest entrepreneur in Donetsk. He began investing in various firms that bought and imported computers and VCRs from the West, and opened stores with cassettes and equipment.
When OBKhSS detained the driver-forwarding agent of the Ukrtekstiltorg base, he said that the goods from the base, intended for stores, were sold at inflated prices in the markets of Donetsk and the region, and accused Akhatya Bragina in forgery. Akhat Bragin upon learning of the charge, he was forced to hide until the freight forwarder withdrew his testimony against him.

Until the early 1990s, a group of like-minded people led by Bragin was involved in providing security services to other entrepreneurs in the Donetsk region. His associates were such well-known entrepreneurs in Donetsk as Fishchuk, Dolidze, Dzhamalov, Galushkin, Dutko, Minayluk. In 1991 Bragin was hired to work in the meat department of a grocery store, located in the Administrative settlement of the city of Donetsk.

At this time, entrepreneurial ties were developed with business people from Moscow. Howl directed all his efforts to joint entrepreneurial activities with businessman Yanosh Efimovich Krantz, whom Boris Kolesnikov introduced him to.
Janos Krantz was a major entrepreneur at that time, a partner of Evgeny Kushnir, one of the most famous Luhansk entrepreneurs. Upon arrival from Moldova, Krantz conducted his business in Luhansk, where he lived. In 1987, Krantz created in Lugansk one of the first large cooperatives in the city for the production of consumer goods, but was forced to leave for Donetsk due to disagreements with the entrepreneur Valery Dobroslavsky. Have Bragin Until mid-1992, there was also fruitful cooperation with other large entrepreneurs of the Donetsk region - Frolov, Mazurkevich, Dribny, Avtsin, Braginsky.

Bragin also introduced into his business a group of entrepreneur Givi Nemsadze.
Big business income Akhatya Bragina brought the Central Market of Donetsk, which was managed by his business partner Kolesnikov.
Akhat Bragin settled in the mini-hotel "Villa Lux" on the territory of the Donetsk Botanical Garden.
He extended his influence to dozens of large enterprises in the region, including the Azovstal metallurgical plant and the Khartsyzsk pipe plant, controlled significant financial and business interests of Donetsk, and acquired the Shakhtar football club. Unofficially, he was considered the "master" of Donetsk.

Mid 1992 Akhat Bragin invited Janos Krantz to unite financially, to do business together. But Krantz refused, citing the fact that a real businessman should be independent. Thanks to his approach, by the end of 1992, Krantz had become one of the richest people in Ukraine. He owned several factories for the production of paints and varnishes in Donetsk and Lugansk, on which new capacities were built, a significant share in the authorized capital of the then flourishing Donuglekombank, a dry cargo ship of 3 thousand tons with a team of 16 people that had the right to enter foreign ports, two stores and also one of the best cafes in Donetsk at that time "Chervoniy Kut" on Pushkin Boulevard. He also owned a rich office in the Kalininsky district of Donetsk.

But Krantz was turned against the Greek Kushnir and Ryabin. Akhat Bragin decided to dot the i's, otherwise strife and conflicts would have destroyed the group anyway, which the others would not fail to take advantage of. The Donetsk prosecutor's office found out that one of the co-founders of the communal enterprise "Lux" is an official from the regional executive committee. For this reason, the local authorities terminated the hotel lease agreement with Krantz and handed over the property Akhatu Bragin... Hotel "Lux" is a former government residence, built in the late 1980s on the day of Mikhail Gorbachev's arrival in Donetsk.

A quarrel between partners in October 1992 took place in a cafe "Chervonyi Kut" (Donetsk). Following the hotel incident, Krantz terminated business with Bragin. Bragin took the post of general director of the largest Donetsk company "Lux", and also took up publishing, financed the newspaper "Donetsk News".
Akhat Bragin and Rinat Akhmetov controlled Evgeny Shcherban's Russian vodka business.
On March 19, 1994, an unsuccessful attempt was made on Akhata near his dovecote in the village of Peski, Yasinovatsky district.
This was not the first assassination attempt. Someone named Boatswain organized thimblers in the city (the authorities of Filippok, Banabak and Mula). One day they drove up to the house Akhatya Bragina And they shot the windows of Bragin for a couple. When Bragin found out who was shooting, they brought Boatswain home to Rinat Akhmetov. Bragin was at home with Akhmetov. When the Boatswain entered, Rinat shot him, but he was able to escape.

On May 8, 1994, there was a second unsuccessful attempt Bragin's murders- already in Donetsk itself, using five grenade launchers. This assassination attempt had no precedents on the territory of the CIS in terms of technique and audacity of execution. Police officers found a GAZ-51 truck with five loaded grenade launchers fixed in the back on one of the streets. The weapon was to be activated by a homemade radio-controlled device made from a children's toy.

Bragin did not hesitate to hand over his enemies to the police. For example, in July 1994, 37 Dolidze militants were detained by means of the head of the Internal Affairs Directorate Gavrilenko S.D., on whom Bragin had direct influence.
On December 15, the Donetsk newspaper Gorod published an interview with the then head of the Donetsk MIA Administration, Arkady Boldovsky. The interview was titled "Mafia Showdown: The Police Understand". In it, the chief police officer of the city said that several mafia clans operate in Donetsk, the most powerful of which is headed by a man named Alik the Greek. General Director of the firm "Lux" Akhat Bragin wrote a letter to the editorial office of "Gorod" in which he stated that he was undeservedly recorded in the mafia, thereby insulting his honor and dignity. Akhat Bragin claimed that such statements hurt his business reputation. The next issue of the Gorod newspaper came out with a published letter from Bragin.

Akhat Bragin filed a civil suit in court, demanding the protection of his honor and dignity in the form of a public apology from the newspaper "Gorod" that had offended him. The Bragin case was accepted by the chairman of the Voroshilovsky court, Viktor Ivashura. He made a decision: to oblige A. A. Boldovsky to bring a public apology to Akhat, and to the newspaper Gorod to publish a refutation on the same page on which the interview was published. The presidium of the regional court sent the case on the protection of Bragin's honor and dignity for review.
Boldovsky said from the pages of the "City":
He climbed into someone else's garden, that is, the dovecote, where he was detained red-handed. Given his youth, the Kuibyshevskiy District Court on November 24, 1971 sentenced him to a suspended imprisonment with a two-year correctional term, and in the courtroom he was released from custody. On February 17, 1974, together with his brothers, out of hooligan motives, he beat up an underage guy. The injured party calms down, since no grave consequences have come for her, and the case is terminated

On August 4, 1995, a group of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Security Service of Ukraine arrived in Donetsk from Kiev. The repeated search in Bragin's residence, carried out with the sanction of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine V. Datsyuk, did not bring any results, and after three days of detention in the SBU pre-trial detention center Bragin was released.
On October 15, 1995 in Donetsk at the Shakhtar stadium during a football match Akhat Bragin was killed by an explosion of a powerful radio-controlled device. Five kilograms of plastic (about 11.5 kg of TNT) were used as explosives. Bragin's body was identified by the Rolex watch he wore. With Bragin, the head of his personal guard, Viktor Dvoynykh, who had previously served as a KGB colonel, also died tragically. Yevgeny Shcherban's friend: “Lazarenko ordered Zhenya. I think Bragina is the same. " The perpetrators were subsequently announced to be people from the group of Yevgeny Kushnir and the killer Vadim Bolotskikh. Police Major Vyacheslav Sinenko was sentenced to life imprisonment in the case of Bragin's murder.
In 1996, Sergei Bubka, on the advice of Akhat Bragin, created the Mont Blanc company.

Family of Akhata Bragin

Daughter of Akhata Bragin, Dilyara, born in 1985, died in 2009 from heart failure. Son Ravil, born in 1989, entrepreneur, lives in Donetsk.

Business structures of Akhatya Bragin

A. Bragin owned a number of organizations, among them:
Bragin was the founder of the ARS company (co-founder of the Lemtrans company). The name "ARS" consists of the first letters from the names "Alik", "Rinat", "Samson". Alik is Bragin, Rinat is Akhmetov, and Samson is Bogdanov
Bragin was the founder and CEO of the Donetsk firm "Lux"
"Ukrtekstiltorg".
A. Bragin was one of the five (together with Alexander Momot, Yevgeny Shcherban, Rinat Akhmetov) founders of the Industrial Union of Donbass Corporation (ISD)
The company for the sale of oil products "Gefest" was created by Akhat Bragin together with Yevgeny Shcherban and Rinat Akhmetov.
Firm "Lux". (Subsequently, the firm passed to Rinat Akhmetov)
System Capital Management (SCM

Ahatya Bragin's charitable activities

When Alexander Gaidukov was killed by a stray bullet, his family received from A. Bragin an amount "ten times more than the city authorities allocated."

Rinat Akhmetov believes that:
Alexander Sergeevich really was a patriot of the Donetsk region and loved his city very much. He was not engaged in deciding who was allowed into the region and who was not. It's just that people who came to him with bad intentions had no future here.

Memorable dates of Akhatya Bragin

November 6, 1992 - murder of Vladimir Goldin
November 10, 1992 - assassination of Janos Krantz
1993-1994 - a series of murders in 1993/1994
1993-1994 - the first murders of the Nemsadze group
March 19, 1994 - the first attempt on the life of Akhata Bragin (aka Alik the Greek)
May 8, 1994 - the second attempt on Akhata Bragin (aka Alik the Greek)
September 2, 1994 - the murder of Eduard Braginsky (aka Chirik)
November 30, 1994 - shootout on Shakhtostroiteley Boulevard
April 12, 1995 - the murder of Yakov Bogdanov (Samson Sr.)
August 10, 1995 - the murder of Artur Bogdanov (Samson Jr.)
October 15, 1995 - the murder of Akhat Bragin (aka Alik the Greek)

Perpetuation of the memory of Akhat Bragin

The only mosque in Donetsk "Akhat-Jami" is named after Akhata Bragin

Bragin Akhat Khafizovich (aka Alexander Sergeevich Bragin, aka Alik the Greek)

Bragin was born into a Tatar family on the outskirts of Donetsk near the airport, in the village of Oktyabrsky, Kuibyshevsky district. In his youth, he received the nickname "Alik the Greek".

The beginning of the war

The second attempt on Bragin

To physically eliminate Alik the Greek, the next time it was decided to use more powerful weapons than machine guns. And on May 8, 1994, in Donetsk, there was a second attempt to assassinate Akhati Bragin - and again unsuccessful. The police officers managed to find in time on one of the streets of Donetsk a GAZ-51 truck with five loaded grenade launchers in the back. The weapon was to be activated by a homemade radio-controlled device, converted from a child's toy.

On the night of May 9, 1994, a deafening explosion thundered in the Kalininsky district of Donetsk. These were specialists from the military unit and the police who neutralized the contents of the truck body, which had been parked for almost ten days on Sechenov Street (between the meat-packing plant and the winery).

And in the back of an old GAZ-51 there were five loaded grenade launchers and a large grenade. By a system of wires, the guns and ammunition were connected to a car battery located here.

On the day after the directed explosion, the then head of the Donetsk Department of Internal Affairs, Militia Major General V.N. Varaka. He said that, according to experts, the explosion could have occurred in two cases. Firstly, when the battery is discharged, and its charge, as it was established, was already running out. The possibility of an explosion from a remote control signal was also allowed. In addition, the dangerous cargo could be mined. In short, attempts to tow a truck with a deadly filling out of town or to quietly neutralize the structure on the spot could end tragically. Then the decision was made: to blow up the deadly structure on the spot.

Who personally made this decision, General Varaka did not say. He only said that, in addition to the police chiefs, the heads of the regional state administration, the prosecutor's office, and the SBU had arrived on Sechenov Street. Apparently, for such extremely important cases, a decision-making procedure is provided, and it was followed. They immediately outlined an urgent action plan and began to implement it.

The area where the explosive truck was placed was cordoned off by the police. Residents of nearby houses were taken to the shelter. At the same time, as the head of the Department of Internal Affairs put it, they understood the situation correctly and did not grumble.

They drove up KamAZ trucks with huge concrete slabs, set up "screens" - barriers - from these slabs so that nearby buildings would not be damaged by shell fragments and a blast wave.

The explosion, which took place at 1:00 am on May 8-9, was powerful. But the experts planned the direction in such a way that its force was directed upward into the air. That is why the deafening action did not do any harm - the air wave only knocked out the glass in some windows of the winery building.

Then, in May-June 1994, there was an active search for organizers and performers of the failed, but carefully prepared action. Different versions were expressed about who should have become her victim. The directions of the search, as usual, were determined by the evidence that was found at the scene.

GAZ-51 was from the old, made 30-35 years ago. The license plates (01-49DTSA) attached to the car were stolen from the ZIL, which was being repaired at the time, owned by the Kirovsky Ors. Belonging to GAZ, the origin of the grenade launchers was also then established. But the true details of the preparation for the crime, who and how participated in it, are still unknown. Only the members of Kushnir's gang, who survived, testified at the investigation and in court about what they knew from that fact. But the defendants themselves, as claimed, had nothing to do with the truck with explosives, and knew about this episode only by hearsay.

They said that a GAZ truck with loaded barrels had been installed along the proposed route of Bragin's vehicles. The grenade launchers in the back, camouflaged with a tarpaulin awning, were aimed at the roadway of Ilyich Avenue. The trunks, as they argued in conversations with accomplices Akulov and Filipenko, should have fired at the right moment from a signal from a radio-controlled remote device. This device has been converted from a child's toy (driven car). The implementation of the plan was prevented by the police, who discovered the "lawn". It is believed that the reason for the detection was the "knock"

The assassination of Eduard Braginsky

The death of Chirik and four days later of Dvorny marked the end of an era ...
Boris Mikhailovich Avtsen, born in 1936, who died in 1993, played an important role in the formation of Chirik. He had the nicknames Borya Donetskiy and Tselka. For his 56 years, a native of the Donetsk region, Boris Avtsen, served his sentence twice. And both times for the murder of those who insulted him. People who knew Avzen closely characterize him as a principled, honest and decent person in his own way. He resolved many disputes and enjoyed serious authority on either side of the barbed wire. Many well-known criminal groups have gone through his "consultations". Nevertheless, Boris Mikhailovich knew how to remain in the shadows.

In the high-profile case of 1990 about the theft of imported goods in the Donetsk trading system, Avtsen was among the suspects. The essence of the matter is this: from the trading base, bypassing the retail network, a group of imported goods worth hundreds of thousands of rubles ended up in thrift stores. The accounting department, on the other hand, documented the movement of goods at state prices and exclusively in the direction of manufactured goods stores. In the opinion of competent persons, Avtsen had a serious impact on the formation of organized crime in Donetsk, on the recognition of its leaders in Russia and not only. If he hadn't died so early, who knows, maybe the recent history of Donetsk organized crime could have developed differently and would have been less bloody. Boris Mikhailovich lived on Leninsky Prospekt, and in recent years on Perekopskaya Street in the Kirovsky District. He was very fond of pigeons and playing cards. I played for large sums. He had an influential circle of acquaintances, covering trade and catering workers.

Economic changes made him one of the founders of the Miner company, located on the street of the 50th anniversary of the USSR, near the central collective farm market. According to operational sources, the money for the commercial projects of Avzen was received from Russian authorities, who were already cramped in Mother Moscow and its environs. Undercover sources testified about Avtsen's connections with Russian lawyers, who recorded the participation of the Donetsk authority at the all-Union gatherings. Boris Donetskiy's health was undermined by cirrhosis of the liver. To alleviate his suffering, he took drugs. During the attack, Avtsen died in the hospital after another injection. The manager at his funeral was the Makeevsky criminal authority Eduard Braginsky, nicknamed Chirik, who was soon "crowned" in Moscow as a thief in law.

Braginsky grew up in a typical mining quarter on the outskirts of the Chervonogvardeisky district of Makeevka. He studied at high school No. 58. Chirik's classmates with a grin recalled the times when ubiquitous journalists in the early 90s were frequenting the school, preparing publications about the diligent student Edik. Either Braginsky thus corrected his bad reputation of youth, or the resourceful sharks of the pen tried to earn the favor and material gratitude of the hospitable authority. We must pay tribute to Braginsky: he studied and behaved badly. But he famously boxed in sports sections and fulfilled the standards of a master of sports in boxing. In fact, he belonged to the category of ordinary street punks and walked the typical path of a courtyard bully. From 1979 to 1982, the biography of Braginsky is replete with three convictions, and on the territory of Russia, where he traded on robbery voyages.

Eduard Braginsky was also suspected of arms trafficking. According to the published data, there was no other compromising material on him. Allegedly, it was Eduard Emmanuilovich who was the "roof" of Janos Krantz after his move to Donetsk from Luhansk. And allegedly in August 1993, 30 units of firearms (Makarov carbines and pistols) were sent to Chirik from Transcaucasia. They were brought in a refrigerator along with citrus fruits. The Donetsk authority allegedly successfully sold the weapon and asked to double the party, which was done. The destination was Rostov. Evil tongues asserted that Chirik let the weapon go into more advantageous hands than the Rostovites indescribably let down. Threats and promises to kill the Makeyevka thief sounded from the Don expanses. So the options for ordering may be different, since the final phase of those events occurred exactly in the last days of Chirik.

The etymology of this nickname has remained a mystery to many. There is an assumption that he received it for his decoration: a massive amulet of red gold, which he never parted with. They say that earlier Edik bore the nickname "Chervonny", which was then shortened. they also say that he received the nickname Chirik because he liked to pay in a taxi in ten-ruble bills.

Chirik often traveled to Paris, Madrid, San Francisco, New York, managed to establish contacts in Sicily, controlled part of the manufacturing and trade business and sometimes served as an arbitrator. His favorite car was a convertible convertible. He never surrounded himself with guards, declaring that he was a fatalist. Braginsky did not carry weapons either.

An important detail! Chirik was crowned in Moscow for a large sum, which he transferred to the common fund. Thieves-in-law of the old leaven called such "early ripeners" and were not very fond of them. Although, what kind of love is there.

On September 2, 1994, at about 13:00, death overtook Braginsky in the form of a long-haired brunette under 30 years old, who released a long submachine gun. During these hours, Chirik and Anatoly Ryabin were having dinner at the Chervony Kut cafe, which until recently belonged to Janos Krantz. Both were waiting for the arrival of Shakhtar sports school coach Evgeniy Mizevich and dentist Arkady Baddu. The meeting was supposedly supposed to settle the conflict between Ryabin and Mizevich. Before his visit to "Chervony Kut" Eduard Emmanuilovich underwent a preventive examination at the central clinical hospital, and a little earlier he visited the south, from where he returned rested and tanned ...

Chirik and Ryabin went out onto the terrace, waiting for the waiter to bring orange juice. According to another version, Braginky was with Ryabin and another friend. In those minutes, a long-haired brunette in a red baseball cap appeared, who most likely wore a wig (hair fell down on his shoulders). "Closed," said the waitress, and immediately saw in front of her a short machine like "Uzi".

The visitor smiled at the bewildered woman and followed to the entrance. Chirik, in black with glitter trousers and a striped sleeveless jacket, stood with his back. From the suddenly elongated and pale faces of his interlocutors, who were facing the exit, he realized that something serious was happening. Braginsky turned. In the blink of an eye, the package was ripped off and thrown aside. The last thing Chirik saw was the barrel pointed in his direction. The line went through Braginsky. Two of his companions were seriously wounded by gunshot and were soon taken to hospital. The stranger, who did not even try to hide his face, just as calmly went out and disappeared in a car ...

In reality, "Chervonyi Kut" has not yet been closed. Several pairs of visitors sat at tables and drank coffee. As it should be in such situations, most fell to the floor, but there was one girl who decided to see what was happening and, despite the opposition of the companion who dragged her to the floor, looked ... She survived.

The shooter's departure was covered by an accomplice. Witnesses saw how two young guys ran away from the side of the cafe through the courtyard of Hospital No. 5, and then got into a white car.

The killer fired from a shortened submachine gun. Experts soon established the exact brand of the weapon: the "Wolf" assault rifle is a Chechen novelty produced in Chechnya on legal terms. The machine gun was placed under glass in the Donetsk Museum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. A note rested nearby: "The well-known" thief in law "E. Braginsky, nicknamed Chirik, was killed from this machine gun. The authorities of the near and far abroad came to see Edik on his last journey. A hundred foreign cars followed the luxurious coffin.

Five months after the shooting at Chervon Kut, Yevgeny Mizevich will be shot in Moscow. Also a possible customer ...

Eduard Braginsky was actually the last of the thieves in law who actively influenced the formation of organized crime in the Donetsk region. With his departure, the criminal leaders, relying on thieves' concepts, gave up their positions. Some chose to quietly and permanently leave the local criminal arena (although in this case not everyone had a chance to meet a calm old age), others left Ukraine, making them only guess about their future fate.

Four days after the destruction of Braginsky, the last active carrier of the traditional thieves' idea, a 45-year-old resident of Donetsk, Mikhail Dvorny, died, who did not yet have the status of a thief in law, but was preparing to undergo this honorable procedure (not without the help of Chirik, of course) in Moscow.

Mikhail Ivanovich Dvorny lived in house No. 1 on Kislovodskaya street in the Kuibyshevsky district for about thirty years. His neighbors were openly afraid and disliked, describing him after his death as a cunning, resourceful and rude person. Addiction to drugs in his beardless youth in 1984 turned into two years of corrective labor for Dvorny. Subsequently, he repeatedly underwent a course of drug addiction treatment and, it is worth giving credit, almost overcame the addiction. In the 80s, Dvorny was one of the first businessmen who realized the enormous financial opportunities from the drug trade. Criminal elements with experience assured that the growth of Dvorny's authority was influenced by his ability to help (usually with money) those who needed a bribe to save them from time. True, then the debtor had to work out the service, which once again confirmed: Dvorny did nothing without personal gain.

The authority met the new economic relations with the rank of leader of the group that controlled the collective farm market on Privokzalnaya Square. Along with the needs, the appetites of the station lads gradually grew. Operational sources testified to the friction that now and then arose between Dvorny and Samvel Martirosyan. During another conflict in the spring of 1992, Mikhail Ivanovich received a gunshot wound in Makeyevka. Then his team clashed with Leonid Fishchuk's team about the market in the Solnechny microdistrict. In the same period, the authority from Kislovodskaya managed to take control of Donetsk firms that specialized in call girls. The legal activities of M.I. Dvorny concerned a number of large and small shops in the vicinity of the railway station.

On the afternoon of September 6, a beige Zhiguli of the sixth model slowed down near house No. 1 on Kislovodskaya Street. A short, dark-haired guy in a black T-shirt came out of the salon and quickly headed into the courtyard of the house. He was holding a submachine gun in his hands. At that moment, the owner was visited by two people who had no obvious relation to the underworld: the 47-year-old director of a building materials store, Andrei B., and a 32-year-old employee of a trading enterprise in the village of DOK, Elena K. at the table in the yard of the house. All three, including Dvorny himself, were mortally wounded. The killer fired almost two automatic horns. When the ambulance arrived, only the store director, who died the next day, showed signs of life ...

Shootout on the Boulevard

On November 30, 1994, almost in the very center of the city, on Shakhtostroiteley Boulevard, a real battle took place: cars stuffed with explosives exploded, fired from a grenade launcher, but the one on whom the whole hunt was arranged remained alive.

At nine o'clock in the evening, a violent explosion shook the Kalininsky District. It was a car filled with explosives that exploded. According to the wreckage, where it will be difficult to guess the car parts, experts recognize the white "Zhiguli" of the sixth model. The explosion was so powerful that the windows in the district were blown out (in some places together with frames), the doors of nearby entrances were ripped off their hinges, and the fence of the regional children's hospital was partially destroyed. In the branch of Sberbank, which had already been put under guard, not only glass fell, but also metal gratings arched. The alarm went off immediately, sending a "raid" signal to the security console. The prices for apartments in this area have dropped - cracks have started along the walls of the "Khrushchevs" ...

A few seconds after the explosion, from which, fortunately, no one was hurt, there was another rumble, but weaker. A dark cherry-colored Poggero jeep, parked not far from house No. 15, was on fire. A grenade launcher was firing at it. Then another car exploded. All passers-by in the area threw themselves to the ground, pressing their palms to their ears and crawling under any cover. Finally, the machine guns were jammed. The shots fell on a car parked several tens of meters from the flaming jeep. One of the machine guns was beating with tracer bullets, which in the evening twilight slashed someone's Zhiguli with a bright thread. The fire was fired under the cover of two white cars.

The fight ended as suddenly as it began. Probably on the same command. The bandits began to withdraw. How many there were - no one could say for sure. Some claimed eight, others ten. The raiders, under the guise of machine guns, began to sit in the cars. In a matter of seconds, two light sixes disappeared from sight. On the way, the bandits split up. Some Zhiguli were left not far from the asphalt concrete plant, others at Giproshahtnaya. Both cars were doused with gasoline and set on fire. On examination, they found submachine guns with spare and shot horns, an RPG-5 grenade launcher, F-1 grenades and several bulletproof vests, in which the bandits were fighting. Two "sixes", on which the militants arrived and lost, traditionally turned out to be hijacked. Only a casual passer-by, a resident of a neighboring house, Alexander Gaidukov, was killed, who had forgotten that taking out garbage out of the house in the evening was a bad omen and was struck down by a stray bullet. A. Bragin personally sent generous financial aid to the family of the deceased. As reported by "DN", the amount of aid was dozens of times more than allocated by the city authorities. After the evening battle, the regional and city authorities will allocate over 4 billion karbovanets for the reconstruction of the quarter.

Donetsk News, which was funded by Lux at the time, wrote that the killers' goal was “to eliminate the director of one of the city’s most famous structures,” but not Bragin, whose name was already well known. Alexander Kuchinsky in his book "Criminals and Crimes" claims that a certain Renat was wounded that day. Just Renat, no surname. By the way, "DN" also confirmed that the hunt on Shakhtostroiteley Boulevard was carried out precisely for Renat, also through "E", and also without specifying his surname.

First search of "Lux"

After that, in an atmosphere of complete secrecy, a police operation to search the "Lux" was prepared. Nothing compromising or indicating the involvement of A. Bragin in the underworld was found. They say that once Bragin admitted that he knew about the upcoming search, but there is, of course, no reliable data.

You can talk a lot and often about the links between the government and the underworld. And I have no reason to "run into" the current Prosecutor General of Ukraine Gennady Vasiliev, but my colleagues, who are more familiar with the criminal world than I do, believe that it was not without "the exchange of large figures." At least, it was by the hands of the regional prosecutor's office that in the summer of 1994 the grouping of the Dolidze brothers, at that time the main competitors of the Greek, was destroyed. And when, headed by the latter, the firm "Lux" entered into a confrontation with the head of the regional Ministry of Internal Affairs, Gennady Andreevich personally, in the middle of the night, came to the firm to prove the illegality of its search by the police.

Bragin a little later filed an application with the Donetsk Regional Prosecutor's Office asking for a legal assessment of the search in his firm. Lux organized a press conference for journalists, which the local press actually ignored. Only four journalists came to listen to Bragin's version. Two newspapers got off with "informukha", "Vest" wrote a detailed report, and "Donetskie Novosti", published by Bragin himself, prepared a special issue exposing police arbitrariness.

By the way, it was in this special issue that the name of Alik the Greek was first publicly mentioned. Literally a few days after that (the special issue came out on December 12, 1994) - on December 15 - the Donetsk newspaper Gorod published an interview with the then head of the Donetsk MIA Administration, Arkady Boldovsky. The interview was titled "Mafia Showdown: Police Understand". In it, the chief police officer of the city said that several mafia clans operate in Donetsk, the most powerful of which is headed by a man named Alik the Greek.

In his subsequent interviews, Boldovsky stated that he never gave the real name of this mysterious Greek. Bragin himself designated himself as such. The general director of the firm "Lux" Alexander Sergeevich Bragin wrote a letter to the editorial office of "Gorod", in which he stated that he was not deservedly recorded in the mafia, thereby insulting his honor and dignity. The businessman claimed that such statements deal a blow to his business reputation. Lux's "Donetsk News" commented on the impact of Boldovskiy and "Gorod" as follows: "The agitated city whispered, waiting for the next planned performance, and the next issue of the Gorod newspaper came out with a published letter from the director of a large and respectable company A. the remaining nickname "Alik the Greek".

Proceeding from this, Bragin filed a civil suit in court, demanding the protection of his honor and dignity in the form of a public apology from the newspaper Gorod, which had offended him. The Bragin case was accepted by the chairman of the Voroshilovsky court, Viktor Ivashura. An experienced lawyer made a decision: to oblige A.A. Boldovsky to bring a public apology to Akhatiy Khafizovich Bragin, and to the Gorod newspaper to print a refutation on the same page on which the interview was printed.

Having won the trial, Alexander Bragin admitted in this way that he really was once called Alik the Greek. But this is not a crime in itself. There was no evidence that this very Greek and the leader of the mafia group were the same person. By the way, the presidium of the regional court sent the case on the protection of Bragin's honor and dignity for review.

Arkady Boldovskiy himself explained that he named the nickname Alik the Greek because the correspondent of "Gorod" persistently asked him to name "the coolest" in Donetsk: "I used the nickname Alik the Greek, as one of the most common in the region. in the region, according to our far from complete data, there are 27 people who were previously prosecuted, including even one woman. " Moreover, the policeman accused Gorod that the newspaper set him up: "If the Gorod correspondent or editor told me that Bragin's letter would be published, then in my reply I would immediately say that Alik is Alik, and Bragin is Bragin. "

But Boldovsky did not give up. Having no reason to talk about Bragin's mafia present, he reminded the Donetsk residents of the criminal past of Alekandr-Akhat from the pages of the same "City": On November 24, 1971, the district court sentenced him to a suspended imprisonment with a correctional term of 2 years, and in the courtroom he was released from custody.

On February 17, 1974, together with his brothers, out of hooligan motives, he beat up a minor boy ... The injured party calms down, as no grave consequences have come for her and the case is closed ... ".

In 1991, due to the lack of corpus delicti, another criminal case against Akhat Bragin was dropped for speculation. Bragin then worked in the meat department of a grocery store, located in the so-called Administrative village of Donetsk. The police obtained information that meat from the store, bypassing the counter, got to the market, where it was sold at inflated prices. According to Boldovsky, it was not possible to prove Bragin's involvement in this redistribution of meat products.

“That’s actually all about Bragin,” the head of the Donetsk city administration of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine concludes his “apology” to Alik Grek, “I ask the regional court to consider this article as my evidence at the suit of citizen A.Kh. Bragin. ...

Thus, proceeding from the presumption of innocence, all statements about the criminal past and present of Alexander Bragin, which are heard from time to time from the pages of various newspapers, cannot be taken seriously. Theft of pigeons and domestic scuffle on the "godfather" do not pull.

But in his apology, Arkady Boldovsky, apparently, did not say everything or did not quite sincerely apologize. In any case, he continues to work with Lux and its general director.

On August 4, 1995, a group of experienced employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Security Service of Ukraine arrived in Donetsk from Kiev. Their goal was again Bragin's residence. A repeated search, by the way, carried out with the sanction of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine V. Datsyuk, and even the frightening extradition of Bragin to Kiev again did not bring results, and after three days of detention in the SBU detention center, Bragin was released. But don't forget ...

The murder of the Samson brothers

Between the first and second searches in "Lux" there were two "kinship murders", which should be combined into one chapter. We are talking about the death of two brothers Samsonov: Yakov and Artur Bogdanov. But there were plenty of other, less high-profile cases.

At this time, they killed a lot and often. There were five or six premeditated murders a week in the Donetsk region, while in the Transcarpathian region this is the annual statistics. In a month, there were up to 25-30 undisclosed cases of this kind. In the days of the Union, for the same figure, but for a year, the heads of the military commanders were flying.

I remember very well the murder of a certain Syava, which happened on Shchors Street at a grocery store between Gurov and Komsomolskoye. In 1985, he was sentenced by the Kiev District Court of Donetsk to two years in prison for extortion, theft of personal property and forgery. Since 1988, he began to assert himself as a guardian of entrepreneurs, quickly gained a reputation as a greedy "outrageous". At a certain period, Syava was even forced to hide outside the Donetsk region, fearing reprisals from other authorities.

On a gloomy rainy morning on April 11, walking up Gurov Avenue on the way to the "steam", I heard clapping. As a novice journalist, he could not help but try to find out what happened. I arrived at the scene 15 minutes after the shootout and had the opportunity to observe the investigative measures. The "nine" in which the 36-year-old Vyacheslav Galushkin (aka Syava) was traveling with a guard, his wife and a driver came under fire. The car managed to drive about forty meters from the five-story building on Grinkevich Avenue, where Galushkin lived, and slowed down between the houses on Shchorsa Street. Syava's wife - supposedly the daughter of a high-ranking mayor's office official - went out to buy groceries. As soon as she disappeared behind a glass door, assassins with machine guns appeared on the road. The woman narrowly escaped death. Those sitting in the "Zhiguli" were mowed down by a flurry of fire. The criminals - young people of short stature, dressed in spring-style jackets and hats, threw one machine gun at the riddled "nine", rushed through the courtyards to the Shcherbakov park, where behind the dam between the first and second city headquarters, accomplices with transport awaited them. On the way, both threw their cap and hat into the pond. Who these people were, who were the customers, is unknown.

Syava's wife, who was in shock, was taken away before my eyes. Later, there were characters who accused her of "ordering" it. The time of the murder was set according to the testimony of an old woman who was watching the series and "at the moment when Antonio proposed to Elena, I heard the tire burst outside the window." A little later, a colleague of mine arrived, who was leading a criminal topic in the newspaper. He felt bad - the blood, of course, was not washed away ... According to my information, neither who was the customer, nor who was the executor is still unknown. Sources claim that Syava was a superstitious person and, above all, he terribly disliked leaving empty bottles on the table. If during a booze, an empty bottle did not immediately disappear into the bowels of the establishment, it immediately flew to the waiter / waitress. All the Chaldeans of the city remembered this well.

The murder of 36-year-old Yakov Samsonovich Bogdanov (Samson Sr.) fell on April 12, 1995, that is, the day after the murder of Galushkin. According to the layman, this action could well have been a retaliatory blow to Syava's "order". But, as the results of the Luhansk trial testify, the elimination of Samson was planned by Kushnir as a retaliation for the death of a thief in law named Chirik (already known to us Eduard Braginsky). Chirik's friends Evgeny Kushnir (nickname - Nose) and Magomed Aliev (Maga) confidently believed that the execution was the work of Samson, whom they decided to remove. This version is confirmed by another source. According to Alexander Kuchinsky, Bolotskikh (one of the main defendants in the Luhansk trial) met Kushnir and Ryabin just in March 1995, when, at the request of the Moscow thieves' authority, he arrived in Donetsk to assist in the elimination of a man nicknamed Samson: "He supposedly had to answer according to concepts for the death of Eduard Braginsky. It was also rumored that Samson cleaned up the entire financial legacy of the thief in law, leaving his family without a livelihood. "

At one time, Bogdanov Sr. was already serving a sentence for murder on the basis of conflicts between thieves and athletes. According to law enforcement agencies, the Bogdanov brothers' group was engaged in extortion, economic scams and, according to operational data, was involved in a number of liquidations of local criminal authorities. There was information that in 1994 Yasha, under threats, forced him to sign a contract for the supply of metal to the Baltic states, the head of one of the regional factories associated with metallurgical production. All the payment terms passed, the director arrived in Donetsk to sort it out and ran into a laconic answer: "Don't drive, go home and consider that you just worked at a loss."

Either Kushnir, or Ryabin (Bolotskikh does not remember exactly) told Moskvich that with the murder of Samson, lawlessness would stop in Donetsk, and they would return the Chirik family and the property that Bogdanov had brazenly taken away for themselves.

Together with Andrey Akulov (nickname - Closet) Bolotskikh traveled around Donetsk in a car with tinted windows - they tracked Samson in places of his residence, rest, route - they chose a possible place of attack. The Muscovite was shown a photo of Bogdanov and explained that he was driving a black Mercedes-140, which had previously belonged to Chirik. This "Mercedes" was constantly accompanied by several cars with security.

Then Samson left Donetsk, how much is unknown, and the murder was postponed. Vadim returned to Moscow and already there, in mid-April 1995, he learned that on April 12, Bogdanov had been shot from a machine gun on the steps of the Donetsk cafe "Teatralnoe", which is on Artyom street near the cinema. T. G. Shevchenko. Allegedly without his participation.

After receiving information that Samson was heading for lunch, Kushnir gave the command to start the operation. For this action, a VAZ-2109 passenger car was stolen in advance, and its numbers were replaced with fictitious ones. In this car, two members of the gang drove up to the cafe and, seeing Samson on the threshold, shot him point-blank.

At about 19.20, together with his entourage and his brother Arthur, Yasha was leaving the cafe when a cherry "seven" slowed down on the sidewalk, from where machine guns were fired. At this time, "Teatralny" was experiencing a habitual revival, so it could not do without accidental victims. The 34-year-old Chechen Anatoly Khatsyev, who accompanied the brothers, was killed and died on the spot, as well as a member of their group, 20-year-old Nikolai Vasilyev, a native of Grozny. A ninth-grader of secondary school # 23 and a 38-year-old Armenian who came to Donetsk from Tbilisi on personal matters were also injured.

At high speed, the "seven" rounded the Donetsk Opera and Ballet Theater and disappeared in the direction of Universitetskaya Street. Ten minutes later, a burning car was found on Teatralny Prospekt not far from the city's second pond. In the same place, the unidentified men got into a green VAZ-2106 car and drove off to the Yuzhny bus station. An assault rifle and two magazines were seized in the cabin, and three cloth gloves and a cardboard box with 13 cartridges were seized near the car.

According to eyewitnesses, Samson Jr. (brother of Yakov Bogdanov Arthur) was with the dying man until the last minutes. When Yasha received the first portion of lead and fell on the steps of the cafe, the first person to catch him was his younger brother. "Car, live!" - shouted Arthur and, stained with blood, dragged the body to his "Mercedes-600". The car rushed to the regional hospital, ignoring the road signs and traffic lights. Arthur, already holding a corpse in his arms, burst into the sanitary inspection room and shouted to his white robes: "On the table! Move, your mother. If he dies, I will shoot you all. His life is against yours." Ten minutes later, the young surgeon, trembling all over, after a moment's hesitation, informed Arthur, who was looming in the corridor, about his death. Not embarrassed by those around him, he sobbed and said: "I know the bitches who did it. They will all die!"

Maybe Arthur really knew something, since this was not the first attempt to separate the Samsons from life. On December 10, 1994, on Ilyich Avenue near the Donetsk meat-packing plant, an armored Mercedes of the Bogdanovs drew up at a traffic light with a modest "nine" from the window of which the barrel of a grenade launcher suddenly peeped out! But the projectile fired ricocheted off the armor. The Mercedes flew into the pedestrian alley of the square between the one-way lanes and, having received several bullets from a machine gun, safely disappeared towards the Motel.

The automatic turn went through the protection of the brothers, who, due to the turmoil that arose, crashed into a traffic light pole in her car. In this case, there were also accidental victims: the driver and passenger of the car that happened to be nearby were injured. The failed killers threw their "nine" near the meat processing plant along with a Kalashnikov assault rifle and two grenade launchers, one of which remained on the combat platoon (later it will be transferred to the Museum of Internal Affairs of the UMVD as an exhibit of the criminal war), and moved to the red "Zhiguli-2108 ". Half an hour later, on Yamalskaya Street in the Budennovsky District, Zhiguli crashed into a lighting pole. Before finally disappearing, the bandits set fire to the car. In the cabin, the police seized three more machine guns and an equipped magazine. Both vehicles used in the attack were listed as stolen.

An important fact. The invitation of Moskvich justified itself and the murder of Samson Sr. - the first of the successful attempts on the life of competitors by Kushnir's gang. But far from the last.

“Having come to me in Moscow, Maga offered to go to Ukraine again and help to deal with the“ enemies, ”- said Bolotskikh at the investigation. - He said that the murder of Samson did not bring the desired result: his younger brother took matters into his own hands. The magician boasted that the scheme developed with my participation had justified itself. As expected, no one offered resistance, and there was no police chase. "

The "Moscow boss" again asked the Bolotskikhs to go to Donetsk to help the local "lads" put things in order. I drove home to Vadim in a black Mercedes "Magician" and they went to Donetsk. On the way, Aliyev explained the situation to Moskvich.

In Donetsk, in one of the rented apartments, according to Bolotskikh, he, together with Kushnir, Ryabin, Aliev, Akulov and Filipenko, developed and agreed upon a plan for the liquidation of Artur Bogdanov (Samson Jr.). The method was chosen the same as in the attack on Yakov Bogdanov.

Arthur did not have time to avenge his brother. On August 10, 1995, Artur Bogdanov was with his mother in house number 26 on Ilyich Avenue. Knowing that he was being hunted, he let go of the Mercedes and called a taxi. When the car with "checkered" cars stopped at the entrance, Bogdanov, together with the security guard at about 9:30 am, left his house and got into a taxi - GAZ-24, which drove towards Ilyich Avenue. Having received a radio message about this from members of the gang - "observers", a group of shooters in "Zhiguli" led by Akulov moved towards the taxi. Between houses No. 26 and No. 32 along Ilyich Avenue "Zhiguli" stopped. The Muscovite put on a T-shirt hood over his head, and Filipenko and another gang member (a certain Nikolai) put on masks-caps with slits for the eyes.

The taxi with passengers began to slowly leave the yard. The "Zhiguli", which were following, went to overtake, then the car left to the right and "squeezed" the taxi to the side of the road. The Volga crashed into a tree. The tinted windows of the Zhiguli dropped, and automatic rounds began to pour over the Volga. The killers knew their business well: Arthur and his loyal guard were struck down instantly, the driver's hand was slightly touched. The windows of the "six" rose again, and the car disappeared into the alley.

"... Until the" Volga ", in the front seat of which Samson Jr. was located, there were 20 meters left, - said Bolotskikh. - I, Igor and Nikolay, armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles, went to the firing position and stood in a row. I was in the center and told the guys not to hook the driver. We fired through the front windshield at Samson Jr., and when he saw us, it seemed to me, he tried to get a pistol from his belt. But he didn't have time ... The taxi driver fell out of the cab. and the car continued to move in our direction. We were shooting ... The taxi stopped beside us on the right. The right door and windshield were riddled with bullets, the last shots at Samson were fired from a distance of two meters. I fired all the cartridges. Nikolai with a machine gun at the ready made movement in the direction of the driver, who was lying face down on the asphalt. I told him to leave him. We got into the Zhiguli, which Akulov had already turned into a position for withdrawal "...

Frightened but curious passers-by surrounded the Volga with two corpses, perforated in sixteen places. A minute later, a short-haired guy with a submachine gun appeared near the car. This was Arthur's second guard, assigned to guard his mother. Hearing the shooting, he ran downstairs, but it was already over. He fell into hysterics and, in a frenzy, began to shoot upward. Onlookers instantly rushed in all directions. Having pulled out the body of the chief from the bloody salon, the guard transferred it to the "nine" parked at the next entrance. Before that, he broke the side window with a butt and opened the door from the inside. These "Zhiguli" were found several hours later.

The other Zhiguli, those with machine guns inside, were thrown by the shooters in a private residential area, one kilometer from the crime scene. Akulov doused the interior with gasoline from plastic bottles and set it on fire. A hundred meters away, other Zhiguli - "nine" and some other car were waiting for them - the transport to leave was called on the radio. The bandits immediately went home to one of the attackers.

“Soon after that Bolotskikh and Aliyev departed for Moscow, where Maga gave Moskvich, according to the latter, 500 or 700 US dollars. Although Bolotskikh emphasizes that he participated in the attack on Artur Bogdanov not because of money, but out of a desire to help Kushnir, Rowan and Mage.

“Moskvich insisted on his disinterestedness on other murders. Just like on the fact that he always acted selectively - he tried to hit only the“ object ”planned for liquidation and spared people who, for whatever reason, found themselves next to the“ condemned ”.

"The elimination of another competitor only angered the" opponents "of Kushnir's gang. Therefore, it was decided to temporarily lay low. "enemies".

“And the most important“ enemy ”for the gang was Alik the Grek, who, as Kushnirov and Ryabin assumed, could not forgive them for attempting to kill themselves and killing their people.

Second search in "Luxe"

When on October 3, 1995, a car near the Slavutich grocery store in Kievsky district of Donetsk was fired upon, they began to look for the shooters in the patrimony of Alexander Bragin. Boldovskiy commented on his decision as follows: "One of the cars that fired at the cherry nine in the Kievsky district today, presumably belongs to the firm" Lux ". There was a rare incident - one of the witnesses who called us accurately named the number of this car."

The most common version of what happened on Kievsky Prospekt looks like this: "Tail", who followed Bragin's Mercedes, behaved extremely arrogantly and the "Lux" guards decided to teach the impudent a lesson. Allegedly, it was they who fired at the cars of their pursuers.

Arkady Boldovsky decides to conduct another search of the "Lux".

He himself headed this operation, but as the prosecutor of the Kiev region Leonid Chervyakov (the current prosecutor of Donetsk) later reported, he did not give a search warrant: “Yes, they asked me to issue a warrant. It was not received.”

Like the two previous times, no "compromising material" was found against Alik the Grek. In connection with this search, the fate of one of the employees of the Braga firm "Lux" R. Markulov, who is creating a political organization in the Donetsk region, the "Liberal Party of Ukraine", became somewhat clearer. However, he suddenly disappears, almost under mysterious circumstances. According to the materials of the investigation, the chairman of the party fled to England, where he asked for political asylum. The reason was ... "an extremely bold step of the Donetsk law enforcement agencies, which in August 1995 searched the Lux Hotel and found a whole arsenal of weapons and ammunition there," writes Business and Law. "A total of five carbines were found, a dozen sporting and hunting rifles, a sniper rifle with a telescopic sight and ammunition for them, as well as about a dozen radio stations, a lot of body armor. " But all the ammunition allegedly did not belong to "Lux" ... Bragin himself generously "forgave" the offenders: "I want to emphasize that this time we have no complaints about the actions of law enforcement agencies. They acted absolutely correctly in the situation that arose on October 3 in Donetsk ".

Or maybe it’s a pity that the police didn’t manage to catch on and arrest Akhat Khafisovich. Then he would definitely not have gone to that ill-fated match between Shakhtar and Tavriya. But history, as you know, does not tolerate the subjunctive mood.

The murder of Akhata Bragin

After an unsuccessful attempt on Akhat Bragin, who was rescued by a dovecote in Sands, it was decided to plant a radio-controlled explosive device in the place where Bragin was supposed to appear sooner or later. At first, the heated gangster minds of the Kushnir group seriously considered the possibility of shooting down the plane with the football team and its president in the air during takeoff or landing. In this case, they intended to use a rocket launcher or, at worst, a grenade launcher. But in the end, we settled on an equally original version.

Judging by the testimony of the Bolotskikhs, the idea of the explosion at the stadium belonged to Kushnir. Andrey Akulov and his close friend Igor Filippenko took up the laying of the radio-controlled device. For several nights, they pounded a hole in the concrete base at the entrance to the podium for the guests of honor. Then they laid five kilograms of plastic with a detonating device, which was activated by a radio signal.

The deepening was carefully cemented. In addition, the place of the bookmark was covered with a wooden step. The mining was carried out two to three weeks before the explosion. It was originally planned that Bragin would be killed in the match between Shakhtar and Brugge. However, for some reason, the Greek did not come to the match.

Ryabin and Kushnir began to worry, fearing that the batteries of the explosive device would run out and it would not work. Subsequently, explosives experts confirmed that the batteries could really well have been discharged, especially since it rained for several days after the bomb was planted in Donetsk. The bandits decided to repeat the attempt to eliminate Bragin at the very next game between Shakhtar and Tavria Simferopol. It was October 15, 1995.

Ten minutes before the arrival of the president of the football club, security drove up to the service entrance. She carefully examined all the nooks and crannies, went up to the podium and, without revealing anything suspicious, reported on the radio: the entrance is safe. At 17:03, when Bragin with his guards arrived at the stadium and entered the corridor leading to the second tier, Igor Filippenko, walking alongside in the uniform of a police officer, activated the remote device. He was covered in case of possible complications by the major of the criminal investigation department of the Kalinin regional department - the same Sinenko, now deported from Greece to Ukraine. According to the investigation, Vadim Bolotskikh was also nearby, keeping in touch with the observers who warned by radio about Bragin's appearance. Death overtook Bragin and the bodyguards near the entrance to the podium. The blast was directed in such a way that it brought minimal destruction with maximum effect. After the explosion, taking advantage of the turmoil, all the participants in the massacre fled unnoticed.

“There were already five officials on the podium: the chairman of the Donetsk regional sports committee A. Kucherov, his deputy and three guests from Crimea. The blast wave carried out the front door and scattered human remains. Hands, feet, entrails were lying within a radius of 30 meters. a stopped heart. The picture is not for the faint of heart. The regional administration allocated three special vehicles, which began to take the remains to the Kalinin morgue. It was almost impossible to carry out identification and identification. Pathologists brought the body parts brought on six tables "- writes Alexander Kuchinsky.

The current director of the public relations department of FC Shakhtar Mark Levitsky was then an active journalist and commented on the football match between Shakhtar and Tavria Simferopol. The commentary booths are located next to the VIP tribune and Mark Yurievich saw a lot of what the camera did not grab. It was surprising that Shakhtar President Oleksandr Bragin was late for the match. Five minutes had passed since the start of the match, when the guards appeared, followed by the president himself. A minute later there was a deafening explosion. "I thought the wall behind the podium was blown apart." - says Levitsky. From its place it was difficult to see the place of the explosion. There were clouds of smoke over the box. Frightened spectators in a hurry left their seats and fled to the football field. The referee interrupted the match. Levitsky ran to the cameraman, who was a little higher. "What happened?" - asked. - "Better not go there. There is only blood and pieces of bodies on the podium," said the operator.

Fortunately, the fans did not suffer - the fencing of the VIP box served as a screen and the blast wave went upward, turning its visitors into mush on the way ... I have already mentioned that Bragin was identified only by the "Rollex" watch. Eyewitnesses of the explosion claim that Due to the noise that is common in sports arenas, many generally thought that a powerful firecracker was blown up by fans. The law enforcers did not object to this opinion and in an organized manner took the people out of the stands, avoiding panic.

According to the police, one of the guards survived, a certain Kukharev, who remained outside. He was taken to the hospital the next day. There was also an accidental victim - a barmaid, who was hit by a blast wave and hit against the wall. The woman received a concussion and injury to the hip joint.

At that moment Lyubov Uspenskaya began her performance at the Donetsk Cinema and Concert Complex. “As soon as I had time to sing the first song,” the singer recalled, “as the audience of the first rows got up and went to the exit. Most of them were with companions and held cell phones in their hands. I was shocked. This had never happened at my concerts. with difficulty finished the speech and only then learned that Bragin had died. "

Some of my colleagues have visited the crime scene. Then, of course, they were interrogated by the relevant authorities. I was not able to collect their memories of these events, since many years have passed since then and all the people I know have left Donetsk - some left to conquer the capital of Ukraine, some to Moscow, and some abroad. Particularly interesting would be the memoirs of Boris Dobromyslov, a photo correspondent for the newspaper "Life", who now lives in Australia. He was one of the first to be on the scene and managed to take several frames before the arrival of the officials. According to his friends, later the film was bought either by the relatives of the victims (according to one version) or by the authorities.

People who knew Akhat Khafisovich closely claimed that he felt the approaching death: "I know that I will die soon, but I am not preparing for death. I only regret that I have lived so little." The deceased turned forty-two.

Akhata Bragin was buried according to Muslim tradition. They washed the remains of the body, wrapped them in a burial shroud, carried them out on a chinaz - a special stretcher - into the courtyard of the house, where hundreds of people wishing to say goodbye were already crowded. A long funeral procession set off towards the mosque near the Oktyabrskoye mine administration. Near the mosque, Mufti Aisa Khametov performed a prayer service for the deceased. Soon Bragin's body was buried in the Proletarian cemetery. A helicopter circled over the funeral procession ...

This is how Akhat Bragin, one of the most influential nouveau riches in Donetsk and Ukraine, ended his days. "He is remembered as the first president of FC Shakhtar, who extended a hand of considerable financial assistance to the football team, which was on the brink of financial crisis in the mid-90s. The international youth football tournament and the regional association of pigeon lovers are named after him."

The fact that the murder of Bragin - at that time the undisputed leader of the Donbass business elite, which is now called the "Donetsk clan" - will happen in a way that is dangerous to the lives of many people, was allegedly known, except for the direct executor Filippenko (it was he who pressed the button of the remote control disguised under the car alarm key fob) and the ringleaders, only he and Akulov. Bolotskikh himself was absent from Donetsk that day (in this part he changed his previous testimony at the trial). On the eve of these events, he allegedly traveled with Ryabin to Kharkov on a commercial deal related to oil. Returning to Donetsk, he immediately flew to Moscow, and came to Ukraine again only next spring. And in the period of preparation for the explosion, I visited the stadium and wondered what was what, even sat at the match with “Bruges”, when the explosion went off due to the non-arrival of Bragin.

However, the representatives of the prosecution have a different opinion about the Bolotskys. At one time, the Russians conducted a search in the apartment of the Bolotskys in Moscow and found several notebooks with notes on the explosive case. True, Moskvich explained that he gave an accurate description of the device blown up at the Shakhtar stadium because he saw it in one of the rented apartments in Donetsk when he arrived from Kharkov.

According to the Bolotskikhs, about ten gang members took part in the operation. Including Sinenko, who was not a member of the group, but for some reason agreed to participate in this crime. It was he who was next to Filippenko to provide the latter with assistance if an unforeseen situation arises. So, at 17 02 minutes the explosive device was detonated - at that moment Bragin and the persons accompanying him entered the box. The television picture accompanying the match clearly shows how the camera shook as a result of the detonation ... As a result, together with Akhat Bragin, five people were killed, three more were seriously wounded. As Bolotskikh clarified, on the same day all the participants in the crime left the city: some moved to Kiev, some to Luhansk, to pre-rented apartments. Bolotskikh himself returned to Moscow. Kushnir left for Israel to not only sit out there, but also to repay the debt from one of his acquaintances.

Interrogated in Israel as part of an international crime detection assistance program, witness Boris Farfil confirmed that during a meeting in the Recital cafe in the city of Haifa, Kushnir wanted to receive money in the amount of $ 300,000, which Cherevatchenko allegedly bequeathed to him. Maga was with Yevgeny Borisovich; according to the description of a resident of Haifa - a strong Caucasian, seemingly a fighter: muscular, thick wide neck, ears "broken". With regard to Farfil, both of his interlocutors were determined. Realizing that he could not get money under the pretext of a will, Kushnir invited his old acquaintance to financially participate in the war with the opposing group. And to convince how serious and constructive his intentions are, Evgeniy Borisovich mentioned that the explosion of Grek at the Shakhtar stadium was his work. So if Boris financially supports his group in the struggle for influence in the region, they will soon return to Donetsk together as victors. After that, Farfil Kushnir never saw again. But I heard that he was killed. "Then the Kushnirovites had to go underground for a whole year," most sources say. But it is not so.

The next step was the elimination of Alexander Momot, which happened in May 1996. And he is also charged with the Kushnir gang.

Murder of Momot

However, between these crimes, among the most resonant murders, there was one more - the shooting of Donetsk businessman Alexander Shvedchenko. He was born in Selidovo, at a mature age he moved to Donetsk, having managed to make a considerable fortune in a short period. Alexander Shvedchenko came to big business from the post of a civil servant. For some time he headed the Selidovsky City Council, then held the post of deputy head of the Donetsk Regional Administration. When Shvedchenko stepped up his commercial activities, he had influential enemies. The most difficult was the struggle for the promising company "Itera-Energy", or rather, for the right to represent its interests in Ukraine. This energy company, headquartered in Moscow, is one of the few such structures that supply gas (in this case, Turkmen) to Ukraine. Everyone who knew him personally noted considerable charm and cheerfulness. I agree, as I have had contact with him more than once at work: it was he who made Shakhtar basketball a Ukrainian super club, challenging the capital's giants.

So, on March 28, 1996, the head of the Itera Energy representative office, at that time the largest gas supplier to Ukraine, the president of the Shakhtar-ASKO Donetsk basketball club and the head of the AlMar company, Alexander Shvedchenko, was killed in Podol. The guards ignored a group of young people chatting nearby. And if she did, it’s too late. All four guys quickly turned to the approaching president, immediately grabbed pistols from under their long cloaks, which had been removed from the safety locks in advance, and opened fire almost point-blank. Apparently, the roles were distributed between the killers: three neutralized the guards, the fourth shot Shvedchenko in the head. The first bullet hit the eye and knocked him off his feet. The shooting continued for several seconds. A car was waiting for the killers around the corner, in which they fled (according to another version, these were two BMWs). The pistols were left at the scene of the crime. Shvedchenko and one of the guards died without regaining consciousness on the way to the hospital. The rest were brought to the operating room while still alive. Soon a police brigade headed by the head of the Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime under the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine arrived at the blood-soaked entrance of Itera Energy. The Sirena police plan, introduced to search for criminals, did not bring any results.

Valeriy Markotenko, vice-president of Itera Energy, who flew to Kiev from Moscow a few hours after the murder, said that the murder of the president of the Ukrainian branch of the firm had nothing to do with Itera Energy. According to him, Oleksandr Shvedchenko worked at the firm for only three weeks. "He was just getting to know the people and the tasks that he had to solve, so we do not associate this murder with our business."

On the day of the burial, March 30, pouring rain gushed. The foyer of the Donetsk Sports Palace "Druzhba" was filled to capacity. Among those who came to say goodbye to the deceased were sports celebrities, politicians, artists, entrepreneurs. Gray-haired respectable men wept bitterly. Finally, the president of Shakhtar-ASKO was raised to the last, unattainable height for ordinary mortals: the coffin was carried by basketball players.

The murder of the Swede, as his friends called him, has not yet been solved. After his death, the basketball club "Shakhtar", which was declared bankrupt in September 2002, withered and then completely ceased to exist. Only the youth basketball club named after A.D.Shvedchenko remained afloat, which once a year holds international tournaments in his memory. In general, memorials have been in great demand since then in Donetsk ...

Many see the Dnieper trace in the Shved case - the rapid progress of Shvedchenko and, as a result, the Donetsk businessman in the leadership of the national corporation was disadvantageous to Itera's competitors, who at that time represented Dnipropetrovsk.

It is believed that the murders of Momot and Shvedchenko are somehow related to each other and it is not by chance that I have combined them into one chapter.

In early April 1996, a journalist of the Pravo i Delo newspaper reminded the president of Danko JSC about a recent conversation in order to find out when the publication would be able to start preparing a publication about the situation on the gas market in Ukraine and the region. "After all, there are forces, including in Russia, who want to crush this market for themselves, use the difficult situation with payments for gas in their own interests." - Momot said shortly before the murder of Shvedchenko. In April, Momot replied: "The topic is too acute and dangerous. So Alexander Shvedchenko was killed recently. Better to wait a little."

The journalist replied that the newspaper was preparing material about the death of the president of the Ukrainian office of Itera. “Momot showed a keen interest in this, asked: what are the reasons for the organized murder of Shvedchenko? And he said: to take on such a topic, you need to have extraordinary journalistic courage. It sounded not only like praise, but also as an assessment of the danger of the“ gas topic ". - recalls the source. Alexander Momot probably knew where the blow might come from. But, obviously, he did not expect that it would happen so soon.

By the way, at the end of May 1996, about a week after the death of the president of "Danko", investigators from the Kiev prosecutor's office came to Donetsk, who had a case on the liquidation of the head of the Ukrainian representative office of the gas "Itera". The people of Kiev tried to figure out: what is common between the murders of two Aleksandrs - Momot and Shvedchenko? In the possible motives of the customers, in the handwriting of the performers.

The criminal prosecutor told how, after the death of A. Momot, they examined his office in Danko JSC. On the desktop, they drew attention to the newspaper "Delo i Pravo" No. 3. It was revealed on page 6 with the article "Why was Alexander Shvedchenko killed?"

There seems to be only one connection in the murders of Shved and Momot - Dnepropetrovsk. In 1996, when Moskvich and Maga were in Dnepropetrovsk, he again asked him to help Kushnir - to remove one businessman who supports the enemy's grouping. It turned out to be Alexander Momot, the head of the Danko firm.

On May 16, 1996, the president of Danko JSC was deprived of his life in a less sophisticated way than Akhat Bragin, but this does not mean that it is less thoughtful and cruel. It was just easier to do it - no security, no security measures inherent in businessmen of this level - Alexander was known as a fatalist. However, judging by the bloody history of Donetsk, any preventive measures mean little if a deadly mechanism is launched and professionals of their craft are involved.

That evening, as it often happened, Alexander was late on business, and returned home quite late - after 21:30, the Jeep with the president of Danko and his driver drove into the courtyard of the house where A.V. lived. Momot, the only possible way is from Kobozeva Street, past two buildings of the Technical University. The car stopped in front of the entrance and the driver went to the doors - to open the combination lock. Alexander followed, but hesitated a little at the Jeep. And then an unknown person appeared from the darkness. Eyewitnesses heard two bangs, after which the driver fell. And the gun immediately turned to the main victim, sentenced by someone. Alexander tried to escape, but his run was interrupted by several shots - he fell. This was followed by a test. And the killers immediately disappeared. People saw two guys running down the steps from the building of the technical university - they went to Pushkin Boulevard.

Everything happened instantly - it took about two minutes to directly execute the deadly plan. It was dark, there were few eyewitnesses, and their testimony was contradictory. The militia officers could not even compile the identikits of the criminals. That is, the charges are almost entirely based on the testimony of the accused. What is not good.

The work of detectives, forensic experts, experts and investigators at the scene of the incident and around it did not bring tangible results. The bullets that struck Alexander and his driver and seized by the investigators were allegedly fired from a foreign-made pistol, such as a Beretta or Browning. According to journalist Alexander Kuchinsky, experts counted five wounds on Momot's corpse, two of which occurred in the head - all the bullets were fired from a TT pistol. The discrepancies are easy to explain. No weapons were found at the crime scene - a rare case in the history of the "order"! - the killers took him with them, and did not throw him away along the way, as they often do, getting rid of bulky machine guns or sniper rifles. It was not possible to find any traces or promising "clues" at the scene of the murder.

In cases of such contract killings, the following versions are usually developed: the elimination of a strong competitor in the area of the market and production where the object of the assassination was successful; the person who ordered the murder intended to increase his own influence in the economic and power structures controlled by a competitor; in parallel - an action of intimidation of the victim's companions - so that they leave the sphere that was controlled by the victim; a share of a debtor who did not want to return a large amount; personal motives (revenge, domestic conflict, etc.)

Immediately after the death of A.V. Momota and later investigators and operatives, as well as journalists of some publications considered the main versions concerning the redistribution of the spheres of influence in the gas and metal market (not excluding, however, the rest of those mentioned above). These assumptions were well founded.

Since the beginning of 1996, the press has repeatedly noted that the Donetsk region is the only one in Ukraine that makes payments for the supplied gas directly, through its own structure - the Industrial Union of Donbass corporation, and not through the United Energy Systems of Ukraine (UESU), like everyone else. rest. It is clear that, given the energy intensity of enterprises in our industrial region (more than 20% of Ukraine's consumption), control over "gas money" was desirable. And then Prime Minister Lazarenko, who patronized the EESU, clearly did not want to give Donetsk such a tasty morsel.

Here, for the first time, the ex-Prime Minister of Ukraine appears on the Donetsk stage, having gained all power by that time. He became prime minister on May 28, 1996, receiving the support of 300 deputies at once. Almost immediately, the new government began to carry out reforms in the fuel and energy complex. Lazarenko can be called the father of the now obsolete model of the energy market with an extensive system of offsets, against which Yulia Tymoshenko selflessly fought later, and rose to them. He reformed the distribution of gas, and traders received a regional market division instead of the industry one, as it was before. He also stood at the origins of the creation of a system for the removal of spent nuclear fuel and the import of fresh one.

The president of "Danko", who was also one of the founders of the "Industrial Union of Donbass", according to competent people, allegedly developed and implemented such a clever settlement scheme that it was not so easy to take "gas money" from Donbass even for the then all-powerful prime minister.

In May-June 1996, no one has yet directly stated that Lazarenko was somehow involved in the murder of Alexander Momot (an official statement about this was made only four years later, and how much it corresponds to reality is unknown). Leading the criminal investigation, they checked the version and that Momot's departure from the "gas sphere" and in general from key positions in the economy of Donbass was beneficial to someone in the region.

As for the spheres of redistribution of influence on the metal market, there seemed to be those who were dissatisfied with the fact that Danko acquired a controlling stake and became the actual owner of the Yenakiyevo Metallurgical Plant OJSC. This version had less logic than either of the two previous ones. The deal on the plant took place, the controlling stake in the enterprise (by the way, the oldest in the region among similar, at that time hopelessly unprofitable, in dire need of reconstruction) was not with Alexander Momot personally, but JSC Danko had no way back. .. There were even fewer convincing arguments in favor of other versions.

Until the end of 1998, the case of the murder of A.V. Momota was in turn in the proceedings of five investigators. "In hot pursuit", the first two weeks, it was dealt with by employees of the Voroshilovskaya district and Donetsk city prosecutor's offices. And in early June 1996, the case was sent to the investigation department of the regional prosecutor's office.

The officer who immediately received him here did not investigate for long, and soon handed him over to his colleague, who had recently been transferred from the district prosecutor's office. This one, the fourth in a row, was engaged exclusively in this contract murder for almost a year.

After him, since the summer of 1997, the case of A.V. Momota moved on to the next, fifth investigator. There were few opportunities to intensify the investigation - everything that could be established by an investigation was established and verified by the end of 1998. And the case, according to the established practice, was sent to the archives of the Voroshilov District Prosecutor's Office, in which it was initiated on May 17, 1996, at the place of the crime.

It is not known what exactly each of the five officers in charge of the investigation did and did. Yes, this is probably not important in this case. The collected materials fit into four volumes of the criminal case. This is a lot, considering that only one episode was investigated, and the source material was scarce and the case remained “factual” (initiated and investigated into the crime) - there were no accused or even specific suspects in it.

On June 1, 2 and 3, 2000, Ukrainian television channels (TSN, Podrobnosti - Inter and UTN programs) broadcast excerpts of video recordings from the briefings of the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine N. Obikhod, who oversees the investigation of particularly important high-profile cases. Nikolai Sergeevich then officially announced for the first time that Pavel Lazarenko, who was in the United States, was accused of a number of contract killings for mercenary motives, in this regard, on May 30, 2000, the Prosecutor General's Office opened another criminal case against the ex-prime minister.

According to the investigation, on the account of the criminal group, the member of which was detained, - 8 episodes of contract killings. Most of them were organized at the direction of P. Lazarenko. Their victims are E. Shcherban and A. Bragin (their names were already named by N. Obikhod at the end of May as victims of Lazarenko's malicious intent), as well as the well-known entrepreneur Alexander Momot, the Bogdanov brothers, who were related to the Lux firm and others.

So the name of the first president "Danko" was first named - officially and publicly - in a number of victims of the same criminal group as A. Bragin and E. Shcherban (before that it was placed separately). As you can see, the name of Shvedchenko is not here.

Around May 20, 2000, the case of Momot's murder was removed from the archives of the district prosecutor's office and work on it was resumed. He was taken over by the senior investigator for particularly important cases of the Prosecutor General's Office and, taking into account the common executors, and, possibly, the customers, combined with the cases of the murders of A. Bragin, E. Shcherban, brothers Yakov and Artur Bogdanov. By the way, experts have been talking about the fact that the investigation of the "Momot case" requires the level of the General, and not the regional or city prosecutor's office, from the first days after this crime.

Then, after May 20, 2000, the "killer from Russia", about whom N. Obikhod spoke, was brought to Donetsk by members of the investigative-operational brigade of the Prosecutor General's Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to reproduce the events and circumstances of the crimes. Many knowledgeable eyewitness and participant in crimes

Investigators and detectives sent from Kiev with an important accused also visited that courtyard along 25th Anniversary of the Red Army Avenue, near Pushkin Boulevard, where on May 16, 1996 at 21:50 the life of the first president of "Danko" was cut short. The visiting killer - and this, as it became clear, was Vadim Bolotskikh, aka Moskvich - showed and talked about a lot.

In May 1996, Moskvich was 22 years old and did not have a permanent job. He says that he came to Donetsk on behalf of his Moscow boss, who is no longer alive. He himself seemed to have no selfish motives - he just tried to please the boss, to whom he owed a lot. In the course of the liquidations, he played, according to his own statement, a secondary role. If he was a shooter, it was not the main one. According to the staff of the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office and the Kiev lawyer Vadim Dmitry Poezda, he was detained by the GUBOP of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. It happened in Moscow on May 16, 2000 (exactly 4 years later - day after day! - after the death of A. Momot). The detainee was stripped of his driver's license, interrogated and released. The next day, Moskvich was invited to the police station to pick up his driver's license. And they interrogated again. Vadim promised his wife Maria that he would return soon. But she heard her husband's voice only ten days later - he called from the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine ...

It turns out that Vadim was simply kidnapped and secretly taken from Moscow to Kiev. Maria arrived in the capital of Ukraine and there she learned from her husband's lawyer that Bolotskikh was accused of an attempt on the life of the People's Deputy of Ukraine E. Shcherban, committed in 1996 at the Donetsk airport. According to Ukrainian investigators, he is one of the killers who committed the murder of the people's deputy.

Accused of participation in contract killings, Vadim in September 2000 gave his wife a statement addressed to the Moscow prosecutor, in which he indicates that he was taken from Russia to Ukraine by fraudulent means. In the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine, he wrote a confession, however, he claims, did so under pressure from investigators.

What did Bolotskikh tell or was forced to tell about the "Momot case"? An attempt was being prepared, as always in such cases, ahead of time. First, the murders involved in the organization determined the place: where it is more convenient to do it. We studied the daily routine, the routes of Alexander and decided: in the evening at the house. Since the guard was not observed, it was considered that two shooters would be enough.

The performers (Donetsk and Muscovite) in passing, so as not to attract attention, examined the courtyard, outlined the ways of approaching the victim and retreating after completing the plan. We planned the operation itself, determined what would be needed to carry it out: pistols with silencers and fully equipped clips, a hijacked car - to bring it closer to the place of the event and quickly take it away later; means of communication - with those who tracked the movement of the object and with the driver of the vehicle used in the operation - it should not have loomed near the scene of the incident, but appeared a minute or two before the killers returned to Pushkin Boulevard and further to Universitetskaya.

The performers arrived at the appointed place at the beginning of the boulevard about an hour before Alexander's arrival. They knew where he was and expected him to go home. Finally, a signal came over the radio: it was coming. Who gave this signal? The two walked slowly towards the steps leading to the building of the technical university. A "jeep" drove past them that was taking Alexander Vasilyevich home, and the killers quickened their pace a little. It was already dark and a couple with pistols hid behind the bushes near the outbuildings of the yard.

The Jeep pulled up about fifteen meters from them. To him, as agreed, went "Donetsk" - Vadim blocked the path of possible escape of the victim.

The main performer at the beginning shot twice at the driver Alexander, who had already approached the entrance door. He fell and then the Donetsk resident pointed his pistol at the president of Danko, who was nearby, probably not even having time to understand: what was happening? When Alexander ran, he was already wounded, both killers were already shooting after him. Momot fell after running a little over ten meters. The control shot was fired by a "Donetsk resident", after which both killers moved down the steps, which they had climbed five minutes before. At the designated place of the boulevard, a Zhiguli was already waiting for them ... Note that initially it was not indicated who exactly was driving the car.

After the interrogation of a certain Denisov, much became clear. Actually, Denisov himself did not shoot at the "custom" businessmen and did not plant explosives under the guest curbstone of the Shakhtar stadium. In the gang, like the other guys who joined it, the native of Yasinovataya had his own clearly defined role and a characteristic nickname corresponding to it. From the spring of 1995 to the beginning of 1998, he worked as a driver - he drove members of the gang in various cars, mostly inconspicuous Zhiguli. Denisov had the nickname Horse, reflecting his functional duties and some awkwardness in movements. For his work, Denisov received from Kushnir $ 200-300 a month. For long-distance business trips (for example, to Kiev and Vladikavkaz) he was generously paid extra. The Horse received the last $ 200 from Nos-Kushnir in January 1998. Not so much money, even at that time.

It was he who brought Vadim Bolotskikh (Moskvich), who had the skills to organize explosions to the Shakhtar stadium on October 15, 1995 - according to Denisov's testimony, during this deadly action Bolotskikh worked in a group of couriers and insurers. Although Bolotskikh himself at the trial (see above) claimed that he had not been in Donetsk that day.

The same Moskvich and the main killer, hidden under the pseudo "Donetsk resident", Denisov gave a ride on May 16, 1996 at about 9 pm to Pushkin Boulevard and dropped off near the house where Alexander Momot lived. Who is the Donetsk resident? This is 26-year-old Vyacheslav Volkov (aka Volchok and Sava), who previously served in a special police unit for about two years. They killed him at the end of 1997 under mysterious circumstances ...

Hiding after the crime, within an hour one of the killers moved from another car to his Zhiguli at the agreed place on Universitetskaya Street. And Denisov took him to Kalinovka, in the area of the Stroydetal plant, where Kushnir was waiting for them in one of his rented apartments. The leader took the report on what had been done. At least that's what Bolotskikh claims.

Did Kushnir manage to return from Israel to Ukraine by that time? Indeed, according to other sources, he came to Ukraine legally only in 1998, shortly before his death. Maybe someone from the OVIR will enlighten ... Although it is unlikely that Nos used his services at this difficult time and nothing prevented him from coming to the country illegally. On the other hand, I will again note that this is the testimony of the accused, not supported by any circumstantial evidence.

The assassination attempt on Pavel Lazarenko and ...

1996 was perhaps the bloodiest year in the modern history of Donbass. And even if there were few high-profile killings in Donetsk, there were a lot of deaths, if such a definition is used in relation to human life.

On January 10, 1996 at 9:00 in the Tekstilshchik microdistrict, two young men trapped the VAZ-2106 and Ford-Scorpio cars driving away from the house No. 2 on Vysotsky Street and opened fire from machine guns. As a result, 34-year-old Sergei Aslanov, director of "Skif" 000, and 32-year-old Ivan Fasulaki were seriously injured. The killers dropped their weapons at the crime scene. Fasulaki died on the spot, Aslanov managed to survive. To law enforcement agencies, the director of 000 "Skif" was known as an acquaintance of Leonid Fishchuk, a member of Ryabin's organized crime group - Kushnir, who controlled the markets of the Kirov region. Fasulaki, according to operational data, generally had a pronounced criminal past. In this regard, it was assumed that the assassination attempt was organized either by persons with whom Aslanov had conflicts on the basis of commercial activities, or by the enemies of Fasulaki, who left his criminal traces in Kiev, Lugansk, Stakhanov.

On April 19, 1996, a scandal broke out in the Chervonogvardeisky district of Makeyevka over an attempt on the life of the director of the Kamelia private hotel. An improvised explosive device planted on its territory exploded ahead of the deadline set by the bandits due to damp weather. After this incident, a foreign delegation of oncologists, who had come to a scientific seminar, refused to settle in the hotel. The director himself, a former KGB officer, helped to sort out the police. He claimed that they wanted to blow it up and even pointed to the alleged customer - a business partner. Thanks to his help, it was possible to quickly reach two executors of the order from the Dnipropetrovsk region (sic!) And detain them.

On April 21, 1996 at 12.20 a.m. on Dzerzhinsky Avenue in the Kalininsky district of Donetsk, 48-year-old Georgy Morozov, who was convicted five times under articles of law, fell victim to two unknown persons in masks who drove up in a VAZ-21061 car of the color of "ripe cherry" for robbery, hooliganism, grievous bodily harm, theft of personal property, fraud and forgery. In Morozov, they opened fire from a machine gun and a pistol (17 automatic and 7 pistol shells were found near the corpse). A burnt-out car with a weapon was found on the same day on Lesostepnaya Street. Despite the abundance of convictions, the victim was not an influential person in the criminal environment.

The murder on July 23, 1996 on Fioletova Street in the Kievsky district of Donetsk caused a special resonance. Early in the morning, in house no. 38, five bodies with bullet holes were found: twin brothers Vladimir and Vyacheslav Dyachkov, a 23-year-old manager of a commercial firm, and two 18-year-old girls. There were weapons in the house - pistols "Beretta", "TT", submachine gun "Agram". The twin brothers had their own small group in Donetsk and a reputation of "outlaws", terrifying the businessmen. According to operational information, they were engaged in the return of debts and "protection" of retail outlets. Soon it became known about their conflict with one brigade in the capital on the subject of common interests. The Kiev authority allegedly, in front of witnesses, expressed threats to deal with the Dyachkovs. For several months, young people were seriously wary of someone and tried not to shine too much. In the course of the investigation, it was suggested that the Dyachkovs knew their killers, since they opened the door themselves. The two murdered girls turned out to be "priestesses of love". When the shooting began, only the manager had time to jump out the window. The bullets caught up with him already in the garden. After that, he lived for another three hours ...

On August 15, 1996 in Donetsk, 43-year-old director of the Garant firm Alexander Oganov and his previously convicted security guard E. Tsingaev were taken to the hospital from the house E82 on Slepneva street (Kuibyshevsky district). Five cartridges from a TT pistol and a safety pin from an RGD grenade remained at the crime scene. Both died on the operating table.

The director of the "Guarantor" served in the past in the internal affairs bodies. In the early 90s he got involved in entrepreneurship and opened an enterprise providing legal services of various profiles and varying degrees of complexity. In 1994 he ran for the regional council in the Kalininsky district, but to no avail.

What happened on July 16, 1996 in Kiev is only indirectly related to the "bloody history" of the mining capital, but has a direct connection with the fabric of the narrative. Then, during the departure of the freshly baked prime minister to the Donetsk region, in the area of the Moscow bridge of the capital of Ukraine, connecting Rybalsky Island and Podol, a powerful explosion thundered on the way of the motorcade that followed to Borispol. Lazarenko's armored BMW withstood the blast, but the broken glass cut Pavel Ivanovich's hands and head, and the guard's head. The prime minister arrived in Donetsk in an exaggerated theatrical form in the style of "The Godfather": in a white shirt with brown spots and a trickle of blood on his cheek. He blamed his economic and political opponents from Donetsk for planting an explosive package in the manhole. Many experienced experts, including Yevgeny Marchuk, said in private conversations that the assassination attempt on Lazarenko looks like a PR action and may well be staged. PI himself, also in a private conversation, said that he considered the explosion on the bridge a warning, and owed his salvation to the angels.

This attempt on the life of the prime minister was not the only one, but it was it that had the most serious impact on the situation in the region. Until now, this strange story is the subject of controversy and speculation. And it was she who allegedly became the reason (and maybe the reason) for the next murder. At least that is what was announced in the press.

Something like a "contract killing fashion" appeared, which took on exaggerated and sometimes anecdotal forms. Given the popularity of the Brigade series in our Palestine, this is not surprising, but puzzling. Alexander Kuchinsky in his "Chronicles" sets out the history of the gang, which existed from July to August 1996, that is, only a month. It brought together several young people who came from the sports circles of Donbass.

Like many others like him, 20-year-old Sasha Kolomiytsev, before joining big crime, was listed as an errand for more influential bandits. In the criminal world, he gained fame under the nickname Colomon. In the process of natural selection, he was haunted by the laurels of a leader, and in the end he began to put together his own team for the forcible confiscation of personal property. By that time, Kolomiytsev's entourage already possessed automatic weapons, ammunition and cars, which in itself was a considerable achievement. In house No. 134 on Sobinov Street, an apartment was rented in the name of one of the members of the group, where the weapons were transported. The newly minted leader of a small but friendly lads demanded strict discipline from his subordinates, immediately formed a common fund, which personally supervised.

In pursuit of their habitat, the new brigade with amazing speed managed to make enemies among the local lads, who were not happy with the appearance of another mouth. Starting its existence under the auspices of one of the crime bosses named Senya, the toothy youth got out of his control and turned against their own patron.

The 28-year-old unlucky son in the family of a large trade worker Senya was of interest to the operational services already because he maintained warm relations with the Bogdanov brothers. After the shooting of the brothers in 1995, Seni's star went down, his nickname was used less and less among the bandit boys. The “Kolomonovites” also decided to put their hand to the final oblivion of the criminal mentor, barely sensing that the teacher's authority had given a tilt.

Senya did not want to see serious people in Kolomiytsevo and his friends in any way and perceived them without much respect, which greatly annoyed the young bandits. On this basis, an open enmity arose between them, which almost cost Seine his life. The action to physically eliminate the former patron took place on August 21, 1996 and gained notoriety due to ... the awkwardness of candidates for criminal leadership.

That late evening, shots rang out near the house 116-a on Panfilov Avenue in the Kuibyshevsky district. Alarmed citizens began to call the police with a request to restore order. The nearest operational and mobile police groups were directed to the scene of the incident, which was located five hundred meters from the regional department. Together with his colleagues, the district inspector, police captain Eduard Kamlyk, joined the development of the adjacent territory. On the same evening, he delivered the detained hooligan to the duty station. It turned out that the district police officer, walking along the street, noticed a white Zhiguli ... without numbers and decided to wait for their owner. His patience was rewarded a minute later.

To the "Zhiguli", nervously tearing off their pediches and masks, two out of breath guys ran up. They had already thrown away their submachine guns and now stood in front of the district police officer, armed only with their own fists and knitted hats. Attempts to resist were fruitless. For an ostracism, the district police officer fired his pistol into the air, which finally frightened the young killers. The task force that arrived in time for the shots helped to deliver a couple to the regional department. Near house 116, where the shooting was conducted, the bodies of two people were found: a former convicted employee of the Molodist firm Valeria Petrova and a 20-year-old student of the Institute of Management Anton Voronov, who died from gunshot wounds. They found and seized two abandoned 5.45 mm Kalashnikov assault rifles, a Borz assault rifle, two horns, masks, gloves, and imported radio stations.

The detainees turned out to be unemployed residents of Donetsk - Eduard Tairov, born in 1972, and Alexander Kolesnichenko, born in 1974. Soon the picture of the committed crime became clear.

The shot student was a member of a gang! He and his friends organized an attack on Senya. Having found out that he would visit his friend Petrova in the evening, the guys set up an ambush at the house. Automatic bursts sounded when Senya left the entrance and sat in a VAZ model 99, which was waiting for him, driven by his friend. None of the killers knew how to competently handle the machine guns, which were seized ahead of time. They inflicted only light tangential wounds on the target. The driver who was driving was not injured. But one of the killers - a student Voronov, in the excitement of the battle, fell under the queue of his own friends. His chest and stomach were pierced. The neighboring house also got into the shelling sector. Several bullets, accompanied by the sound of broken glass, flew into the windows of citizens awakened by the roar. A chandelier was damaged in one of the apartments. There were no civilian casualties.

When the bandits poured lead on the fleeing Senya, Petrova ran out of the entrance with shouts. One of the killers (presumably it was Kolomiytsev) shot her in cold blood. The woman died on the spot. The Kolomonovites still tried to carry the wounded comrade to the car, but they threw it halfway, seeing that it was dying. Only Kolomiytsev and another guy, whose identity was never established during the investigation, managed to safely leave the scene. Arthur, the elder brother of Eduard Tairov, who was detained on the spot, was suspected of complicity. During the shooting, witnesses heard one of the criminals call the other Arthur. But the "Kolomonovites", planning the murder, initially decided to call each other by fictitious names. The court did not find strong evidence of Artur Tairov's guilt, since the evidence against him was circumstantial.

The fate of the young bandits turned out to be unenviable. Anton Voronov died under the bullets of his friends-bugs. Edik Tairov, a week after his arrest, hanged himself on his own T-shirt in the cell of the remand prison. Kolomiytsev hid from the police for some time, but the danger awaited him from a completely different direction. On January 11, 1997, Kolomon was found shot from a machine gun near house number 69-g on Officer's Avenue in the Kuibyshevsky district. Not a single living place was left on the corpse - the fire was so intense. In the head alone, experts counted twelve bullet wounds.

Through operational channels, it was possible to establish who shot Kolomiytsev, but the killer had already set off on the run and was put on the wanted list. A month later, information appeared that the killer had fallen at the hands of his own. However, the version remained a version.

In the spring of 1999, the Judicial Collegium for Criminal Cases of the Donetsk Regional Court sentenced Alexander Kolesnichenko, who was so successfully detained by a precinct officer, to 15 years in prison with complete confiscation of his personal property. It is noteworthy that the defendant, having made a confession during the investigation, in the courtroom began to deny everything, stating that he was at the scene by accident and gave testimony exclusively under the cops' torture. The Supreme Court of Ukraine dismissed the cassation appeal of the convict.

Senya, who healed his wounds, was prosecuted in 1997 for possession of firearms, but was acquitted by the court. He led a balanced lifestyle and did not recommend himself in the criminal arena of Donbass.