The true story of the black cat gang. Gang "black cat": the most mysterious gang of the USSR. Where plastic windows

60 years ago, members of Ivan Mitin's gang, arrested the day before, were brought to Petrovka, which later became the prototype of the "Black Cat" in the Weiner brothers' novel "The Era of Mercy" and the unforgettable TV series "The meeting place cannot be changed." But it turns out that the "Black Cat" gang itself is nothing more than a myth invented by "filmmakers" for greater persuasiveness.

But the characters of the heroes of Vladimir Vysotsky and Vladimir Konkin, that is, Gleb Zheglov and Volodya Sharapov, though collective in many respects, still have real prototypes, around which these very images “gathered”.

Georgy Vainer, the author of the script for the film "The meeting place cannot be changed," wrote in his memoirs: "Although Sharapov is a collective image, he has a prototype - Volodya Arapov, who later became the head of the MUR department. He participated in the capture of the famous Mitin gang, which we, in fact, personified as the "Black Cat".

A few years ago, an exhibition was opened at the Museum of the History of the Moscow Police, where documents about the "Black Cat" were presented. The first visitors thought they would learn a lot about this legendary gang. But disappointment awaited them: it turns out that the mysterious bloody cohort of criminals is nothing more than a hoax!

According to credible sources, it was like this. In the difficult post-war years, a company of yard guys decided to play a prank on their neighbor, the rich director of the Moscow market. The boys disliked him because the director "fattened" in the rear, while their own fathers fought at the front. Volodya Kolganov, a seventh-grader, led a teenage hooligan gang.

They didn’t do anything so illegal in their youth - they just periodically painted a black cat on his door. Like, watch out, infection! But terrible rumors spread throughout the city. The director of the auction, who had considerable connections in the MGB, also had a hand in this. By order of the high authorities, the operatives began to actively look for the gang, which, for purely operational purposes, they themselves called the "Black Cat". MUR also joined.

Rumors spread throughout the city. Many Moscow raiders, having "smelled" the benefits of such a chic criminal PR, made it a rule after each "case" to paint the sign of a "black cat" on the doors of the victims or toss a black kitten under the door of an apartment. And no one doubted that one gang was operating.

Operatives of the MUR and the MGB were knocked down in search of miraculously "bred" gangsters. People began to say that the "black cat" served as a warning about a future robbery. Although, if you think soberly, then why would the raiders warn potential victims about the impending theft?

The secret of the "Black Cat" was revealed by the great-grandson of A. S. Pushkin himself - Grigory Grigoryevich Pushkin, who before the war worked as an detective of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Oktyabrsky District Department of the Metropolitan Police, and since 1946 worked at the MUR. It was he who "split" the unlucky boys, with light hand who spread a frightening rumor about a "cat" gang in Moscow.

But the gang that served as the prototype of the criminal community in the novel by the Weiner brothers, and then in Stanislav Govorukhin's film "The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed", still existed. It was just the gang of Ivan Mitin, who instilled fear in all of Moscow in the post-war years.

On account of the gang for the three years of its existence, according to the MUR, there were 11 corpses (among those killed were three police officers), 18 wounded, 22 robberies (excluding those who broke), almost 300 thousand rubles became its prey. Mitin and other gang members guilty of the death of policemen were sentenced to capital punishment, accomplices were given 25 years each.

As the author of Pravda.Ru, Irina Shlionskaya, writes in her journalistic investigations, the most mysterious gang of the Stalin era did not step into Moscow from a smoky gambling "raspberry". And not from the prison or camp zone. 11 apparently quite virtuous guys went on a criminal hunt on the streets of Moscow almost directly from the honor roll of the defense plant in Krasnogorsk near Moscow.

The whole life of the city was closely connected with the defense industry, and its stadium "Zenith" was one of the leading sports bases of the Moscow region, the heart of Krasnogorsk, with the strongest teams in hockey, football, volleyball, and athletics. It was there that the members of the future gang gathered at first.

The gang included 11 people, most of them lived in Krasnogorsk near Moscow. Its leader was Ivan Mitin, born in 1927, shift foreman at defense plant number 34. By the way, at the time of the liquidation of the gang, leader Mitin was presented with a high government award - the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.

Eight of the 11 members of the gang were employees of a defense plant, two were cadets of prestigious military schools. For "strategic planning" a certain Pyotr Bolotov, who was much older than all his accomplices, was also involved in the gang, who at work (again at a closed defense plant) was listed as a Stakhanovite, a member of the Party. Also, a student of the Moscow Aviation Institute, Vyacheslav Lukin, an excellent student, athlete and Komsomol activist, was involved in the gang. The gang finally took shape in the early 1950s.

In January 1950, the two-year Stalinist moratorium on death penalty. According to some historians, the leader was forced to do this not by the "invasion" of the enemies of the people, but by the post-war dominance of bloody crime. He began to overwhelm not only the provinces, but also the capitals. And even the gang of Ivan Mitin, who also got into the habit of painting a black cat at crime scenes, was not the most bloody in those difficult times. The war with the Nazis is over, the war with the bandits has begun...

On February 1, 1950, the Stakhanovist Mitin's gang committed their first crime. While trying to rob a store, a police officer was killed. On March 26, the bandits broke into the Timiryazevsky store and, posing as employees of the MGB, pushed the visitors into the back room. The booty of the criminals was 68 thousand rubles. On November 16, 1950, Mitin and his accomplices robbed one store for 24.5 thousand rubles, on December 10 - another one for 62 thousand rubles.

On March 11, 1951, during the robbery of the Blue Danube restaurant, Mitin killed a police lieutenant, and two more bystanders died along with the latter. The patience of the Soviet authorities (if their furious state can be called patience at all) burst. The best forces of the MUR and the MGB were sent to capture the gang.

In February 1953, MUR employees managed to clearly get on the trail of the gang. After one of the members of the criminal gang named Lukin bought out a whole barrel of beer from the Krasnogorsk stadium in style (which, of course, aroused suspicion), he was followed. Shortly thereafter, Mitin and his accomplices, 12 in all, were arrested. During the investigation, many bandits openly confessed to all the crimes committed.

The court sentenced Ivan Mitin and Alexander Samarin to capital punishment - the death penalty by firing squad, the sentence was carried out in Butyrka prison. And Lukin was sentenced to 25 years in prison. Interestingly, he served his term in full, but a day after his release in 1977, he mysteriously died. Then in the MUR they said that he was "sent" to the next world by one of the relatives of those killed by the gang, who waited for his release. Kara overtook him even a quarter of a century after the crime.

The country was gangster after the war. This is especially noticeable in large cities. Young men who returned from the war, who only know how to hold weapons in their hands, growing youth who did not have ...

The country was gangster after the war. This is especially noticeable in large cities. Young men who returned from the war, who only knew how to hold weapons in their hands, growing youth who had no childhood, homeless children ... All this became a breeding ground for the country's criminal life.

One of the most famous criminal communities was the Black Cat gang. Only lazy people don't know about it. The talent of the Vainer brothers and Stanislav Govorukhin was glorified by the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department, which is fighting an incredibly cruel criminal association.

But the real events did not reach the viewer. "Hunchbacked" and many other members of the gang are fictionalized by writers. The gang consisted of good citizens of the country of the Soviets.

"Cat" abundance of the post-war period

As always, reality and literary images do not coincide. Immediately after the war, there were rumors in the country that there was a gang leaving a trace after the robbery - they painted a stylized black cat on the door or any smooth surface. However, reality is very different from fiction.

I liked the romance, in the form of a black silhouette. Bandit groups and ordinary street thieves began to use it in their raids. How mushrooms bred "black cats". Even the street punks considered it their duty to decorate the broken bench in the park with a black silhouette.

And ordinary boys in the yards also portrayed the "black cat" gang. The famous writer Eduard Khrutsky in the 46th was in such a "gang". Teenagers decided to scare a citizen who lived comfortably during the war, when their fathers fought for their homeland, and their families were starving.

Of course, the "gang" of teenagers was figured out, given a neck and sent home. The real members of the Black Cat gang are robbers who take the lives and values ​​​​of a poor people.

Bloody start

In the winter, in the fiftieth, in Khimki, a gang first appeared. They fell into the field of view of two policemen - Filin and Kochkin - who were walking around the entrusted area. In the Produkty store, the man was arguing with the salesperson, who was vigilant and demanded a police ID.

Blue Danube Restaurant

The policemen also failed to see the documents. The friends of the “civilian officer” who were smoking on the porch opened fire on the policemen. The agent fell. In the fifties, the murder of a policeman is a serious event. Raised to their feet, the entire Moscow police could not find the bandits.

The band made a sign of itself. Having attacked a department store, “MGB officers”, as they introduced themselves, closed sellers and buyers in the back room, carried out 68,000 rubles. Employees have been looking for them for six months, carefully shaking up the famous "raspberries". But they didn't succeed.

Vladimir Pavlovich Arapov

Bandyugans "lay down on the bottom" with a big jackpot. However, money has the ability to run out. A department store was robbed - 24,000 rubles were stolen; an attack on a store on Kutuzovsky Prospekt - 62,000 rubles was stolen. Demands grew, and confidence in impunity gave courage.

Next to Stalin

Ordinary vacationers in the Blue Danube restaurant suddenly got up from the table and went to the cashier. Threatening with a gun, they demanded to give out cash. Mikhail Biryukov - a policeman - rested there, with his wife. He had a day off, but he got into a fight with armed bandits. The panic began. Shoot the officer.

Along the way, a worker resting in the hall also died from a random bullet. The bandits left the restaurant without any loot. More successful was the raid on the Kuntsevsky trade, where the director, who entered into hand-to-hand combat with the ringleader, was killed. For the leadership of Moscow, the situation was extremely difficult.

The last attack happened near the "Near Dacha" of the leader of the peoples. The entire Moscow police demanded that the criminal authorities extradite the gang. But they swore by oath that no one among them could allow such a thing. And rumors exaggerated the number of raids and murders. The "Black Cat" firmly stood on its feet in Moscow.

For three years, the gang ironed the capital and its environs. Snegiri station - the watchman was killed, the Beer-Water tent - a random man who tried to help the saleswoman was killed, a shop in the Botanical Garden - the seller was wounded, the policeman was killed. Increasingly, there were raids with a tragic outcome.

call

Smart employees worked at the MUR. The alarm sounded from the savings bank, where the bandits took 30,000 rubles, the cashier managed to press the panic button, became the object of careful consideration. On a call from the police to check the alarm signal, the bandit answered: “Is this a savings bank?”. "No, the stadium."

Why a stadium? Detective Vladimir Arapov carefully analyzed the situation. On the map, it turned out that all the robberies take place near the sports grounds. It turns out that the bandits could be athletes.

Generous guy with a barrel of beer

The policemen were ordered to pay attention to everything unusual around the athletes. And this happened in Krasnogorsk. The guy paid for a barrel of beer and started handing it out to passers-by for free foamy drink. There were a lot of people who wanted to. Among the lucky ones was Arapov.

MUR, according to Arapov's fresh impressions, initiated the check. The “rich man” turned out to be a student at the Moscow Aviation Institute, his friends are workers from a defense plant. It seemed that these were exemplary Soviet athletes, Komsomol members, and social activists. And, nevertheless, the detective sensed that the trail was right.

He turned out to be right. The gang consisted of twelve people who had nothing to do with crime. Ivan Mitin, leader of the gang, presented to the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. Two cadets of a military school, students, advanced workers. Sports brought them together.

In total, the gang made twenty-eight raids, eleven of which ended in killings. Eighteen people were injured. Arrested Mitin calmly testified. He knew that only one retribution was possible for his atrocities - the death penalty.

The case was so deafeningly wrong in terms of ideology that it was classified. Shock workers of communist labor, Komsomol activists, excellent students, cadets of military schools. All were sentenced to long prison terms ranging from 10 to 25 years.

Mitin and Alexander Samarin, who directly killed people, received capital punishment. Werewolves, who live normal lives during the day and become murderers and bandits at night, got what they deserved.

The most mystery gang of the Stalin era, the "Black Cat" for 3 years, with its daring raids, did not give rest to Muscovites. Taking advantage of the difficult post-war situation and the gullibility of citizens, Mitin's gang "teared off" large sums of money and left unscathed.

A series of "Black Cats"

In post-war Moscow, the crime situation was alarming. This was facilitated by the lack of basic necessities among the population, hunger, a large number of unaccounted for captured and Soviet weapons.

The situation was aggravated by the growing panic among the people; for the appearance of frightening rumors, one high-profile precedent was enough.

Such a precedent in the first post-war year was the statement of the director of the Moscow auction that he was threatened by the Black Cat gang. On the door of his apartment, someone began to draw a black cat, the director of the mostorg began to receive threatening notes written on notebook sheets.

On January 8, 1946, the MUR investigation team went to the alleged crime scene to ambush the intruders. At five in the morning they were already caught. They were several students. Volodya Kalganov, a seventh-grader, was the boss. The future screenwriter and writer Eduard Khrutsky was also in this "gang".

The schoolchildren immediately admitted their guilt, saying that they simply wanted to intimidate the “grabber”, who lived comfortably in the rear while their fathers fought at the front. Of course, the case was not given a go. As Eduard Khrutsky later admitted, "they hit him on the neck and let him go."

Before that, there were rumors among the people that before robbing an apartment, thieves draw a “black cat” on its door - an analogue of a pirate “black mark”. Despite all the absurdity, this legend was enthusiastically picked up by the criminal world. In Moscow alone there were at least a dozen "Black Cats", later similar gangs began to appear in other Soviet cities.

Basically, these were teenage groups, which, firstly, were attracted by the romance of the image itself - the “black cat”, and secondly, they wanted to throw the detectives off their trail with such a simple trick. However, by 1950, the activity of the “Chernokoshkinites” had come to naught, many were caught, many simply grew up and stopped being swaggering, flirting with fate.

"You can't kill policemen"

Agree, the story of the "Black Cat" bears little resemblance to what we read in the book of the Weiner brothers and saw in the film by Stanislav Govorukhin. However, the story about the gang that terrorized Moscow for several years was not invented.

Ivan Mitin's gang became the prototype of the book and cinema "Black Cat".

Over the three years of its existence, the "Mitintsy" committed 28 robbery attacks, killed 11 people and wounded 12 more. The total income from their criminal activities amounted to more than 300 thousand rubles. The amount is solid. A car in those years cost about 2000 rubles.

Mitin's gang declared itself loudly - from the murder of a policeman. On February 1, 1950, senior detective Kochkin and district police officer Filin were making their rounds when they caught Mitin and an accomplice in preparation for a robbery attack on a store in Khimki. A shootout ensued. Kochkin was killed on the spot. The criminals managed to escape.

Even among criminals with experience there is an understanding that "militiamen cannot be killed", and here - a shot without warning at close range. The MUR realized that they would have to deal with a new type of criminal, with cold-blooded lawless people.

This time they robbed the department store Timiryazevsky. The booty of the criminals was 68 thousand rubles.

The criminals didn't stop there. They made one daring raid after another. In Moscow, talk began to circulate that the "Black Cat" had returned, and this time everything was much more serious. The city was in panic. No one felt safe, and the MUR and the MGB took the actions of the Mitintsy as a challenge to them personally.

Khrushchev on a string

The murder of a policeman Kochkin was committed by the Mitinites shortly before the elections to the Supreme Soviet. The rosy information agenda of those days, with assurances about the growth of the economy, that life was getting better, crime was eradicated, ran counter to the robberies that had occurred.

The MUR took all necessary measures to ensure that these incidents did not become public knowledge.

Mitin's gang declared itself just three months after Nikita Khrushchev, who came from Kyiv, became the head of the Moscow Regional Committee. At that time, information about all high-profile crimes lay on the table of the highest officials of the state. Joseph Stalin and Lavrenty Beria could not have been unaware of the Mitintsy. The newly arrived Nikita Khrushchev found himself in a delicate situation, he was personally interested in finding the Mitintsy as soon as possible.

In March 1952, Khrushchev personally came to the MUR in order to arrange a "dressing".

As a result of the visit of the "high authorities", two heads of district departments were arrested, and a special operational headquarters was created in the MUR to deal with the case of the Mitin gang.
Some historians believe that the case of the "Mitintsy" could play a decisive role in the history of the confrontation between Khrushchev and Beria. If the Mitin gang had not been exposed before Stalin's death, then Beria could have ended up in the place of the head of state.

The head of the MUR museum, Lyudmila Kaminskaya, in the film about the Black Cat, said bluntly: “They had such a struggle. Beria was removed from business, he was sent to lead the nuclear power industry, and Khrushchev oversaw all law enforcement agencies. And, of course, Beria needed Khrushchev to be insolvent in this post. That is, he was preparing a platform for himself to remove Khrushchev.

Production leaders

The main problem for the detectives was that they initially looked in the wrong place and the wrong ones. From the very beginning of the investigation, the Moscow criminals, as one, “went into denial” and disavowed any connection with the Mitintsy.

As it turned out, the sensational gang consisted entirely of production leaders and people far from the criminal "raspberries" and the thieves' circle. In total, the gang consisted of 12 people.

Most of them lived in Krasnogorsk and worked at a local factory.

The leader of the gang, Ivan Mitin, was a shift foreman at defense plant No. 34. Interestingly, at the time of his capture, Mitin was presented with a high government award - the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. 8 out of 11 members of the gang also worked at this plant, two were cadets of prestigious military schools.

Among the "Mityans" was a Stakhanovite, an employee of the "five hundredth" factory, a member of the party - Pyotr Bolotov. There was also a MAI student Vyacheslav Lukin, a member of the Komsomol and an athlete.

In a sense, sports became the connecting link of accomplices. Krasnogorsk after the war was one of the best sports bases near Moscow, there were strong teams in volleyball, football, bandy and athletics. The first gathering place of the Mitintsy was the Krasnogorsk Zenit stadium.

The court sentenced Ivan Mitin and Alexander Samarin to capital punishment - the death penalty by firing squad, the sentence was carried out in Butyrka prison. Lukin was sentenced to 25 years in prison. A day after his release, in 1977, he mysteriously died.

And now a few details about - "And now hunchbacked!, I said humpbacked!"

The Black Cat gang is perhaps the most famous criminal association in the post-Soviet space. It became such thanks to the talent of the Weiner brothers, who wrote the book "The Era of Mercy", as well as the skill of director Stanislav Govorukhin, who shot one of the best Soviet detective stories, "The meeting place cannot be changed."

However, reality is very different from fiction.

In 1945-1946, rumors appeared in different cities of the Soviet Union about a gang of thieves who, before robbing an apartment, draw a kind of “mark” in the form of a black cat on its door.

Representatives of crime liked this romantic story so much that "black cats" bred like mushrooms. As a rule, it was about small groups, the scope of which did not even come close to what the Weiner brothers described. Often under the sign black cat”street punks performed.

The popular writer of the detective genre Eduard Khrutsky, according to the scripts of which such films as “According to the Criminal Investigation Department” and “Proceed to liquidation” were staged, recalled that in 1946 he himself was part of such a “gang”.

A group of teenagers decided to scare a certain citizen who lived comfortably during the war years, while the boys' fathers fought at the front. The policemen, having caught the "avengers", according to Khrutsky, dealt with them simply: "they hit them on the necks and let them go."

The “bandits” from the “Black Cat” were a group of teenagers of the third, fifth and seventh grades who decided to scare a neighbor and wrote him a note of threatening content, - explains the head of the Museum of the History of the Moscow Department of Internal Affairs of the KC of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for Moscow, Lyudmila Kaminskaya. “They made themselves tattoos with ink, and in the note they drew a black cat, after which this name stuck to the“ gang ”.

The rumor about the mysterious "Black Cat" spread throughout Moscow very quickly, turning into a real "brand". Taking advantage of the loud glory of a non-existent gang, Moscow youngsters committed petty thefts, hooligans, and intimidated the townspeople. The so-called "guest performers" - visiting thieves - were hiding behind the "Cat".

But the plot of the Weiner brothers is based on the story of not such unfortunate robbers, but real criminals who took not only money and valuables, but also human lives. The gang in question operated in 1950-1953.

“As for the Weiner brothers and their romance, they simply took advantage of this loud name. The prototype of the gang, whose affairs were described in the Era of Mercy, was the High Blond Gang. However, there are discrepancies with reality here too: the leader of the gang, Ivan Mitin was not humpbacked at all, but on the contrary, he was distinguished by high growth, ”said Lyudmila Kaminskaya.

Bloody debut.

On February 1, 1950, in Khimki, senior detective Kochkin and local police officer V. Filin made a round of the territory. Entering the grocery store, they noticed a young man who was arguing with the saleswoman. He introduced himself to the woman as a police officer in civilian clothes, but that person seemed suspicious. Two of the young man's friends were smoking on the porch.

When the police officers tried to check the documents, one of the unknown people pulled out a pistol and opened fire. Detective Kochkin became the first victim of a gang that terrorized Moscow and its environs for three years.

The murder of a policeman was an out of the ordinary event, and law enforcement officers were actively searching for the perpetrators. The bandits, however, reminded themselves of themselves: on March 26, 1950, three broke into a department store in the Timiryazevsky district, introducing themselves as ... Chekists.

“MGB employees”, taking advantage of the confusion of sellers and visitors, drove everyone into the back room and locked the store with a padlock. The booty of the criminals was 68 thousand rubles.

For six months, the operatives knocked down their legs in search of the bandits, but in vain. Those, as it turned out later, having received a big jackpot, hid. In the autumn, having spent the money, they again went hunting. On November 16, 1950, a department store of the Moscow Canal Shipping Company was robbed (more than 24,000 rubles were stolen), on December 10, a store on Kutuzovskaya Sloboda Street (62,000 rubles was stolen).

A raid next door to Comrade Stalin.

On March 11, 1951, criminals raided the Blue Danube restaurant. Being absolutely confident in their own invulnerability, the bandits first drank at the table, and then moved to the cashier with a pistol.

Junior lieutenant of militia Mikhail Biryukov that day was in a restaurant with his wife. Despite this, mindful of the call of duty, he entered into a fight with the bandits. The officer died from the bullets of the criminals. Another victim was a worker sitting at one of the tables: he was hit by one of the bullets intended for the policeman. Panic broke out in the restaurant, and the robbery was thwarted. While fleeing, the bandits wounded two more people.

The failure of the criminals only angered. March 27, 1951 they raided the Kuntsevsky market. The director of the store, Karp Antonov, entered into hand-to-hand combat with the leader of the gang and was killed.

The situation was extraordinary. The latest attack took place just a few kilometers from Stalin's "Near Dacha". The best forces of the police and the Ministry of State Security "shaken" the criminals, demanding to extradite the completely insolent raiders, but the "authorities" swore that they knew nothing.

The rumors that circulated in Moscow exaggerated the crimes of the bandits tenfold. The legend of the "Black Cat" was now firmly associated with them.

Restaurant "Blue Danube".

The powerlessness of Nikita Khrushchev.

The bandits behaved more and more defiantly. A reinforced police patrol stumbled upon them in the station canteen at Udelnaya station. One of the suspicious men was found carrying a gun.

The police did not dare to detain the bandits in the hall: there were a lot of strangers around who could die. The bandits, having gone out into the street and rushed to the forest, started a real shootout with the policemen. The victory remained with the raiders: they again managed to escape.

The head of the Moscow City Party Committee, Nikita Khrushchev, threw thunder and lightning at law enforcement officers. He seriously feared for his career: Nikita Sergeevich could well have been asked for rampant crime in the capital of "the world's first state of workers and peasants."

But nothing helped: neither the threat nor the attraction of new forces. In August 1952, during a raid on a tea shop at the Snegiri station, bandits killed the watchman Kraev, who tried to resist them. In September of the same year, criminals attacked the Beer-Water tent on the Leningradskaya platform. One of the visitors tried to protect the saleswoman. The man was shot.

On November 1, 1952, during a raid on a store in the Botanical Garden area, bandits wounded a saleswoman. When they had already left the scene of the crime, a police lieutenant paid attention to them. He knew nothing about the robbery, but decided to check the documents of suspicious citizens. The police officer was mortally wounded.

Mitin now rarely left Krasnogorsk without a pistol in his pocket, even when he visited his father, who worked in the forestry in Kratov. On this day, without finding him on the spot, he got off at the Udelnaya station together with Ageev and Averchenkov to buy a drink in the station cafeteria. In connection with the strengthening of the protection of trains and to maintain law and order, police officers were now often seen at the stations. However, the three bandits noticed them only when they had already settled down at the table. Ageev got nervous:

We must leave. There are too many police here!

But Mitin didn't even flinch, calmly took off his jacket and continued to drink. The evening was hot. He was wearing trousers and a summer shirt, and the TT pistol was clearly visible in his pocket. Mitin's calmness was almost defiant. The policemen realized that the case was taking a dangerous turn.

Ivan, let's go! They saw the trunk of garbage! Ageev insisted. - I know.

The police did not want to endanger others and did not apprehend the suspicious group inside the restaurant. They watched as Mitin and Ageev calmly passed by. Coming to the platform, Mitin quickly jumped onto the railway track and turned towards the forest.

Stop! The policemen rushed after him.

Mitin pulled out a pistol, and a real firefight unfolded. He was on the verge of death, but the bullets stubbornly flew past. All three managed to escape. MUR failed again.

Soon after these events, Ageev, with an impeccable record, entered the Naval Mine-Torpedo Aviation School in Nikolaev. Bandit vacancy was free. But not for long. Mitin brought to work the twenty-four-year-old Nikolaenko, who was restless after a prison term.

In the photo, another crime scene - Susokolovskoye highway (on the left - the territory of the Botanical Garden).

"Everyone on the floor!"

In August 1952, the gang broke into a tea shop at the Snegiri station. The tea room just sounds innocent. In those days, strong drinks were not served in canteens, and you could buy alcohol in teahouses, so the cash desk worked briskly. When the tall, dark figure of Mitin blocked the entrance and a sharp cry was heard: “On the floor!” Everyone seemed to be numb from surprise and horror. Mitin drew his weapon and in a matter of seconds forced everyone to obey. But the watchman H. Kraev rushed into the back room and tore a gun from the wall. Mitin fired. Kraev died the same day in the hospital.

There were about four thousand. For many, a fortune. For the Mitinites, the risk is wasted. A month later, Lukin and Mitin took an electric train to Moscow to choose a new point for the robbery. A suitable object soon appeared - the "Beer-Water" tent on the Leningradskaya platform.

Having met on a deserted platform, all three entered the building of the tent. Averchenkov locked the door from the inside and remained at the entrance, while Lukin demanded the money from the cashier and, pulling her own leather suitcase towards him, threw the money into it. The customer at the nearest table stood up.

What are you doing, mother t ... - The shot cut off his indignation and life itself. Then another visitor rushed to Mitin and received a bullet in the head.

What are you doing there? Lukin, an exemplary MAI student, shouted over his shoulder.

Mitin ran out with Lukin to the platform and at the last minute jumped onto the departing train. Getting off at the next station, they crossed the bridge over the Skhodnya. Swinging, Lukin threw the bag as far as possible into the dark river, and she swallowed the evidence.

Pictured is Vladimir Arapov. 1950 (from the archive of retired major general V.P. Arapov).

Call.

In January 1953, bandits raided a savings bank in Mytishchi. Their booty was 30 thousand rubles. But at the moment of the robbery, something happened that made it possible to get the first lead leading to the elusive gang.

The employee of the savings bank managed to press the “panic button”, and the phone rang in the savings bank. The bewildered robber grabbed the phone.

- Is it a savings bank? the caller asked.

“No, the stadium,” the raider replied, cutting off the call.

The duty officer at the police station called the savings bank. Vladimir Arapov, an employee of the MUR, drew attention to this short dialogue. This detective, a real legend of the capital's criminal investigation, later became the prototype of Vladimir Sharapov.

And then Arapov became alert: why, in fact, did the bandit mention the stadium? He said the first thing that came to mind, but why did he remember the stadium in particular?

After analyzing the places of robberies on the map, the detective discovered that many of them were committed near sports arenas. The bandits were described as young men of athletic appearance. It turns out that the criminals could not be related to crime at all, but to be athletes?

Vladimir Pavlovich Arapov

Fatal barrel of beer.

In the 1950s, this was unthinkable. Athletes in the USSR were considered role models, but here it is ...

The operatives were ordered to start checking sports societies, paying attention to everything unusual that happens near the stadiums.

Soon an unusual incident occurred near the stadium in Krasnogorsk. A certain young man bought a barrel of beer from the saleswoman and treated everyone. Among the lucky ones was Vladimir Arapov, who remembered the "rich man" and began checking.

At first glance, it was about exemplary Soviet citizens. Beer was served by a student of the Moscow Aviation Institute Vyacheslav Lukin, an excellent student, athlete and Komsomol activist. The friends who accompanied him turned out to be workers from the defense factories of Krasnogorsk, Komsomol members and labor shock workers.

But Arapov felt that this time he was on the right track. It turned out that on the eve of the robbery of the savings bank in Mytishchi, Lukin really was at the local stadium.

The main problem for the detectives was that they initially looked in the wrong place and the wrong ones. From the very beginning of the investigation, the Moscow criminals, as one, “went into denial” and disavowed any connection with the Mitintsy.

As it turned out, the sensational gang consisted entirely of production leaders and people far from the criminal "raspberries" and the thieves' circle. In total, the gang consisted of 12 people.

Most of them lived in Krasnogorsk and worked at a local factory.

The leader of the gang, Ivan Mitin, was a shift foreman at defense plant No. 34. Interestingly, at the time of his capture, Mitin was presented with a high government award - the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. 8 out of 11 members of the gang also worked at this plant, two were cadets of prestigious military schools.

Among the "Mitintsy" was a Stakhanovite, an employee of the "500th" factory, a member of the party - Pyotr Bolotov. There was also a MAI student Vyacheslav Lukin, a member of the Komsomol and an athlete.

In a sense, sports became the connecting link of accomplices. Krasnogorsk after the war was one of the best sports bases near Moscow, there were strong teams in volleyball, football, bandy and athletics. The first gathering place of the Mitintsy was the Krasnogorsk Zenit stadium.

Mitin established the most severe discipline in the gang, forbade any bravado, and rejected contacts with "classic" bandits. And yet, Mitin's scheme failed: a barrel of beer at the stadium in Krasnogorsk led the raiders to collapse.

"Ideologically wrong" criminals.

At dawn on February 14, 1953, operatives broke into the house of Ivan Mitin. The detained ringleader behaved calmly, during the investigation he gave detailed testimony, not hoping to save his life. The shock worker understood perfectly well that there could be only one punishment for what he had done.

When all the members of the gang were arrested, and the report of the investigation lay on the table of the top Soviet leaders, the leaders were horrified. Eight members of the gang were employees of a defense plant, all shock workers and athletes, the already mentioned Lukin studied at the Moscow Aviation Institute, and two more were cadets of military schools at the time of the defeat of the gang.

Cadet of the Nikolaev naval mine-torpedo aviation school Ageev, who before entering was Mitin's accomplice, a participant in robberies and murders, had to be arrested with a special warrant issued by the military prosecutor's office.

The gang accounted for 28 robberies, 11 murders, 18 wounded. During their criminal activities, the bandits stole more than 300 thousand rubles.

Not an ounce of romance.

The case of the Mitin gang did not fit into the ideological line of the party so much that it was immediately classified.

The court sentenced to death Ivan Mitin and one of his accomplices Alexander Samarin, who, like the ringleader, was directly involved in the murders. The rest of the gang members were sentenced to terms ranging from 10 to 25 years.

Student Lukin received 25 years, served them completely, and a year after his release he died of tuberculosis. His father could not bear the shame, went crazy and soon died in a psychiatric hospital. Members of the Mitin gang broke the lives of not only the victims, but also their loved ones.

There is no romance in the history of Ivan Mitin's gang: this is a story about "werewolves" who, in the light of day, were exemplary citizens, and in their second incarnation turned into ruthless murderers. This is a story about how low a person can fall.

Let's remember then. Here is also

Georgy Vainer, scriptwriter of the film "The meeting place cannot be changed":“Although Sharapov is also a collective image, he has a prototype - Volodya Arapov, who later became the head of the MUR department. He participated in the capture of the famous Mitin gang, which we personified as the "Black Cat".

The most mysterious gang of the Stalin era did not step into Moscow from a smoky raspberry card. And not from the zone - the forge of bandit personnel. Ten guys - ten black cats - went hunting on the streets of Moscow directly from the red honor roll of the defense plant in Krasnogorsk near Moscow. They were a gang by choice, not by lifestyle. They were seen in person, they were known by name. They did not inspire fear in anyone.

Despite the mass production of the famous Zorkiy camera, the main production of the Krasnogorsk plant was special products: topographic and panoramic aerial cameras, infrared guidance systems, night sights for artillery, tanks and the Kalashnikov assault rifle. The city has stepped far from its childhood - the small village of Krasnaya Gorka. The life of the city was closely connected with the defense industry, and its stadium "Zenith" was the sports base of the Moscow region, the heart of Krasnogorsk, with strong teams in hockey, football, volleyball, and athletics.

A young company often gathered in the wooden pavilion of the stadium: Ivan Mitin, a tall guy from aircraft factory No. 34, a fair-haired engraver from KMZ Alexander Samarin and his friend Agafonov, a factory team hockey player Vyacheslav Lukin, Grigoriev and Korovin, also from KMZ. The stadium was a place of communication - here they discussed sports, talked about life in general. Meetings were made here.

Russia did not last long without a tower. A two-year moratorium on the death penalty was lifted in January 1950. And almost immediately, like a terrible challenge, a police officer was murdered in the capital.

Shock Workers of Socialist Labor

Gang members (left to right): Ivan Mitin, Alexander Samarin, Vyacheslav Lukin, Stepan Dudnik
- I'll ask for your documents.

Mitin sharply retorted:

- And who are you?

At that moment, Samarin pulled out a revolver from his bosom and fired at point-blank range. Detective Kochkin fell dead in the thick snow. The second militiaman began feverishly to get the weapon from a holster. Mitin and Agafonov rushed to run across the deserted dark highway and a moment later they heard another shot. But it was not the policeman who fired, but Samarin, who missed for the second time. Everyone reached Krasnogorsk on their own, and only in the morning it became known that all three had survived. So their first bloody tattoo was applied to the white snow.

But tomorrow was a new day - and yesterday's bandits joined the usual Krasnogorsk life. This life between the plant and the stadium covered them more reliably than any "raspberry" of Tishinka or Vakhrushinka. Samarin worked as an engraver at KMZ, he knew his specialty very well and even became the winner of the socialist competition. His girlfriend, Aurora N., a student at a factory school, was of Spanish origin. Then in Krasnogorsk there was a whole community of Spaniards, still children evacuated to the USSR during the war with Franco.

Despite the lack of information about the criminals, MUR immediately felt the presence of a dangerous, strong beast, and day and night tried to get on its trail. The investigation was carried out in secrecy: the murder of a policeman happened a few weeks before the elections to the Supreme Soviet. Newspapers were full of pre-election commitments and achievements in the economy: electric plants in unison demonstrated their selfless love for the great Stalin, and at the Zarya factory they found a way to use old film for the production of ladies' combs, powder boxes and pins. In this situation, the tragic death of a policeman right in front of people would have exposed too much grim reality. Measures were taken to keep rumors of a bloody attack from intruding into Moscow's agitation fuss. MUR accepted the challenge.

On March 26, Samarin, Mitin, and his old friend Grigoriev entered a department store in the Timiryazevsky district.

- Everyone stand! We are from the MGB!

Psychologically, they calculated exactly. Visitors rooted to the floor. The general confusion allowed all three to quickly take over the crowd. Grigoriev, who remained at the entrance to the store, in a military overcoat without shoulder straps, aroused confidence among passers-by and, in which case, he could divert attention without suspicion. After the robbery, the criminals drove the visitors into the back room and locked the store with a padlock. The extraction turned out to be a fortune - 63 thousand rubles.

In the fall of 1950, the gang, together with a new member, the leader of the Tushino plant, Bolotov, flew into the department store of the Moscow Canal Shipping Company. Visitors were dumbfounded by the sight of a monster with bulging eyes - afraid of being recognized, Bolotov cut out a mask from a gas mask. In his hands he had a training grenade, which Mitin armed him with, and at the sight of her the cashier fainted. Taking the money, Mitin threw away small bills.

“Tell the right person in ten minutes.”

Still on edge from the November case, three weeks later the gang robbed a store on Kutuzovskaya Sloboda Street. The unfortunate cashier was in shock, she looked at them as if spellbound and repeated: "I'm afraid, I'm afraid ..." Mitin ordered irritably:

- Turn away! Climb into the oven - head!

The stove was not lit.

The gang was heard again on March 11, 1951. Hoping for easy prey, Mitin, Averchenkov and Ageev, armed with two barrels, entered the "Blue Danube" on the Leningrad Highway (the beer house was so called for its bold blue color) - they entered as visitors, hiding their pistols in their pockets. After spending time talking over vodka and beer, Mitin leaned back in his chair and gave himself up to heavy drunken anguish. Finally, almost forcing himself to wake up, he pulled out a pistol and threateningly approached the cashier. He was like a train that lost control, flying down a slope and sweeping away everything in its path. Spilling someone else's blood seemed as easy as spilling vodka.

At one of the tables, junior police lieutenant Mikhail Biryukov was sitting with his wife. According to some reports, he had a weapon with him, according to others, he handed it over to the duty officer. One way or another, his bold rebuff cost him his life - two shots were fired, and the young policeman was killed. The second bullet struck to death a factory worker at a nearby table. The raised cry and panic did not allow the robbery to take place. Mitin rushed out of the room. Noticing in the dark a man and a woman moving towards him, he fired again - fortunately, both were only wounded. The woman barely had time to jump into the entrance of the nearest house, as the last bullet lodged in the door.

Before the Murovites had time to develop search versions, as already on March 27, 1951, Averchenkov and Mitin, armed with ViS-35, TT pistols and a revolver, crashed into a crowd of buyers of the Kuntsevsky auction. Ageev was left at the entrance. And he calmly explained that there was a stock-taking in the store. Mitin went up to the glass box of the cash register and demanded money, but the cashier still did not understand what was happening:

- What about the director?

- It was agreed with the director, - Mitin answered and pulled out the door to the cashier.

The cashier screamed, her hair turning white in front of everyone. Having taken the money, Mitin entered the director's office and led the three men who were there to the trading floor. One of them, director Karp Antonov, jumped out the next door. Mitin burst in after him, with a pistol cocked. A fierce, desperate struggle ensued. The table overturned with a crash, but the director firmly held the drum of the pistol. Mitin headbutted him in the face and fired point-blank.

MGB networks

In the spring of 1951, Professor J. Etinger died in Lefortovo. He died in prison, after interrogations by a senior investigator for special important matters Ryumin. In a panic, Ryumin writes a denunciation letter to Stalin, in which he accused the Minister of State Security Abakumov of deliberately killing a prisoner. Say, in this way Abakumov sabotages the investigation of the anti-state conspiracy and dissociates himself from the course of the great Stalin.

The case of Abakumov was started in the spring of 1951, but he still did not suspect anything and read the reports about the elusive gang. Her impunity and namelessness undermined the authority of the detective department.

Pictured is Vladimir Arapov. 1950 (from the archive of retired major general V.P. Arapov). In the meantime, Mitin now rarely left Krasnogorsk without a pistol in his pocket, even when he visited his father, who worked in the forestry in Kratov. On this day, without finding him on the spot, he got off at the Udelnaya station together with Ageev and Averchenkov to buy a drink in the station cafeteria. In connection with the strengthening of the protection of trains and to maintain law and order, police officers were now often seen at the stations. However, the three bandits noticed them only when they had already settled down at the table. Ageev got nervous:

- We must leave. There are too many police here!

But Mitin didn't even flinch, calmly took off his jacket and continued to drink. The evening was hot. He was wearing trousers and a summer shirt, and the TT pistol was clearly visible in his pocket. Mitin's calmness was almost defiant. The policemen realized that the case was taking a dangerous turn.

Ivan, let's go! They saw the trunk of garbage! Ageev insisted. - I know.

The police did not want to endanger others and did not apprehend the suspicious group inside the restaurant. They watched as Mitin and Ageev calmly passed by. Coming to the platform, Mitin quickly jumped onto the railway track and turned towards the forest.

- Stop! The policemen rushed after him.

Mitin pulled out a pistol, and a real firefight unfolded. He was on the verge of death, but the bullets stubbornly flew past. All three managed to escape. MUR failed again.

Soon after these events, Ageev, with an impeccable record, entered the Naval Mine-Torpedo Aviation School in Nikolaev. Bandit vacancy was free. But not for long. Mitin brought to work the twenty-four-year-old Nikolaenko, who was restless after a prison term.

Information from the MUR and the MGB about the elusive gang was demanded by the head of the Moscow City Party Committee, Nikita Khrushchev. He gathered the heads of all police departments for a special meeting and threatened them with demotion and arrest. The threat was not unfounded. The MGB actually arrested the heads of the two police departments on whose territory the robberies took place.

However, acting through arrests and intimidation was like firing blanks. Khrushchev knew that Beria likes to step on sore corns: in the capital they rob, like in Civil, they kill like in war, the police cannot catch insolent raiders for the third year, and the first secretary is unable to ensure the safety of Muscovites. Khrushchev was losing catastrophically in the struggle for Moscow positions. It is not known whether Beria described the criminal situation in reports to Stalin.

“I think Stalin knew,” says Vladimir Arapov. - When I was investigating the murder of a major military engineer, I accompanied Beria several times in his Buick to the Middle Dacha. High-profile crimes were always reported.

"Everyone on the floor!"

There were about 4,000 at the box office. For many, a fortune. For the Mitinites, the risk is wasted. A month later, Lukin and Mitin took an electric train to Moscow to choose a new point for the robbery. A suitable object soon appeared - the "Beer-Water" tent on the Leningradskaya platform.

Having met on a deserted platform, all three entered the building of the tent. Averchenkov locked the door from the inside and remained at the entrance, while Lukin demanded the money from the cashier and, pulling her own leather suitcase towards him, threw the money into it. The customer at the nearest table stood up.

- What are you doing, mother t ... - The shot cut off his indignation and life itself. Then another visitor rushed to Mitin and received a bullet in the head.

- What are you doing there? Lukin, an exemplary MAI student, shouted over his shoulder.

Mitin ran out with Lukin to the platform and at the last minute jumped onto the departing train. Getting off at the next station, they crossed the bridge over the Skhodnya. Swinging, Lukin threw the bag as far as possible into the dark river, and she swallowed the evidence.

The photo shows the store in Kutuzovskaya Sloboda where the raid was carried out. 1953 The bandit madness continued. Late in the evening of November 1, 1952, Mitin, Lukin, Bolotov and Averchenkov approached a store near the Botanical Garden. Another shadow from the Krasnogorsk plant fell onto the site illuminated by an electric lantern - Korovin, "an excellent student of military and political training with good prospects." It must be said that in October 1952, the Council of Ministers of the USSR decided to entrust the protection of trade and industrial enterprises to the police. But no one guarded the Timiryazevsky store.

There was a small queue at the checkout. Mitin loudly ordered everyone to lie down on the floor. The cashier was indignant and fearlessly refused to give money. Bolotov shot her in the shoulder. Having cleared the cash desk for twenty-four thousand rubles, the bandits went out into the street and quickly moved along the deserted Susokolovsky highway. Two, one of whom was Lukin, lagged behind. A militia lieutenant passing by nearby called out to them and asked them to light a cigarette. Suspecting something was wrong - from the looks, from the vodka, from the snippets of conversations - he demanded to see the documents. Turning around at the noise, Mitin decided that the lieutenant was making an arrest, and interrupted the conversation with a shot. Mortally wounded, the lieutenant fell prone, and Mitin disappeared in the direction of the Botanical Garden.

Detective Arapov's intuition

Entering the savings bank, Mitin with one jerk blocked the door with a heavy battery and went up to the cashier. One of the cashiers screamed, and he hit her twice in the face with a pistol so hard that the clip fell out and flew off to the side. Mitin stood in the center of the hall and kept everyone at gunpoint with a second pistol. Lukin jumped over the counter and raked the money into a bag - 30 thousand rubles.

The silence was broken by a ringing bell. After a brief hesitation, Lukin picked up the receiver.

On the other end of the wire was the duty officer of the police department - the cashier still managed to press the alarm button.

No, the stadium.

Vladimir Arapov immediately drew attention to the robber's strange slip of the tongue. Why a stadium? Why not a store, a restaurant, a bath, after all? He compared the points of the raids on the operational map, and he was struck by a circumstance that he had not paid attention to before. Many robberies took place near local stadiums - Dynamo, Mytishchi, Tushino, a stadium in the Stalinsky district and other sports centers.

Arapov immediately gave way to this version. All the pieces of the puzzle came together in his head. There are always a lot of people around the stadiums - and no one pays attention to groups of young guys. But, according to the descriptions of witnesses, the robbers were young people of a sporty appearance. Could it be that all these years MUR has been chasing a ghost? Behind a gang of criminals that didn't exist? Could it be that these are not criminals, but athletes or fans?

Orders were again sent to all police departments to pay attention to any extraordinary events among young people, especially during sporting events. This time the wait was short.

From an excess of energy and money, Lukin decided to show off. Having drunk with friends near the Krasnogorsk stadium, he, laughing, drove away from the outlet a barrel of beer, and when the saleswoman threatened to call the police, Lukin bought the whole barrel and immediately began to treat everyone.

Among those who readily surrounded the guy was Vladimir Arapov. He drank with pleasure the proposed mug - cold beer in the cold - and took note of the lively young man who parted with money with such ease.

In the morning the detective again arrived in Krasnogorsk. At first, he did not find any compromising evidence, there seemed to be nothing to cling to. Lukin and his acquaintances work at defense plants, are respected, and go in for sports. In general, young guys live in the spirit of the times. Two of them are inseparable - Lukin and Mitin. They are often accompanied by a hockey player, turner from KMZ Bazaev. It seems that they have money, they sometimes go to restaurants in Krasnogorsk and Moscow ... But they don’t drink much, they are unmarried, and they pay normally at defense factories. Why not be money? Their life is no different from the life of others.

The only circumstance aroused suspicion: Lukin went to the Mytishchi stadium on the eve of the robbery of the savings bank. Krasnogorsk stadium began to graze operatives and police agents. We were especially interested in Ivan Mitin. Everything about him aroused Vladimir Arapov's suspicions. His look, his mannerisms, his brown leather coat. From a clear imprint in the snow, it was determined that the shoes of one of the company members leave a relief pattern, similar to prints inside a galoshes thrown in the Mytishchi savings bank.

“When Lukin went to Murmansk, to the camp with Nikolaenko,” says Vladimir Arapov, “our employee sat down next to him in the compartment. Taking advantage of the moment when Lukin and Bazaev went out to the restaurant, he opened the suitcase and found twenty thousand rubles in bank packaging. After checking the banknote numbers, it was found out that this was money from the robbery of the Podlipkovsky savings bank. The operative asked for further instructions. Moscow gave instructions for the money to reach the addressee without hindrance. It turned out to be Nikolaenko.”

Having groped for Mitin's other connections, the police came to Samarin, a prisoner in the Sverdlovsk camp (he was accidentally caught for possession of a pistol). His description coincided with information about a blond guy who shot A. Kochkin in February 1950.

At a time when in Moscow they were looking for bandits from the category of the "Black Cat", fiends of hell, morally completely poor and deaf, the leakage of information about the real carriers of evil could have the effect of an exploding bomb. After all, these Krasnogorsk guys did everything that the country demanded: they worked for the defense industry, responded to Stalin's call to lead in sports, were good comrades ... And they robbed openly - quickly, brazenly, cruelly. Murovtsy were shocked.

Maybe then the MGB came up with the idea to cover the true state of affairs with the myth of the thugs from the "returned" "Black Cat"? After all, the gangster underground continued to teem with criminals, much more "typical" in the minds of ordinary citizens. In ideological interests, a “leakage” of information was required about the disclosure by employees of the MUR and the MGB of a dangerous gang of recidivists, and not of young Komsomol workers from a defense plant.

Punishment

Mitin turned out to be right: the violation of these two rules led the gang to collapse.

In those years, the future football hero Lev Yashin worked in the tool shop of the plant. He entered the "five hundredth" as a young man, returning from evacuation (L. Yashin's father worked at a defense plant), and soon began to play for the factory football team. Similar lives, such different destinies.

Before his fatal arrest, Mitin did not spend the night at home for two days. His accomplice Averchenkov visited him several times in Gubailovo and could not find him. Came again and waited again. Finally, Mitin appeared in the dead of night on February 13th. After talking for a while, they both went to bed in his room. At six o'clock in the morning the police broke into the house.

Compared to the criminals with whom Vladimir Arapov had to deal, Mitin stood out for his self-control and directness, lack of fear and even a sense of humor. From the very beginning, he knew that he was going to be shot, and yet, without any tricks and hope of salvation, he testified and helped to restore the picture of crimes in investigative experiments.

On an investigative experiment in Rublevo. In the center - the accused V. Lukin
“It’s a pity that they did this to themselves and to others,” Arapov says thoughtfully. - I had to interrogate Lukin's fiancee. So good beautiful girl. Yes, and Lukin himself was not a stupid guy, he kept calm, you can’t say that he was twenty-one years old ... When I saw Mitin, I thought - I would have shot him myself, with these very hands. And how I began to talk to him - as if another person was in front of me. For Ageev, a cadet of the Naval Mine-Torpedo Aviation School, I flew to Odessa, he was part of the pilots patrolling the sea border. I filed an arrest warrant, but there was a problem. At the time of the commission of the crimes, the accused was a civilian, but now he was at the disposal of the military district. Therefore, the head of the unit demanded a warrant from the military prosecutor's office. I had to fly back to Moscow, get a new warrant in my own hands and fly back. The arrested person was handcuffed and taken by plane to Moscow.”

The Nikolaev School trained pilots and mechanics for bomber and mine-torpedo aviation. Already in the first year, the cadets mastered the Ut-2 and Il-4 aircraft, and the graduates flew the Il-28 jet aircraft. Arrest for armed banditry in the ranks of a military school of this rank was an unprecedented event. Ageev, who soared above all, and fell from a greater height than the rest.

For another member of the Mitinskaya group - Bolotov, banditry became like a kind of second front - Bolotov did not fight, since the plant gave reservations. Attack, risk, weapons gave sharpness to his settled life. This is one of the inaccuracies in the NTV broadcast about the Black Cat. Bolotov was not a front-line soldier, and by nature he was a coward. Entering the taste of left-wing money, Bolotov grew bolder and opened up to his friend Averchenkov:

Why are you working two shifts? You can take the store and have money.

It never occurred to Averchenkov to break the law. But Bolotov, a senior comrade and communist, he trusted: in fact, as a kid, I found a gun ...

Lukin's father, a police officer and a communist, from the shock and shame that fell upon him, fell into mental asylum where he soon died. At the trial, Lukin Jr. will declare with vindictive frankness: “If my father lived with us in Last year, nothing would have happened. He was very strict and would not allow me to embark on the path of crime.

Vladimir Arapov has been hunting Mitin for more than one year. He knew his bloody deeds. And yet he told me without explanation:

- He was an unusual guy. Calm. The look is intense but friendly. It was easy to talk to him.

Mitin admitted that he had committed terrible, grave crimes, but avoided words of remorse or mercy. The only accusation against which he spoke was the accusation of terror against the Soviet regime. This was to be expected. As Vysotsky sang with irony - “How can I look people in the eyes with such a wording ?!”

The arrest of eleven members of the Krasnogorsk gang coincided with the death of Stalin. In Krasnogorsk, in the darkness of houses, barracks and communal apartments, relatives and friends struggled to overcome the losses that had befallen them. Personal grief mixed with public shock.

– Prayer, filled with Christian love, reaches God. We believe that our prayer for the deceased will be heard by the Lord. And to our beloved and unforgettable ... - the words of the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Alexy I reached the people's ears on the day of Stalin's funeral.

Recognition of a thief in law

In an unexpected way, the sinister glory of the Mitinskaya gang found additional confirmation in 1959. While in the city of Stalino (Donetsk), the writer Eduard Khrutsky visited the thief in law Andrey Klimov, famous in criminal world under the name Cross. He had been serving a term with no end in sight since 1947. Klimov, who survived in the penal battalion, in the gang and in the "bitch" war, was distinguished by composure and observation.

- Bloody "Black Cat" - is this your group? asked Eduard Khrutsky.

- Not. There were ten such “Black Cats” in Moscow alone, and two thousand in the Union. “This is how myths die,” thought Khrutsky.

- So, there was no "Black Cat"?

“No,” Klimov chuckled. - If you are interested in a real gang, then talk to the garbage, let them tell you about Mitin.

- Who is it?

- The last Moscow bandit. He was tied up just before Stalin's death.

Thief in law Klimov recognized the “real gang” as the one that had never been connected with the criminal world.

At the end of 1978, Vladimir Vysotsky performed at the Winter Club of Krasnogorsk (now the Salyut Palace of Culture). But even he did not know the whole truth then. And he could not foresee the impetus to the audience's imagination that the upcoming film "The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed" would give, the power of its realism and generalization. The film took the story in the opposite direction. Fictional characters evoked associations and searches for similar thieves in the 1940s. So the case of the Mitinskaya gang was buried for many years under the paws of the "Black Cat" - a myth that has become a reality ...