Alexander neiland the killer. Arkady Neiland: photo, biography
>And why so immediately, equate me with those who kill, I do not put an equal sign, between those who executed Chikatilo, and Chikatilo himself, as you do<
Do not exaggerate! I didn't equate you with murderers. I wrote: there is something in common. Something, not everything! This is a big difference. And this is something, the very idea that you can kill. Criminals do it for profit / pleasure / self-affirmation, and people who want to return the death penalty for the sake of a misunderstood sense of justice.
The people who executed Chikatilo simply did their duty. If the law had not provided for the death penalty at that moment, it is not a fact that they would have rushed to his cell with a cry - let me shoot him! And you are engaged in the propaganda of the murder, even the killers themselves. And you are unlikely to do it yourself. Do you want to know how those who execute the sentence feel? And please:
>oh how you got hooked<
What??? What are you talking about??? I just defend my opinion, and I do it reasonably, with links and numbers, unlike you. If the very presence of arguments for you is "hooked", well ... it means hooked!
>- The conversation was specifically about you, to my words that if in reality your child was brutally tortured by a maniac, you would not say-let him live, he does not deserve to die. You stated that - "If the perpetrator harms someone close to me, I'm fine with his life sentence." - We are not talking about harm, for this the highest measure is not given. And you all evade the answer and refer to others<
No, dear! It is you who are trying to shift from a sick head to a healthy one, this time in the literal sense of the word! Let him live, he doesn't deserve to die - that means no need to punish anyone at all! Like, let him go in peace! I have never claimed anything like that, and I do not claim! On the contrary - I am for inevitable punishment! And life imprisonment for me is a more severe punishment than the UK. And a bonus to this is the opportunity to release an innocent person if his innocence has been proven. So don't overdo it!
For you, only the death of one of my relatives will be a 100% argument? Yes, I'm afraid you will come up with tricks in this case too! You are one of those who simply does not listen to any arguments. I gave you a specific example of people who were asked exactly the question that you asked me. And you know perfectly well what they answered. Their loved ones suffered, and they saw how those who did this are paying for it. Everything suits them, and those who need the UK continue to demand the UK on their behalf! It's not funny anymore! Very similar to the behavior of maniacs. We don't care about everything, we want to be killed! It remains only to demand that this be done publicly, as in China (by the way, such demands are already being made) and at the same time distribute popcorn! Meal'n'Real! Two thousand years of the development of society down the drain! But at the same time, we are waiting for society to become civilized and humanized. But all of you who demand the UK are part of this society. And it is you who resist with all your might, putting a low ceiling on the moral development of society. And while this continues, we will continue to wait by the sea for the weather in terms of a civilized society, and those who slow down this development will blame everything on bad genes! No, to look in the mirror nafig, genes are to blame.
It's funny to read how you sign your own ignorance. Even at the stage of detention, everything is taken away from prisoners, with the help of which prisoners can take their own lives. Even shoelaces are required to be removed and handed over, not to mention belts and cutting objects. There are no knives or forks in the cells and barracks; everyone eats only with spoons. And if in the barracks prisoners can still drag and hide something like sharpening or a knife, then in the places of detention of those sentenced to PZ, this is absolutely excluded! Youtube has it all, is it really difficult to study the issue a little? And you don’t need to come up with nonsense like you could smash your head against the wall, this will already be completely frivolous.
Every adult and capable person knows that the law of the state in which he lives must be observed. But in exceptional cases, for the punishment provided for by law, it may not be enough. We are talking about private and very rare situations that invariably fall into world history. For example, in 1964 in Leningrad, a juvenile criminal Arkady Neiland was sentenced to and shot. What did this teenager do and why did the highest officials of the state decide to violate the current legislation of the RSFSR for his sake?
Neiland family history
Arkady Neiland was born in 1949 in Leningrad. His family history is typical of its time. The boy, along with his parents, brothers and sister, lived in the most ordinary communal apartment. Mother and stepfather often drank and devoted little time to children. The norm in this family was considered physical punishment, often unreasonably cruel. Mother worked as a nurse, and stepfather as a locksmith, respectively, there was no talk of material prosperity. As Arkady himself admitted (after his arrest), he and his brothers and sister were often malnourished, engaged in vagrancy, and began to steal from early childhood. From the age of 7, the boy was registered with the police for hooliganism and petty robbery. At the age of 12, he was expelled from a comprehensive school, and his mother sent his unlucky son to a boarding school. But even in this institution, Arkady "did not take root" - he often clashed with his peers, tried to run away. As soon as Neiland graduated from the 6th grade, he was expelled. After that, he was sent to work at the Lenpischemash production association. However, in this type of activity, Arkady could not prove himself positively. The guy was caught on petty thefts and absenteeism, but because of his age, he managed to avoid serious punishments and courts.
Big "case" for the sake of a "new" life
Until 1964, Neiland's biggest crimes were considered thefts from the Soyuzpechat kiosk and a hairdresser's. But all this seemed like a trifle to an ambitious teenager, in addition, most of the offenses ended with inevitable "vises" to the police station. In January 1964, Arkady Vladimirovich Neiland, together with a like-minded accomplice, decided to do something really “big” and take possession of a large amount of money at a time. The ideal crime for teenagers seemed to be burglary. All that remained was to find a suitable object. The attackers liked the house number 3 on Sestroretskaya street. The villains began to prepare for the upcoming theft in advance. On January 24, 1964, they walked around the entire entrance of the selected building and talked to the residents under an innocent pretext. In one of the apartments, no one opened the door, and then the criminals picked up the key and unlocked it on their own. Having committed an apartment theft, Arkady and his accomplice calmly left the apartment, but immediately ran into her mistress, who made a fuss when she recognized her things. As a result, the thieves were arrested.
The Crime That Couldn't Happen
For another theft, teenagers were traditionally interrogated and left in the office to wait. It was during this pause that Arkady Neiland calmly got up and left. What is striking is that none of the employees of the authorities paid attention to him and did not try to detain him. The offender went to his home and stole one that was distinguished by its low weight and size, as well as a fairly high-quality sharpening. Arkady immediately realized that it was impossible to stay in his parents' apartment. For several days he spent the night in basements and attics, without ceasing to monitor the chosen apartment. According to some versions, the idea of committing a robbery with murder came to the mind of a teenager spontaneously, during the last detention. But if we evaluate all the facts in the aggregate, we can make the assumption that Arkady Neiland and his accomplice came up with and planned everything in advance. Be that as it may, on January 27, 1964, the criminal went "to work." And just think: if he had not managed to escape from the department three days earlier, or if he had been placed in jail for earlier crimes, the tragedy could have been avoided.
Brutal murder on Sestroretskaya street
A juvenile delinquent watched the chosen "rich" apartment for several days. By the time of the attack, he already knew for sure that only a middle-aged housewife and her little son were inside during the day. As Arkady Vladimirovich Neiland later confesses during interrogation, he committed a crime, having decided in advance that he would kill the mistress and, most likely, the child too. The moral side of this issue did not bother him, and as for the likely punishment, the attacker, by personal example, has repeatedly experienced that the RSFSR judicial system is loyal to teenagers. Arkady rang the doorbell of the chosen apartment, and it was immediately opened for him. The hostess - Larisa Kupreeva - recognized the gloomy young man who came in a few days ago, and became alert. The criminal himself also hesitated and uttered some completely unconvincing pretext for a visit, in response to which the door was closed in front of his nose. Then Arkady waited some time, called again, introduced himself as a postman, changing his voice, and when the door opened, he immediately attacked the landlady with an ax. A struggle ensued, the woman understood that she was responsible for the life of her own son, and desperately resisted. At one point, she even almost managed to grab the ax from the hands of the criminal. But then Arkady threw Larisa into a chair and delivered a series of blows to the head. After the mistress of the apartment calmed down, the offender dealt with her son in cold blood. Then he went around the rooms and collected valuables, after which he did not disdain to have a bite to eat in the kitchen. Before leaving the apartment, Arkady committed arson, hoping that the fire would destroy all traces of his atrocities. However, this expectation was not justified. The fire brigade arrived quickly enough: the neighbors suspected something was wrong, smelling the smell of burning in the entrance. The fire was extinguished fairly quickly. But when the firefighters entered the apartment, they were shocked. Dead bodies, traces of blood and the general mess in the rooms were clearly evident. In addition, they even managed to find fingerprints of an unknown person, which later became important evidence against the main suspect.
To the sea, for a new life!
15-year-old Arkady Neiland is not a maniac, but just an unfortunate child who grew up in terrible conditions and with a complete lack of concepts of morality and conscience. In their official statements, he himself and his failed accomplice said that they wanted to commit a big theft in order to go to the sea with the proceeds (in Sukhumi or Tbilisi, according to various sources) and rest there, and then start a new one, law-abiding life. Of course, these plans were not destined to come true. Immediately after the crime, Arkady handed over the stolen items to the storage room at the station. And he, after a little walk, started looking for tickets. In Leningrad that day it was not possible to take a long-distance train to the south, so the criminal bought a ticket to Moscow, hoping to make a transfer there. And he succeeded, but when leaving the train to the platform of the southern city of Sukhumi, Neiland Arkady was detained and taken back to Leningrad.
Confessions of a minor fanatic
The offender was surprised only by the fact that he was identified and found 4 days later. Arkady had several important pieces of evidence, in particular, a Zorkiy camera with several noticeable scratches, stolen from a robbed apartment, passports of Kupreev and his adopted daughter, in addition, dried blood stains were present on the killer's clothes and some things. Neiland himself was in shock and did not even try to deny it. Quite quickly, he began to cooperate with the investigation. Arkady Neiland, whose biography includes a huge number of petty offenses and police drives, thought he knew what to expect. The thing is that the legislation in force in the country did not provide for the highest measure - the death penalty - for minors. Accordingly, deciding on the theft with murder, Arkady thought that the maximum that threatened him was a prison term. During interrogations, Neiland told in detail how he had planned his crime and killed a woman and a child.
Prosperous apartment turned out to be ordinary
This crime struck the public throughout the country with its brutality and senselessness. In his confessions, the killer repeated several times that he had planned the robbery of a "rich" apartment, followed by the murder of witnesses. However, the affected Kupreevs were the most ordinary family. It is difficult to say on what basis Arkady Neiland himself chose the object for attack. 1964 - the year in which in Leningrad, in principle, there were not so many truly wealthy families. And to look for a similar one in the most ordinary house was a mistake from the very beginning. However, what to expect from a young man who grew up in communal apartments at the very social bottom? According to some versions, the guy lost his head when he saw the front door upholstered in leatherette, a color TV and a housewife leading an "idle" lifestyle.
Inhuman cruelty and cynicism
During interrogations, the suspect himself will tell that he struck the first blows to his victim on the arms and shoulders, and during the struggle he had time to change his mind and leave the woman alive. The fight between the victim and the attacker was really long and noisy, many neighbors heard suspicious sounds. Neiland himself was aware that the sounds of the struggle were quite loud, so at the first opportunity he turned on the master's tape recorder in order to muffle them. The child, who "got underfoot" while the criminal was killing his mother, was hacked to death by Arkady in several blows. However, in this act, the killer even repented, saying that he regrets that "I had to do this." The case of Arkady Neiland received such a wide public outcry precisely because of the cynicism of the criminal. After the double murder, the attacker ransacked the entire apartment in search of valuables, and then took a series of obscene pictures of the body of the murdered woman with a stolen camera, planning to sell them as pornography in the future. After that, Arkady calmly washed himself in the master's bath, went to the kitchen and prepared dinner for himself, using the supplies of his victims. Neighborhood with two cooling bodies did not spoil his appetite at all. And only having refreshed himself, the killer set fire to the apartment, turned on the gas and hurried to leave. In his defense, the offender will also say that Larisa herself is to blame for what happened. Like, if she had not defended herself, she might not have had to be killed ...
Capital punishment for a minor
When all the circumstances of this crime became known to the public, the reactions were mixed. Many argued that Arkady Neiland is a maniac, a fanatic and is not worthy of life as such. The offender himself aggravated his situation by saying during interrogations that he knew that he had nothing to fear. However, Arkady Neiland was shot in Leningrad in 1964 by a court verdict. Many residents of our country asked for just such a punishment for the killer, they sent their letters and official petitions to the prosecutor's office and even personally to L. I. Brezhnev and N. S. Khrushchev. All these appeals of citizens were attached to the criminal case. After receiving such a sentence, Arkady Neiland, whose execution was contrary to all the laws in force in the country, entered world history. The intelligentsia and lawyers were somewhat dissatisfied with the fact that the verdict did not quite fit into the legal norms. But it is impossible not to notice that this execution was not only indicative, but also rational. According to the law, Neiland was supposed to receive a term of imprisonment and had a real opportunity (with good behavior in the colony) to be released after 5-6 years. Accordingly, society would receive an adult and adult recidivist criminal at the age of 20, on whose account not only robbery, hooliganism and theft, but also the murder of a woman and a child.
The name of Arkady Neiland in world history
The story of this juvenile delinquent ends on August 11, 1964. It was on this day that the sentence was carried out, and the murderer was shot. There are legends that it was very difficult to find performers to carry out the execution. None of the civil servants wanted to shoot the teenager. It is worth noting that Arkady Neiland (you can see the photo of the criminal in our article) had a completely ordinary appearance. He sometimes looked unkempt and was poorly dressed, but the overall impression was neutral: the average teenager of his time. When the verdict was read out in the courtroom, Neiland was not only surprised, but really scared. After that, he began to ask for pardon, wrote a cassation appeal, but his request was not granted. At the global level, these events received a double-digit reaction. Civilized countries were amazed at the impudence and cruelty of the criminal, but among the jurists there were those who were outraged. The Western public perceived this case and the verdict as oppression of freedom and individual rights by the socialist system. And yet, in order to carry out the sentence, it was necessary to somehow legitimize such a decision. For this, a unique action was carried out: a written survey was conducted among the judges of Leningrad, in which it was necessary to answer whether it was possible to recognize the Decree of the Presidium of the USSR Armed Forces as retroactive? Agreement with this thesis meant the admissibility of the death penalty for a minor. Of course, the judges who participated in the survey immediately understood what the authorities expected of them, and voted in the affirmative almost unanimously. It is worth noting that this case is unique in the history of Russia and the whole world. That is why Arkady Neiland (1964 - the year the crime was committed and the murderer was shot) became so "famous". Unfortunately, he managed to become famous in a bloody way.
) - a juvenile criminal who in January 1964 committed a double murder in Leningrad and was sentenced to death by the court for this, which was contrary to the current legislation, since at the time of the execution of the sentence Arkady was 15 full years old.
The "Neiland case" caused a public outcry and gave rise to statements about the violation of the norms of international law in the USSR.
Biography
double kill
The picture of the crime was recreated according to the testimony of A. Neiland, interviewed witnesses, forensic experts and firefighters. The crime was committed at Sestroretskaya Street, Building 3, Apartment 9. Neiland chose the victim by chance. He wanted to rob a rich apartment, and the criterion for "wealth" for him was the front door upholstered in leather. The apartment was 37-year-old housewife Larisa Mikhailovna Kupreeva and her three-year-old son. Neiland rang the doorbell and introduced himself as a postal worker, after which Kupreeva let him into the apartment. After making sure that there was no one in the apartment except for the woman and the child, the criminal locked the front door and began to beat Kupreeva with an ax. To prevent the neighbors from hearing the screams, he turned on the tape recorder in the room at full volume. After Kupreeva stopped showing signs of life, Neiland killed her son with an ax. After the murder, the offender searched the apartment, ate the food found by the owners. Neiland stole money and a camera from the apartment, on which he had previously taken the murdered woman in obscene poses. According to the killer, he planned to sell these photos later. In order to cover his tracks, Arkady Neiland, before leaving, turned on the gas on the stove and set fire to the wooden floor in the room. The murder weapon - an ax - he left at the crime scene.
Neighbors, smelling the smell of burning, called firefighters. Due to the fact that firefighters arrived promptly, the crime scene remained practically unaffected by fire.
Consequence
Arkady Neiland already at the first interrogations fully confessed to his deed and actively helped the investigation. According to the investigators, he behaved confidently, he was flattered by the attention to his person. He spoke about the murder calmly, without remorse. He only felt sorry for the child, but justified his murder by the fact that there was no other way out after the murder of a woman. He was not afraid of punishment, he said that he, as a minor, "everything will be forgiven."
The Neyland case received wide publicity. In the USSR at that time there was an increase in crime, including among minors. Arkady Neiland under these conditions was an ideal example of an anti-hero.
The court decision in the Neiland case, taken on March 23, 1964, turned out to be unexpected for everyone: a 15-year-old teenager was sentenced to death, which was contrary to the legislation of the RSFSR, according to which persons from 18 to 60 years old could be sentenced to capital punishment, and the use of death Execution of minors was prohibited in the USSR).
The verdict caused a mixed reaction in society. On the one hand, the inhabitants, amazed by the cruelty of the crime, were waiting for the most severe sentence for Neiland. On the other hand, the verdict caused an extremely negative reaction from the intelligentsia and professional lawyers, who pointed to the discrepancy between the verdict and the current legislation and international agreements.
The "Neiland case" became known abroad, where it was cited as an example of the disregard for the law under the socialist system.
There is a legend according to which L.I. Brezhnev petitioned to
During the last detention, the thought came to Neiland's head that next time it was necessary to rob and kill so that there were no witnesses to the crime. Returning to the same apartment on Sestroretskaya Street on January 27, 1964, Arkady armed himself with a tourist hatchet. He knew that a woman with a child lives in the apartment, which means that it will not be difficult to deal with them. The main calculation of the criminal was that even if he was detained, the death penalty is not applied to minors, which means that the maximum that shines for him is a prison.
In order to be allowed into the apartment, he decided to introduce himself as a postman. When the hostess, Larisa Kupreeva, opened the door, he immediately attacked her. The woman began a desperate struggle not only for her life, but also for the life of her child, but the criminal with the ax was stronger. After the murder of a woman, he calmly dealt with the child, after which, without a twinge of conscience, he ate in the kitchen. To hide the trace of the crime, he set fire to the apartment, but thanks to the prompt work of firefighters and the vigilance of neighbors, the fire was extinguished in time. At the crime scene, operatives managed to find fingerprints, which became the main argument in court.
Law enforcement agencies could twice isolate the vicious and dangerous teenager from society, but he remained neglected and committed a savage murder Photo from murders.ru
Arkady Neiland committed a double murder in Leningrad the day before his 15th birthday - January 27, 1964. He met his birthday on the way to Moscow, where he left by train a few hours after the brutal massacre of a woman and her young son. In the capital, he bought a train ticket to Sukhumi, and while waiting for the train to depart, he traveled around the city in a sightseeing bus. In a word, he behaved like a Soviet schoolboy from the provinces, who was heading through Moscow to the Artek All-Union Pioneer Camp.
On January 30, on the platform of the Sukhumi railway station, Neiland was detained by local operatives, who identified him from an orientation received from Leningrad. It took four days to reveal the bloody atrocity, the rumor about which instantly spread around the northern capital...
The future killer was registered with the children's room of the police when he was not yet 12 years old
The family - mother, younger sister of Arkady, stepfather and his two sons from his first marriage - huddled in one room of a communal apartment. The head of the Neiland family worked as a mechanic at the enterprise, his wife worked as a hospital nurse. Their more than modest earnings did not provide prosperity in the house. In addition, both spouses drank.
The conditions and way of life of the Neilands were not something exclusive for the USSR of the 60s. In the same Leningrad, tens of thousands of people lived in densely populated communal apartments, counted pennies until payday, or "intercepted" up to an advance payment from friends. Very many families with children were incomplete or consisted of mother and stepfather or father and stepmother. The image of a dysfunctional family ended, as a rule, with drinking parents who were not involved in raising children.
Arkady grew up without parental supervision, and by the age of 12, the juvenile thief and bully was registered in the children's room of the police department of the Zhdanovsky (now Primorsky) district of the city.
Here we need a little digression…
Juvenile technologies in Soviet style
In the summer of 2010, draft federal laws were submitted to the State Duma of the Russian Federation, which allow, in particular, to deprive or restrict parental rights because of "poverty", for "improper" education. The bills were perceived in society ambiguously. There were many supporters of the adoption of repressive measures against "negligent" parents. Opponents of the total intervention of the state in the internal life of the family objected - if the family is dysfunctional, it is necessary not to destroy it, but, first of all, to help get out of a difficult situation. ("Right. Ru" conducted a survey on this subject, which can be found ).
Returning to the Neiland family, one can trace how forty years ago the state, represented by the executive authorities and law enforcement agencies of the Zhdanovsky district, the school where Arkady Neiland studied, reacted to the situation in a dysfunctional family.
Let's start with the housing issue. For many years, he not only did not resolve, but finally reached a dead end - in 1963, one of Arkady's half-brothers got married and brought his wife under his father's roof. Thus, two married couples and three teenagers of different sexes coexisted in one room. And there was no hope for an improvement in living conditions in the foreseeable future.
As they say, the high school also washed its hands, from which Arkady was expelled after the 5th grade for chronic poor progress, theft and hooliganism. The authorities sent him to a boarding school in the city of Pushkin. But even in this state institution for "difficult teenagers" Neiland fell, as they say, out of place. Several times fellow practitioners gave him a "dark" for stealing from others. In addition, Arkady suffered from enuresis, for which he was ridiculed and bullied by others. Here is the description in 1964 that the management of boarding school No. 67 provided to the court against Arkady Neiman: "... he showed himself as a poorly taught student, although he was not a stupid and capable child ... The students did not like him and beat him. He was convicted of theft more than once boarding school students have money and things.
According to some reports, the teenager escaped from the boarding school and was detained by the police in Moscow, according to others, the boarding school management insisted that Arkady be taken away by his parents. It is only known that after that the authorities employed Neiland as an auxiliary worker at the Lenpischemash Production Association, where he somehow held out until the end of 1963.
During this period, Arkady twice attempted a robbery attack on lonely passers-by with the aim of robbery, committed thefts from the Soyuzpechat kiosk, a bathhouse, a household and several hairdressers. All of them were disclosed, and the district prosecutor's office opened a criminal case against the teenager. However, it did not reach the court: the prosecutor's office took into account the "sincere repentance and age" of the person under investigation, and the case was closed.
But less than a month later, Arkady Neiland again became a defendant in a criminal case - this time for burglary.
How Neiland escaped from the district prosecutor's office
On January 24, 1964, Neiland and his friend Kubarev, under the pretext of collecting waste paper, called apartments in one of the entrances of house No. 3 on Sestroretskaya Street. After making sure that none of the tenants was in one of them, they picked up the keys, and hastily tied the things that seemed to them the most valuable into knots. However, when they went outside, the janitor, at the sight of unfamiliar teenagers with bundles, raised the alarm. Novice "burglars" were detained by passers-by.
They were interrogated at the prosecutor's office of the Zhdanovsky district. Due to an obvious oversight of the assistant prosecutor, who sent Neiman to the corridor for the time of Kubarev's interrogation, the latter managed to leave the prosecutor's office without hindrance.
Three days remained before the commission of the bloody atrocity that shook the city.
Breakfast on Sestroretskaya against the background of corpses
All this time, Arkady Neiland was hiding in the basements. In the early morning of January 27, he appeared at home for a few minutes, where he took an axe. This indicated that the 14-year-old teenager was already ready to cross the last line.
The apartment, which Neiland intended to rob, he outlined on the day when he and Kubarev "collected waste paper" in the house on Sestroretskaya and were caught stealing. First of all, he was attracted then by the front door, upholstered in leather. When the hostess, 37-year-old Larisa Kupriyanova, let the teenagers into the hallway, Arkady managed to make out the switched on color TV in the room, which he had only heard about before. The fact that the hostess had a golden crown did not pass by Neiland's attention. He also saw a three-year-old child. But this did not affect his plan in any way ...
On the morning of January 27, Arkady Neiland introduced himself as a postman through the closed door to the Kupriyanovs' apartment. And right from the threshold he attacked the hostess with an ax.
Seeing an ax in the hands of a teenager, Kupriyanova tried to take it away. Therefore, the first blows fell on the hands and shoulders of the woman. In total, the forensic medical examination counted about 15 wounds, 5 of which were fatal. He inflicted 6 blows on little George, "so as not to spin under his feet," as he explains during the investigation.
Having searched the apartment, Neiland found a wallet with 54 rubles, three-percent loan bonds, gold women's jewelry, and a Zorkiy camera. For some reason, he took the passport of the husband of the murdered woman and her daughter from her first marriage. The camera turned out to be loaded with film, and Neyland, exposing his victim's legs, took several obscene pictures, which, according to him, he intended to sell under the guise of pornography.
After that, Neiland washed his hands in the bathroom, fried eggs in the kitchen, and quietly had breakfast. Before leaving, he set fire to the apartment, opened the gas, hoping that the fire and gas explosion would destroy all traces of the crime. However, the neighbors on the landing, smelling the smell of burning, called the firemen. The calculation arrived promptly, and the crime scene was almost not affected by fire.
Thanks to this, the investigative team found bloody fingerprints on the wardrobe, and the murder weapon - an ax with a burnt ax handle. After interviewing dozens of residents of the house about the appearance of unfamiliar faces here, a verbal portrait of Neiland was drawn up.
The description of the tenants - "a lanky, lipped teenager of 15-16 years old" - was all too familiar in the district police department and the prosecutor's office. So Neiland fell under suspicion. When the operatives established that he had taken an ax out of his apartment, this version became the main one. Kubarev, Neiland's accomplice in the theft from an apartment in the same house, was immediately interrogated. He said that his friend planned to return to Sestroretskaya to "profit" in apartment No. 9, and leave for Sukhumi or Tbilisi.
Orientations were urgently sent to these cities, as well as to Moscow ...
The voice of the people, demanding from below the execution of a minor, was clearly organized from above
As soon as Neiland was detained in Sukhumi, several operatives from Leningrad flew there. On the spot, it turned out that their Abkhaz colleagues had searched the detainee badly, and he managed to hide several important material evidence in the cell - a wallet, the passport of the murdered husband, the keys to the Kupreevs' apartment and a bunch of thieves' master keys. In the hands of the investigation was also a camera stolen from the apartment. Dried blood stains were found on Neiland's clothes, which were later identified with Kupriyanova's blood type.
During interrogations in Leningrad, Arkady Neiland spoke in cold blood, without a trace of remorse, about the details of the crime he had committed. It was obvious: Neiland had already been enlightened by the inmates of the pre-trial detention center that age would reliably protect him from severe punishment.
Meanwhile, a brutal double murder committed by a teenager has received wide publicity. The Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Leonid Brezhnev from all over the country began to receive letters from citizens and organizations with requests to adopt a law on the application of capital punishment to minors who committed especially serious crimes. And the initiative group of Leningraders, in turn, began collecting signatures for a petition demanding "destroy the geek."
The voice of the people was heard above. Although subsequent events indicate that, most likely, the letters and petitions were just organized on orders from above: the growth of crime, including juvenile crime, which emerged in the 60s of the last century, worried the party and Soviet leadership, and Neiland was elected as "whipping boy".
On February 17, 1964, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, contrary to legal rules and customs, adopted a resolution allowing the use of capital punishment for minors - execution. But what to do with the fact that the law has no retroactive effect?
The final punishment is the death penalty. The sentence was carried out 5 months after the trial
In Leningrad, a written survey of the judiciary of the city was conducted - can the decision of the Presidium of the Supreme Council be considered retroactive? A positive response by the organizers of the action was programmed in advance.
Consideration of the case on the merits took place on March 23, 1964 in a closed trial. Taking into account the great social danger of the crime committed - murder under aggravating circumstances, as well as the personality of Neiland and "guided by the decision of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of February 17, 1964 No. 2234", the court on the totality of the crimes committed made the final decision: execution.
The verdict in the country was generally received with satisfaction. However, among lawyers and part of the intelligentsia, he caused a negative reaction. Abroad, the Neiland case was unambiguously commented on as an example of the Soviet Union's non-compliance with international law and relevant agreements.
The cassation appeal of Arkady Neiland was left without satisfaction, and the Supreme Soviet of the USSR rejected the petition for pardon. On August 11, 1964, the sentence was carried out.
In preparing the publication, materials and photographs from the site murders.ru were partially used.