Mikhail Popkov murdered 55 women and a police man near Irkutsk between 1992 and 2007, he was already serving time in jail for 22 other murders. He killed the victims when he offered them a late-night ride in his car. At least 10 were also raped. He is described as Russia’s most prolific mass murder in modern times.
Popkov was caught in 2012 when a DNA match identified his car. The victims were all women aged between the age of 16 and 40, in three cases he was on duty in his police car. Popkov killed them all around the city of Angarsk with an axe and hammer; he dumped and mutilated their bodies in forests by the road side and in a local cemetery.
He claimed to be cleansing Angarsk of what he saw as immoral women. Several the women were drug users or prostitutes, but most were ordinary women with families and had done nothing bad. His one male victim was a policeman who he gave a lift at night and killed him in a forest.
Tyre marks from Popkov’s Niva car were found next to some of the bodies which led to the police checking all owners of the car type in the city. The owners’ DNA were taken and checked against victims, this is how police discovered the dark side of Popkov.
He was arrested en route to Vladivostok where he had gone to buy a new car. He later confessed to 20 murders; his youngest victim was 15-years-old. He was found guilty of 22 murders in 2015 and sentenced to life but was kept on investigation. He showed police where he had buried the bodies of some of his victims.
Popkov was found to be sane but with a “pathological attraction to killing people “according to prosecutors.
Investigates said they have uncovered remains and found murder weapons including axes, screwdrivers and knives.
Popkov reportedly boasted to cellmates that he had committed more murders than Andrei Chikatilo. Andrei Chikatilo murdered 52 people which were all sexually motivated, he was known as the “Butcher of Rostov” after the area most of his killing took place.
State prosecutor Alexander Shkinyov said: “He forgave three women because they didn’t agree to drink with them. He escorted these women home and even helped some of them to carry their bags. He clearly loved killing.
“Some victims had 145, or even 170 knife wounds.”
