Murder, Mystery & Makeup - Chessboard Killer - 1 Of The Actual Worst! - Alexander Pichushkin

Episode Date: August 29, 2023

Hi friends! Hope you are having a wonderful day so far! Today I wanted to talk about a highly requested story, Mr Pichushkin and his crazy ass. Love you so much and please be safe out there! Hope to be seeing you very soon. x o Bailey Sarian Watch the original video here and don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube @BaileySarian! Tik Tok: https://bit.ly/3e3jL9v Instagram: http://bit.ly/2nbO4PR Facebook: http://bit.ly/2mdZtK6 Twitter: http://bit.ly/2yT4BLV Pinterest: http://bit.ly/2mVpXnY Youtube: http://bit.ly/1HGw3Og Snapchat: https://bit.ly/3cC0V9d Discord: https://discord.gg/BaileySarian

Hi, how are you today? I hope you're having a wonderful day. My name is Bailey Sarian and today is Monday, which means it's murder, mystery, and makeup Monday. Sana-shan, shana-shan, shana-shan-shan-shan-shan-shan. San. If you are new here, hi, my name is Bailey Sarian and on Mondays I sit down and I talk about true crime story

that's been heavy on my noggin and I do my makeup at the same time. If you're interested in true crime and you like makeup, I would highly suggest you hit that subscribe button because I'm here for you on Mondays. So before we jump into today's story, we do have to add disclaimer. Warning, today's story contains graphic descriptions

of crime scenes, adult dialogue, and strong language. Viewer discretion is advised. Just have to say that because today we're talking about some weirdo. I just thought of something that I want to say really quickly. If you've been following me for a while, then you should know that words are hard.

They're very difficult for me. This story takes place in Russia, so as you can imagine, here we go, you know, here we go. The story doesn't change, but the names might change because of me. Okay, today's story, chess, it involves chess. Chess has come and gone in terms of being a popular topic of conversation over the years. Bobby Fischer was a big deal for a while, remember?

And then just recently over quarantine, The Queen's Gambit. Pretty girl playing chess during the pandemic, super cool. Wow, people are very interested. But there's always like some bad seeds within a community like chess that kind of puts a stinker on the name. And babe, in 2007, chess became associated with a very dark tale.

This is when the world was introduced to Alexander Pichuskin, also known as the chessboard killer. I don't think I mentioned it later on in the video, cause he kind of had different nicknames, depending on who you asked. Alexander Pichuskin, he was also known as the chessboard killer. He liked to keep a count of his victims on a chessboard.

So you know how a chessboard, well, if you don't know, a chessboard has 64 squares on it. Well he like kept a victim's log in each square and at the time of his arrest Alexander had filled in 61 of the 64 squares of his chessboard. So who is Alexander Pichuskin? He was born April 9th, 1974 so he's an Aries. I've been liking adding in Zodiac signs. I think it humbles some of us. He grew up in Mateshi, Moscow with his mom, Natasha, and his younger half sister, Katya. His dad left the picture when Alex was just one year old,

and the family would grow up in like the same apartment his whole life. So the family apartment was a six minute walk from Bicevsky Park. And locals, they would describe this area as a quote unquote bad neighborhood, which later on it would only get worse thanks to Alexander over here.

It was said that Alexander, who I'm just gonna call Alex, okay, you get it. He had a pretty normal childhood, okay. He was sweet, he was outgoing, but at the age of four, that'll change, just all of a sudden. I guess one day, like little Alex was playing at the park, okay, and he's like, I wanna go on swings.

So he goes on the swings, he's having a great time swinging as one does, and then he goes a little too high and he ends up falling backwards off of the swing. I guess Alex like stands up pretty quickly and the swing was swinging and then it swings. Sorry, I'm just saying swing a lot. And it swings backwards and it ends up hitting him

in the head, like just smacks him square in the forehead. Now here's the thing, it's like 1978 at this time and his mom, she doesn't take him to the hospital, but she notices like there's a big old bruise forming on his head. So she's like, you know, just put some Vicks on it. You're good. But sadly enough, this accident on the swing,

it just really seemed to be a turning point in Alex's life. You see a kid's forehead only provides a small fraction of protection to the brain compared to you as an adult. So a bump like that, the damage, it would be very severe for Alex than say a grown adult. Experts think that the swing incident may have damaged his frontal cortex and his brain.

And that kind of damage is known to produce poor impulse control and can cause a tendency towards aggression, which is exactly what happens to Alex. I mean, not long after his swing incident, it was said that like a light switch went off and he became super impulsive and angry. Mind you, he's only four,

but it was like enough for his mom to take notice. So it wasn't easy in school for Alex. He would say that kids would verbally abuse him, they would bully him, they'd physically abuse him as well. I mean, they would call him some pretty vile names that I cannot say here on YouTube, but it was pretty bad. His mom takes notice that he's just not doing well in school and he's like super quiet and really kept to himself and stuff.

So his mom decides to transfer him from the public school and she takes him or she enrolls him into a school for children with learning disabilities, hoping that it would be just a better and safer place for Alex to learn. Alexander's grandpa found out that he was going to a school for kids with learning disabilities. He was a little upset by this

and his grandpa felt that Alex was like super talented and he had a lot of special gifts. And he just felt like they were being wasted at the school that was focusing more on overcoming disability rather than working on growing his talents or gifts. So his grandpa decided to take Alex, like take him out of school, come live with him.

And then he really encouraged Alex to pursue like bigger activities out of school, come live with him. And then he really encouraged Alex to pursue like bigger activities outside of school. And this is where chess comes into the picture. Enter to the scene chess. Flash makeup. So his grandpa would go to the local park and play chess pretty often, and he taught Alex how to play. Where Alexander would play games

against like the older guys there. Now I guess this park is like super huge. It's ginormous. It's more than 27 acres. I'm so sorry. I don't know where my head's at. It's more than 2,700 acres. I'm really sorry.

Focus Bailey, 2,700 acres. And to put that in perspective, Central Park in New York City is only 843 acres. Bitsa Park was 2,700 acres. Like that's a big boy. It's a little too big. Now the downside, this big park was located in not the best area.

In fact, many of the people in the area would call this part of Moscow pretty grim. So anywho, Alex, his grandpa, he notices that he caught on pretty quick with playing chess and he was like really fricking good, okay? He, Alex, was beating a lot of the older guys who had been playing at the park, playing chess at the park for like years.

So his grandpa's like, ooh, okay. Now Alex said that he found it to be a really great way to release his built up aggression through playing chess, which he still had like a lot of because he was still getting bullied and beat up by kids all the time, like up until his late teen years. Sadly, when Alex was around 15 years old,

he would experience his first like real loss. His grandpa passed away. And when this happened, it forced him, well, he had to move back with his mom and like go back to his old school where he was just being tortured pretty much. So he's feeling a lot of anger and sadness over the loss of his grandpa,

having to go back to that super awful school, having to move back in with his mom. It was just like a lot of negative changes for him. And this is when Alex decided to start numbing the pain by drinking a shit ton of vodka. So he would still go down to the park and play chess, but now he was joining in with the older guys and drinking a ton,

cause they would be drinking a lot there. Alex noticed, or at least he thought when he was drunk, he was like so much better at chess. He was like, I'm freaking amazing. And he's just thinking he needs to be drunk all of the time because he's freaking the chess god. I think when you're drunk, you always think you're better at something.

But then if you ever look at pictures or videos of yourself when you're drunk, you're like, oh, I thought it was hot shit. Oh, it was definitely not hot shit. But again, because he has so much built up aggression, it just made him a really combative chess player. And he would eventually just dominate the circle of people he played with.

Like he was really, really good. That's what I heard, or at least what I read. I wasn't there, so I don't know. So it's around this time that Alex develops a new hobby. A new hobby that nobody really knew about. It's like, I don't know how we got here to this point, but, or like what made him get to this jump in life, but what he was doing,

finding children to interact with at like the park or whatever, and then he'd bring his video camera and he'd record them. He would record himself threatening them, but he did it in like a joking, playful manner, but still it was creepy and freaking weird. There was one instance where he had held a young child upside down by one leg and was telling the camera,

I'm in power, I'm gonna fucking drop you to your death. He just really liked torturing kids or something, a control thing, there you go. And he would video record this, save the tapes, and he would go back and like rewatch these videos later to re-experience that feeling of power he had in the moment. So by 1992, these tapes threatening children,

they just weren't cutting it for him anymore. He needed something a little bit more, a little more to quench his dark urges. This is where shit just gets real bad. So Alex decides like the next thing he needs to do is kill someone. I know another big jump, but that's what he settles on. So July 27th, 1992, Alex is 18 years old and he's in college and he's talking to one of his classmates named Michael.

They must've been close enough because Alex confides in him, tells Michael like, hey, I really wanna go on a killing spree. He tells his friend Michael like, hey, you should come with me, tells Michael like, I really wanna go on a killing spree. He tells his friend, Michael, like, hey, you should come with me. His friend was like, okay. So his friend Michael goes and they're wandering around

just looking out for someone to kill. Alex notices that Michael isn't taking this mission as seriously as he was. And this was frustrating to him because it seems like Michael just doesn't really wanna be there. It pisses Alex off and he decides, you know what, I'm gonna kill Michael.

And guess what? He fricking does, okay? He bashes him in the head pretty damn bad and Michael does indeed die. Now it was said that something just clicked for Alex. He described the feeling of this murder to be like your first love. He just, he felt magical.

He had butterflies in his stomach. He's like, oh my God, like this is different. This is it. Police, they do investigate Michael's death and they do end up questioning Alex, but like no charges were filed. Well, Alex said that same year he committed another murder. This time it was his ex-girlfriend,

well, his girlfriend at the time, her name was Olga. They broke up and she started dating one of his friends. So obviously this pissed Alex off. And so he's like, I'm gonna go confront him. He does just that. So he confronts his friend and he's like, I don't know, they get into an argument. He ends up pushing his friend out the window and it kills him. He does just that. So he confronts his friend and he's like, I don't know, they get into an argument. He ends up pushing his friend out the window

and it kills him. Alex was questioned by police, but this death was ruled a suicide. So Alexander learned nothing. Great, fantastic. So it's unclear what happened. Maybe the police like questioning Alex about the murders kind of spooked him a little bit

or maybe killing those two people satisfied him because he would, for some reason, start laying low and he doesn't kill anyone for nine years, which is a good thing, right? Great, awesome, the end. It's just unusual. Like nobody really knows what happened in that nine years. So fast forward to the year 2001,

Alex is now 27 years old and it said he wasn't the best looking guy around, but what he does have going for him is his personality. It said that he had like a really nice charm to him. At this time he was working at a grocery store where his coworkers would describe him as quiet, perhaps a little strange, but he could be pretty charming. Now this year is when he decides to end his nine year hiatus

and he's ready to kill again. So Alex goes to his favorite spot at the park and he plays chess with this guy named Eve. So they're playing for a while, they're drinking some vodka. Alex tells the guy like, hey, yeah, so my dog died and I buried him in the park. Do you wanna go see and like share a toast with me at his grave?

Now, to be fair, his dog did die, okay? And he did, I think he did bury his dog in the park. Not a hundred percent sure. I don't think it really matters because he was using this as a front. Okay. So the guy that he's playing chess with, his name's Eve. He's like, yeah, okay, sure.

Like let's go toast to your dog. So they go out into the park area where it's like kind of hidden. Alex takes him to the point where his dog was buried. They do share a toast. Okay. And then I guess just out of nowhere, Alex attacks this man and kills him. It's pretty brutal.

He did some horrendous things. His style was just not appropriate. So he kills the man. He hides the body in like a sewage area and then he just heads home. Now, I guess this is like that fix. He's excited again. Time to shine.

Things escalate pretty quickly from here. Over the next eight weeks, Alex kills nine more people. And then things kind of like calm down for a little bit. And then over fall and winter, he then kills five more people. So that's 14 people in a matter of months. Terrifying. And nobody, nobody, nothing.

Nobody caught on, nobody saw. It just doesn't make any sense. Now the reason it's believed why nobody caught on is because Alex was targeting homeless people, elderly homeless people, mostly men. And he was luring them into the woods, offering them free cigarettes or vodka. And his go-to pickup line, I guess you could call it, was always like saying that he wanted company

while he mourned the death of his dog. After drinking with the victim, he would then attack them and then throw them down the wells in the park that led to the sewers, which is awful. Alex would say that he would start his attack from behind in order to make sure that the victim was caught off guard, you know, but also mainly because he wanted to avoid getting blood on his clothes.

Thinking ahead, I guess. Sadly, because most of his victims were homeless at this time, there wasn't like a major urgency to help find those who were missing. And at the time the police had a mandatory three day wait period before you could report someone missing, which is far too long.

Three days, they're long gone. Day three, bye, gone. So that was their protocol at the time. It really worked in, I guess, Alex's favor. But people were coming in and reporting some missing. The cops just made little to no progress and no one seemed to be making the connection that maybe these disappearances like were related somehow.

Time goes on, it was actually, it wasn't even long until Alex was up to 20 victims. Mainly they were the people that he played chess with in the park. Alex wants to switch things up a little bit and then he starts to target women and kids now, instead of just homeless elderly men. So on February 23rd, 2002, Alex tried to kill a woman named Maria.

He was able to lure her into the woods with the promise of black market goods. I'm not sure what the black market goods were that he was offering, but it doesn't matter. He was able to lure her into the park. And when they finally got to an area where he felt like it was a safe place to be, no one's watching, he would attack her,

hitting her head against a concrete wall before throwing her down into the sewer. And then he leaves thinking that she's dead because this is how he attacks like all of his victims in the same way. The thing is though, Maria, Maria was not dead. Good for fricking Maria. Maria was not dead, okay?

She was not dead. And this girl, she is a champ. She is a real champion here, okay? She is able to pull through. She swam her way out of the sewer and then she headed to the hospital. Mind you, her head's like bleeding. She's like half aware, you know, incredible, incredible.

This is upsetting, okay? Because she gets to the hospital. They could tell that the staff can tell that there's a problem. She tells them she needs to speak to the police, whatever. So they come out and they talk to Maria. Now here's the thing. Maria at this time was living in Moscow illegally

and she didn't have any registration papers saying that she could live in Moscow. So when the cops came, they asked her for her paperwork, she didn't have any. She was afraid she's gonna get removed, she's gonna get kicked out. Now the cops, for some sick reason, the cops told Maria, if she stays quiet about her attack,

then they'll overlook her illegal status, you know? It's a little trade-off. So what does she do? She stays quiet. I don't know why they don't want to solve this. They're busy, I guess. That could have been the part where, I don't know, maybe police could have actually like helped, you would think, you know?

Maybe. Nothing, right? So Alexander, he continues to go on and kill three more people in the next two weeks. I know, what the hell is this guy doing? I don't know, like how does he have the time? He's literally fearless. That's what's spooky. Alex was attempting to go after a 13 year old boy.

This 13 year old boy was able to escape Alex's attack. Yeah, so same as Maria, this 13 year old boy, he takes off. He's able to get away. He goes running straight to police. And he's telling the police, like, you have to help me. This man just attacked me. He's trying to kill me. But the police tell him that he needs to go home

because he smells of booze and cigarettes. They believe that this kid's probably lying or they're gonna, they're threatening to arrest him because he's drinking and smoking. He's not supposed to be drinking and smoking. He's only 13. Again, I don't know. The police seem to be super busy or something

because they don't want to solve any mysteries. Why? There's a lot of people dead at this point. I don't know what they're doing. This poor little boy, not only did he escape death, he runs to police thinking like, oh, they're gonna save me, they're gonna help me. Nope, I couldn't imagine.

I could not imagine how frustrating that would be. But get this, this doesn't end. The boy goes home, right? Super traumatic experience. And then a week goes by. A week goes by, the little boy, 13 year old boy, he goes down to the Metro station. Guess who he spots?

Guess who he runs into? Fricking Alex. The little boy sees Alex, they make eye contact. The little boy, he goes into full blown panic mode as he should. He's freaking out and he starts screaming at the top of his lungs. And then he runs to this group of officers

who were just standing around, like patrolling the area. He runs to them, the boy's telling them like, "'You have to do something, like that guy tried to kill me "'a week ago, literally a week ago, like help me.' Like he's just, you know, he's gotta do something." And guess what? Surprise, surprise. They brushed him off and told him to go home.

They didn't do a single thing for him. I don't know why. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. It's like the police just can't be bothered. I mean, things could have ended right then and there. More and more people start disappearing.

The families start getting together of those who are missing and they're talking. And they're trying to put the pieces together and see like, what do we all have in common? You know, brainstorm, because obviously the police aren't gonna solve this shit. So let's figure it out ourselves. 10 of his victims, they put the pieces together, right?

And they realized that 10 of the victims had lived in the same building complex, where everyone seemed to know everyone else. It's also where Alex happened to live as well. The people who live in the building complex are super freaked out now because they're like, oh my god, like we're the target. Terror is just rippling through the apartment blocks and the metro stations that surrounded the huge park that now had become this haunted awful place.

People would even talk about hearing shouts and cries echoing through the trees. So it was awful, and again, police didn't seem to care. There was nothing they could do, really, unless they wanted to go out there, but no one wanted to go out there. Meanwhile, Alex is like, La-di-fucking-da. Mid-2005, Alexander's number of victims was now up to 40 people. Oh yeah.

But Alex is getting a little bored. He's getting a little bored, it's just not as satisfying as it used to be. So he's like, you know what, maybe I should try and like change my approach, change my technique a little bit, make it fun again. So he does just that. Instead of hiding the victims' bodies in the sewer, where he was putting majority of them, he decided to just like leave them out in the open.

It's kind of a good thing, but not really, but kind of because finally, because he's leaving them out in the open, finally the cops are taking notice. And the fact that one of the victims was a retired police officer, of course. Only now does it matter. So yeah, after 40 victims, they're like,

hey, maybe something's going on that we should investigate. For a brief moment, police arrest a different dude thinking that he's the one who's been causing all this chaos, work gets out, it's all over the news and stuff. And this was devastating to Alex. Oh yeah, he was devastated. When he finds out that they got the wrong guy,

and this guy's getting all his credit, he's pissed, he's devastated, because he feels like all of his hard work was being credited towards someone else. So he's real butt hurt about this. So June 13th, 2006, Alex went after his final victim. So Alex, again, still, Alex went after his final victim. So Alex, again, still working at the grocery store. He also worked with a lady named Marina

and they worked together. Well, I think he had like a little crush on her. Actually, no, I think he wanted to murder her because he invites her to go like on a picnic at the park with him. I guess she was kind of nervous because she had heard like nothing but bad things are happening at this park

and like maybe we shouldn't go there. But the fact that she was going with Alex kind of gave, I don't know, I guess a little bit of peace of mind. So she ends up agreeing and she goes with him to have a picnic at the park. Marina, she left a note back at home saying that she was going to the park with a coworker named Alex and left his phone number behind,

you know, in case of an emergency, because Marina had a young son at home. So just in case of an emergency, like this is where you can find me. So Marina tells, at some point tells Alex, like, yeah, I left behind, you know, just in case of an emergency. And it makes Alex very uncomfortable.

And he kind of doesn't know, like, what should I do? Should I still kill her or not this time? Hmm. So he's like really thinking it through. It's going back and forth in his mind. What's my best move here? And I know what we're all thinking, don't do it. Alex, he's decided, you know what?

I can't let this one go. And sure enough, he decided to sadly kill Marina. Well, when Marina didn't come home, what do you think happened? The police were called. They were informed that she was supposed to go out with a coworker named Alex and that she hadn't been home that night,

but they had his name and phone number, so they gave it to police. Once again, police, they're just different out there, I guess, they're just more slow. Police went looking for surveillance footage from the Metro system, which they find footage that showed Marina walking with Alex the day that she went missing.

And they're like, fucking bingo. Now, again, I guess police just work different out there or something because instead of like going after to arrest Alex, you know, as you think would happen, instead they have his phone number. So they're like, hey, let's get him on the phone. So they call him up. Hey, this is police.

Alex answers. And they're like, hey, have you seen your coworker Marina? And Alex is like, oh no, I haven't seen her in months. And then quickly hangs up on them. Very different out there, very different. They're lucky he didn't make a run for it because that's the first thing you think would happen, right? And then get this.

This is the dumbest story I've ever, ever read, okay? Because again, police work different out there or something. Two days go by, two days, and then finally, in July of 2006, police show up at Alex's apartment and they arrest him. Two days, he had two days to get away. I mean, not that he should get away, but you know, come on. So they take him and they ask him some questions,

you know, interrogation. The police end up showing him surveillance footage from the Metro system where he's walking with Marina. And that's when Alex just started to talk. He tells the police, like, I purposely outed him myself. So there's no reason that the cops need to take credit for catching him. He was like, I'm a professional

and I purposely was being sloppy so you'd catch me. So don't pat yourself on the back. And I don't want to see anything in the media about police catching me. I gave myself up. Honestly though, at first I was like, oh my God, he's so cocky, what a douche. But he's kind of right.

They sure as hell did not deserve any type of credit. Sorry. But he's making sure like the cops know this cause he's like, I don't want, I won't want any news reports saying that you guys caught me. I caught myself. Make sure you write that down. So it really didn't take much for Alex

to just start yip yapping to police. He's telling them everything they want to know. He's like, look, you guys, I actually killed more than 60 people and you could find all of their bodies in the sewage in the park because that's where I put them all. And then finally police are making a connection. They're putting the pieces together and they're like,

oh my God, all those missing people, they're probably a victim to Alex. Great work you guys, great work. We solved it. But Alex wanted to do more than just talk. He wanted to show the police what he did and actually led them to the scenes of many of his crimes. He was also really excited to demonstrate like how the murders were committed.

He was like super jazzed about it. He's like, let me show you guys. Police, they ended up filming one of the reenactments. I'm laughing because I just, it's just different. So police, they're filming the reenactment of the murders and he's just going in great detail. But Alex just really seems to be loving the attention. The community in which Alex lived, they were in total shock when they learned that it was Alex

who was responsible for all of those who were missing. Again, it was a pretty tight-knit community and his neighbors always saw him as like really calm and just a really quiet guy, just he was always by himself. It seemed like it actually hurt the neighbors in the community more that the killer ended up being someone that they knew versus someone that they didn't know. Because it was like, they knew him. They were so close.

They lived, it just, it couldn't be him. Do you know what I'm saying? Alex told police that he got a sexual satisfaction when he killed. Sometimes he would like get off when he was doing it. It was said that the way he talked in great detail about his attacks, it was again, like a man talking about falling in love, ew.

So Alex, his trial started on September 13th, 2007, and it would last for around 46 days. There were a couple of things during the trial that were memorable, I guess, for the lack of a better word. First of all, Alex was kept in a glass cage during the trial for his own protection. Just like another well-known serial killer in Russia, Andrei Chikatilov.

He's just another well-known serial killer in Russia. And he too was absolutely nuts, okay? When he went to trial, he too was in a glass cage during his whole trial. Second, Alex admitted that he liked toying with the cops during his killing spree, and that the more risky the murder, the more powerful it made him feel.

Third, during the trial, he bragged about how many murders he committed. And not only that, he bragged about how violent they were. But most of all, he said his inspiration was to beat Andre Chikatilo's record, and he wanted to kill as many people as possible, and make sure that he was number one and Andre was no longer number one.

Like that was his biggest motivation is what he said. Alex genuinely insisted that he be charged with all the murders he had taken credit for, saying that he deserved the title of 63 victims. He wasn't being charged with that many. He was only being charged with like 40, which bud, I think that's a lot, but he won credit for 63. So after three hours of the jury deliberation,

Alex was convicted on November 24th, 2007 for only 49 murders and three attempted murders. He got sentenced to life in prison. Now, like many other murderers we've talked about here on Murder, Mystery and Makeup, Alex also has some fans. He had a lot of fans actually. And in 2016, he even tried to get married to one of his fan girls,

but the prison system ended up banning them from seeing each other. But the woman like still says that she's dedicated to him no matter what, and she's like gonna be by his side. Which girl like, no, you deserve better than that. Get a better standard for yourself. How about not a murderer? That's a good standard to start with.

Get better idols. There are so many good people out there in the world who have done great inspiring things. I don't know, pick someone who went to the moon. Great, you know, like come on, you could do better. That my friends is the awful story about Alexander Petruskin. Freaking horrible, horrible, disturbed little man.

He's still alive and he's still creepy as hell. Well, he is creepy as hell. He looks, when you think of a killer, you're like, meh, I could see it. Thank you so much for hanging out with me today. I hope you have a good rest of your day. You make good choices and I'll be seeing you guys later. Bye!