Mikhail Malyshev

Mikhail Malyshev
Born	Mikhail Yuryevich Malyshev (1965-10-31) October 31, 1965 Perm, Perm Oblast, RSFSR (present-day Perm Krai, Russia)
Other names	"The Perm Cannibal"
Conviction(s)	Murder x2 Rape x2 Illegal deprivation of liberty x2 Cannibalism x2 Animal cruelty
Criminal penalty	25 years imprisonment, with two years time served
Details
Victims	2–8
Span of crimes	1997–1998
Country	Russia
State(s)	Perm
Date apprehended	1998

Mikhail Yuryevich Malyshev (Russian: Михаил Юрьевич Малышев; born October 31, 1965), known as The Perm Cannibal (Russian: Пермский людоед), is a Russian murderer, cannibal and possible serial killer. He was convicted of murdering, dismembering and eating the remains of two acquaintances in Perm from 1997 to 1998, but was also suspected of six similar murders for which he was never charged.

Malyshev was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment, but released in 2022 and is currently living in Perm.

Early life

Mikhail Yuryevich Malyshev was born on October 31, 1965, in Perm, and was raised in an affluent, well-respected family. Some sources claim that his mother worked as a school teacher, while others say that she worked as a leading engineer at a nuclear plant. As a child, Malyshev attended violin classes, but was forced to abandon them after sustaining an injury to his arm.

In the late 1970s, his parents divorced and his mother remarried, having a daughter with her new husband in 1983. The divorce greatly affected Malyshev emotionally and mentally, further distancing him from his peers, who bullied him for being overweight. This led to him being highly stressed out and frequently angry, with Malyshev resorting to killing stray cats and dogs to vent out his frustrations. In 1980, he was arrested on charges of cruelty against animals and interned at a juvenile detention center, where he started exercising and attended boxing classes.

In order to effectively build muscle mass, Malyshev decided that he would need to eat more meat, but as there was a shortage of meat products, he resorted to eating dog meat. He changed three high schools before enrolling at a vocational school, and after graduating in 1984, he was drafted into the Soviet Army. After completing his service, he returned to his mother's home, whereupon he became even more aggressive and began to show signs of mental illness. Due to his frequent outbursts, his mother and stepfather accused him of being anti-social and forbade him from contacting his younger sister.

Marshal Rybalko Street apartment

In 1986, Malyshev's mother exchanged the family's current one-room apartment for two separate apartments, one of which was located on Marshal Rybalko Street in the Zakamsk District. He eventually moved into this apartment, where he lived for the following years and where his future murders were all committed.

It is unclear what professions he held during this period – one source claims that he worked at the "Sorbent" nuclear power plant, while others claim that worked as a welder or carpenter. Malyshev led a secluded life, never married, was fond of reading and weightlifting, but despite this, he held a reputation as an anti-social man who enjoyed killing stray dogs.

In the mid-1990s, he quit his job due to delayed wage payments, and to avoid economic hardship, Malyshev began to produce and sell moonshine on the streets, as well as selling hats made from the skins of dogs he had killed. In 1995, he met an 18-year-old mentally-ill orphan named Nikolai, whom he allowed to stay in his apartment – not long after, he began physically and sexually abusing him. As payment for the housing, Nikolai was ordered to bring stray dogs back to the apartment, which they would later kill and eat. At around this time, Malyshev also resorted to drinking large quantities of alcohol.

Growing paranoia

In mid-1996, Malyshev met a 19-year-old nurse named Inna Borovik, with whom he soon began a romantic relationship. He soon introduced her to his mother and later met her father, who was also an alcoholic. A few months later, Borovik moved into Malyshev's apartment, where she was soon imprisoned. Malyshev would torture, rape and abuse both her and Nikolai, and would go so far as to force them to have sex with one another while he watched.

During this period, his own mental state began to rapidly decline and he started experiencing paranoid delusions. Malyshev eventually installed a metal door inside his apartment with several locks and peepholes to monitor the stairwell, as well as steel bars and blinds on the apartment's windows, crafted from horizontal plates of thick metal steel. In order to prevent theft, he also placed several pieces of furniture, including his television set, in steel cages that he kept locked up.

Malyshev understood that Borovik suffered from low self-esteem and depression, and in order to keep her under his control, he manipulated her by forbidding her to go outside without him, in addition to intimidating and humiliating her on a regular basis. During one particular beating, he took a knife and cut off one of Nikolai's ears in front of Borovik, thus completely crushing her will to resist.

As he spent most of his time on the streets, Malyshev often befriended various marginalized people whom he would invite back to his apartment to drink alcohol and eat pies and pelmeni made from dog meat. As a consequence of his alcohol addiction, his behavior became even more unstable, with him developing an obsession with collecting items. In the span of a few years, his apartment was turned into a run-down brothel where most of the rooms were filled with various garbage, random items and animal carcasses that were stacked onto one another. In the kitchen, Malyshev would attach hooks to the walls to hang said carcasses, and would usually dismember animal remains on a cutting board using various carving knives.

Murders

Natalia Suvorova

Malyshev's first known victim was 16-year-old Natalia Suvorova, a student at one of Perm's vocational schools. At the end of 1997, he let Borovik out of the apartment so she could bring back a girl to satisfy his sexual urges. After meeting Suvorova on the streets, Borovik persuaded her to go to Malyshev's apartment to drink alcohol together. According to Borovik's testimony, after Suvorova became intoxicated, Malyshev and several friends (including a supposed police officer) proceeded to sexually abuse her for several hours. This version was deemed to be faulty by Lt. Gulnara Abibulaeva, a retired Lieutenant Colonel of Justice and former senior investigator of the local prosecutor's office, who ascertained that aside from Malyshev, Borovik and Nikolai, there was nobody else in the apartment.

After Malyshev stopped abusing the girl, Suvorova threatened to call the police on him – upon hearing this, Malyshev grabbed an axe and bludgeoned her to death. Then, with Borovik and Nikolai's help, he dismembered her body and made minced meat out of her flesh, with which he later used to prepare pelmeni and cutlets. During the dismemberment of Suvorova's body, Borovik suffered a nervous breakdown, after which Malyshev beat both her and Nikolai, threatening to kill them as well if they did not cooperate. In a bid to intimidate them, he bit the tip of Borovik's nose and ate it in front of them. Malyshev then put Suvorova's hands, feet and head in a bag, which he then threw into the Kama. The girl's remains were soon found, but another resident of Perm was wrongfully arrested and coerced into confessing by authorities – reportedly, Malyshev was not considered a suspect in her murder at the time.

Anton

Malyshev committed his second known murder in mid-1998, with this victim being an acquaintance named "Anton". On the day of the murder, he invited Anton to spend the night in his apartment to drink alcohol. The pair drank until late at night, when Borovik attempted to throw him out – unwilling to leave, an argument arose between him and his hosts, upon which Malyshev grabbed an axe and bludgeoned him to death. He dismembered Anton's remains and ate his heart, but this time made no effort to cover up his tracks and threw the remains behind a garage lot near his own house, where they were soon found by a passer-by. After identifying the victim, the police questioned his brother, who stated that shortly before his disappearance, Anton had gone to visit an acquaintance named Mikhail Malyshev for a barbecue. As he was already notorious for killing animals, he was immediately considered the prime suspect, and a few weeks after the murder, police officers were sent to the apartment. During the subsequent search, they found packages containing human remains, as well as over 600 kilograms of meat of unknown origin, after which Malyshev was immediately arrested.

Arrest and confessions

Immediately after his arrest, Borovik and Nikolai decided to testify against Malyshev. During the first day of interrogations, he denied any and all responsibility, but soon cracked under pressure from the abundance of physical evidence and confessed to killing Suvorova and Anton. In his confessions, Malyshev claimed that he committed both killings in a state of both anger and drunkenness brought him from his heavy consumption of vodka.

As he continued, he explained that he believed dog meat had medicinal qualities and a high protein intake that he needed to build up his muscle mass. Malyshev attributed his urge to cannibalize his victims to curiosity, as he had no idea what human meat tasted like, pointing out that various tribes in Africa also ate human flesh. Later on, however, he refused to cooperate and threatened physical violence against Abibulaeva, claiming that "if [he] had a hammer right now, he would smash all [her] fingers".

Malyshev's roommates were also prosecuted. Borovik was charged with aiding and abetting in the commission of a crime, but was ultimately given a suspended sentence and released. During interrogations, she claimed that she was afraid of Malyshev, who threatened that he would throw her in the freezer if she attempted to run away from him. Due to her constant state of stress, she had a hormonal breakdown and was unable to have her period for six months. It's unclear what happened to Nikolai after his arrest.

Prosecution

A forensic psychiatric evaluation determined that Malyshev was able to stand trial, despite the fact that he did indeed suffer from some mental abnormalities. During the investigation, he was ordered to take a polygraph test, the results of which were inconclusive. While searching through his apartment, investigators found several articles of clothing that did not belong to Malyshev, which they believed were possible additional victims. Malyshev failed to answer several questions during questioning, and when asked if he was involved in at least six similar murders committed in Perm in recent years, he refused to acknowledge whether he was involved or not.

At the request of the prosecutor's office, the 600 kilograms of meat were sent to a laboratory in order to determine what kind of meat it was. Samples were taken from various packages, and results showed that a majority of it was dog meat – however, law enforcement officials later stated that they were unable to completely verify that all 600 kilograms were dog meat due to a lack of resources.

In the end, no evidence implicating Malyshev in other murders ever surfaced, and since results from polygraph tests cannot be admitted as evidence, he was only charged with the murders of Suvorova and Anton. The trial was held behind closed doors at the Perm Regional Court, and due to this, much of the process and materials related to the case were never revealed to the public. In 2000, Malyshev was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to 25 years imprisonment, with two of these years counting as time served due to the fact he was immediately brought to a penal colony after his arrest.

Imprisonment and release

After his conviction, Malyshev was transferred to the high-security penal colony No. 10 in Chusovoy. At said colony, he was placed in a 200-bed unit and worked as a food handler, a prestigious position that allowed him unlimited access to food. As a result, he quickly gained weight, and while he participated in boxing competitions, he did not achieve any outstanding results.

Throughout his time in prison, Malyshev was treated as an outcast by other inmates, but was otherwise not bullied in any way and left to his own devices. In 2005, journalists visited him for an interview, and in said interview, Malyshev claimed that he was remorseful and currently attempting to better himself physically and spiritually. As he was not popular with the prison staff, he was constantly disciplined for being unkempt and keeping spoiled food in his cell, due to which his mental health deteriorated sharply and he contracted a number of neurological diseases, even developing a stutter. He only communicated with a few inmates and his mother, and after spending more than a decade in prison, he developed a meeker personality and would often cry while being scolded by prison guards.

In 2016, Malyshev began receiving a pension due to his previous work in hazardous conditions – due to this and his job as a food handler, he earned a reputation as one of the most financially secure convicts in the country. Despite this, he began to experience health issues, and due to being overweight, he was diagnosed with a number of cardiovascular and musculoskeletal diseases which caused him to walk with a limp.

Release from prison

In early 2022, several of Malyshev's acquaintances claimed that he had become institutionalized and supposedly would confess to additional murders so he could receive a new sentence and be kept in prison, but this never occurred. After serving 23 years in prison, Malyshev was released in October 2022 and returned to his apartment on Marshal Rybalko Street. His release caused great outrage from the public, thanks to which his life and crimes received renewed attention from the media.

Since his return to Perm, Malyshev has refused to talk to journalists and has avoided publicity. His release caused a moral panic among some residents, leading to allegations that residents of his apartment building were collecting signatures to have him evicted, since there was a school and a kindergarten near the building; however, these claims remain unconfirmed. Law enforcement officials have stated that there is currently no legal basis to evict Malyshev, since he is the registered owner, has served his sentence in full and regularly reports his status to the local police.

In the media and culture

His crimes were covered on an episode of Frank Confessions (Russian: Чистосердечное признание) in 2005.

See also

• List of incidents of cannibalism