Siberian Criminals

Fri Mar 12 17:39:12 UTC 2010

Dear Listserv users,

I'm currently trying to fact-check a piece for a magazine on Siberian  
criminals living in Moldova in the 1990s. It is proving extremely  
difficult and I would really appreciate any leads or any help in  
verifying these facts. Mainly I would like to get in touch with  
experts on Moldova and more particularly the city of Bender in the  
early 1990s, and on Siberian criminal culture. Below is a list of the  
issues we are still researching. Thanks in advance for your help.

Best,

Jacques Testard

Are you able to confirm that a large group of Siberians was resettled  
in (present) Moldova, in the Transnistria region, in the 1930's? Can  
you think of any sources that might focus on this topic?

Are you able to think of any sources that could confirm certain  
Siberian criminal traditions and rituals:

The weapons in our house, as in all Siberian houses, were kept in  
particular places. The so-called personal guns?the ones Siberian  
criminals carry around with them and use every day are placed in the  
red corner, where the family icons hang on the walls, along with the  
photographs of relatives who have died or are serving prison  
sentences. (2)

Whenever a criminal enters the house he goes straight to the red  
corner, pulls out his gun and puts it on the shelf, then crosses  
himself and places a crucifix over the gun. This is an ancient  
tradition that ensures that weapons are never used in a Siberian  
house: if they were, the house could never be lived in again. (2)

They are not cult objects, in the way that the 'pike', the traditional  
knife, is. The gun is simply a tool of the trade. (2)

The weapons of Siberian criminals fall into two broad categories:  
honest ones and sinful ones. The honest weapons are those that are  
used only for hunting in the woods. According to Siberian morality,  
hunting is a purification ritual, which enables a person to return to  
the state of primal innocence in which God created man. Siberians  
never hunt for pleasure, but only to satisfy their hunger, and only  
when they go into the dense woods of their homeland, the Tayga. Never  
in places where food can be obtained without killing wild animals. (3)

The honest weapons used for hunting are kept in a special area of the  
house, called the altar, along with the decorated hunting belts of the  
masters of the house and their forefathers. (3)

The sinful weapons are those that are used for criminal purposes.  
These weapons are usually kept in the cellar and in various hiding  
places scattered around the yard. Every sinful weapon is engraved with  
the image of a cross or a patron saint, and has been 'baptized' in a  
Siberian church. (3)

In criminal slang each model has a name; no one uses abbreviations or  
numbers to
indicate the model and caliber or the type of ammunition it requires.  
For example, the old 7.62 mm AK-47 is called a 'saw', and its  
ammunition 'heads'. The more recent 5.45 mm AKS with the folding butt  
is called a 'telescope', and its ammunition 'chips'. There are also  
names for the different types of cartridge: the bottom-heavy ones with  
black tips are called 'fat ones'; the armor-piercing ones with white  
tips, 'nails'; the explosive ones with red and white tips, 'sparks'.

The same goes for the other weapons: precision rifles are called  
'fishing rods', or 'scythes'. If they have a built-in silencer on the  
barrel, they are called 'whips'. Silencers are called 'boots',  
'terminals' or 'woodcocks'. (3)

According to tradition, an honest weapon and a sinful one cannot  
remain in the same room, otherwise the honest weapon is forever  
contaminated, and can never be used again, because its use would bring  
bad luck on the whole family. In this case the gun must be eliminated  
with a special ritual. It is buried in the ground, wrapped in a sheet  
on which a mother has given birth. According to Siberian beliefs,  
everything connected with childbirth is charged with positive energy,  
because every newborn child is pure and does not know sin. So the  
powers of purity are a kind of seal against misfortune. On the spot
where a contaminated weapon has been buried it is usual to plant a  
tree, so that if the curse strikes, it will destroy the tree and not  
spread to anything else.(3/4)

Siberians respect children, and will talk freely about any subject in  
front of them, without creating an air of mystery or prohibition. (4)

According to the rules of criminal behavior, Siberian men cannot  
communicate with policemen. It is forbidden to address them, answer  
their questions or establish any relationship with them. The criminal  
must behave as if the police were not there, and use the mediation of  
a female relative, or friend of the family, provided she is of  
Siberian origin. The criminal tells the woman what he wants to say to  
the policeman in the criminal language, and she repeats his words in  
Russian, even though the policeman can hear what he says perfectly  
well, since he is standing there in front of him. Then, when the  
policeman replies, the woman turns round and translates his words into  
the criminal
language. The criminal must not look the policeman in the face, and if  
he refers to him in the course of his speech he must use derogatory  
words like 'filth', 'dog', 'rabbit', 'rat', 'bastard', 'abortion',  
etc. (5)

That evening the oldest person in the room was my grandfather, so  
according to the rules of criminal behavior the right to communicate  
was his; the others had to keep silent, and if they wanted to say  
anything they would have to ask his permission. (5)

Is it part of Siberian criminal custom that juveniles can communicate  
with the police? (36)

Can you confirm that according to Siberian custom: "When someone is  
ill, and especially when he is suffering extreme pain, they put an  
open pike under his mattress, with the blade sticking out, so that,  
according to the beliefs, the blade cuts the pain and absorbs it like  
a sponge." And that: "When an enemy is struck by that blade, the pain  
collected inside it flows out into the wound, making him suffer even  
more."

Can you confirm that in Siberian criminal circles: a 'chat' involves  
the males of the family sitting together drinking and eating all night  
long to the point of exhaustion, till they collapse in a heap, one  
after another. When the males are having a chat, no one disturbs them;  
everyone goes about their own business, pretending the meeting doesn't  
exist. (9)

Can you confirm the following Siberian criminal custom: "To seal  
important pacts between two people -- truces, friendships or  
brotherhoods -- both criminals cut their hands with the same pike,  
which is then kept by a third person, who is a kind of witness to  
their pact: if either of them betrays the agreement he will be killed  
with that knife."

Can you confirm that according to Siberian criminal beliefs: "A pike  
keeps its powers only if it is in the hands of a Siberian criminal who  
uses it respecting the rules of the criminal community. If an unworthy  
person takes possession of a knife that does not belong to him, it  
will bring him bad luck ? hence our idiom, ?to ruin something as a  
pike ruins a bad master?."

Can you confirm that according to Siberian criminal tradition: "The  
umbilical cord of newborn babies is cut with a pike [knife], which  
must first have been left open overnight in a place where cats sleep."

Can you confirm the following Siberian criminal tradition: "When a  
criminal dies, his pike is broken by one of his friends. One part, the  
blade, is put in his grave, usually under the dead man's head, while  
the haft is preserved by his closest relatives. When it is necessary  
to communicate with the dead man, to ask for advice or a miracle, the  
relatives take out the haft and put it in the red corner, below the  
icons. In this way the dead man becomes a kind of bridge between the  
living and God."

Can you confirm the following Siberian criminal belief: "When a  
criminal is in danger, his pike can warn him in many ways: the blade  
may suddenly open of its own accord, or become hot, or vibrate. Some  
think it can even emit a whistle."

Can you confirm that in Siberian criminal families: "When [a boy] is  
about ten years old, a boy can become a full member of the clan of the  
youths, which actively cooperates with the criminals of the Siberian  
community."

Can you confirm that according to Siberian criminal tradition: "If a  
pike is broken, it means that somewhere there is a dead person who  
cannot find peace, so offerings are made to the icon, or dead  
relatives and friends are remembered in prayers, visits are made to  
graveyards, and the dead are remembered by talking about them in the  
family and telling stories about them, especially to children."

Can you confirm the existence of a neighborhood called Low River in  
Bender, Transnistria? (6, 8)

Is there a sect of the Russian Orthodox church called the "Siberian  
Orthodox Mother Church"? (6)

Is the following a usual greeting amongst Siberian criminals: ?As he  
did so he kissed them on the cheeks and gave the typical Siberian  
greeting: 'Peace and health to all brothers and honest men!? They gave  
the reply that is prescribed by tradition: 'Death and damnation to all  
cops and informers!"' (7)

Can you confirm that in: 'In the Siberian community you learn to kill  
when you're very small. Our philosophy of life has a close relation to  
death; children are taught that taking someone else's life or dying  
are perfectly acceptable things, if there is a good reason. (8)

Can you confirm that: 'From a very early age children are shown by  
their fathers how animals are killed in the yard? (9)

It is the custom among Siberians that the first people who go to visit  
a newly released prisoner should take children with them?

Is the following a Russian idiom: He was 'hewn with the same axe' as me"?

Is it accurate to say that "by age thirteen or fourteen, Siberian boys  
often have a criminal record, and therefore some experience of  
juvenile prison"?

"By that age [thirteen or fourteen] many Siberians have some  
black-market experience and one murder, or at least attempted murder,  
to their name."

"The Ukrainians of the Balka district, on the other hand, dressed in  
the American style, or more often like African-Americans."

"'Our ancestors took refuge in the woods, in Siberia - they didn't go  
to America.'"

Is it accurate to say that the quilted fufaika (jacket/coat) was worn  
by half the population in the days of the USSR because it was given to  
workers. (31)

Does the tulup (sheepskin coat) have an enormous fur collar that you  
can pull right up to your eyes to protect yourself against the  
harshest cold? (31)

Is it Siberian tradition to wear a belt? Is the belt connected with  
the tradition of the hunters, for whom it was much more than a lucky  
charm: it was a request for help. If a hunter got lost in the woods,  
or had an accident, he would tie his belt round the neck of his dog  
and send it home. When the others saw the dog return, they would know  
he was in trouble. (31)

Is it custom amongst Siberian criminals to wear a hat known as 'eight  
triangles',' which consists of 'eight triangular segments of cloth  
sewn together to form a domed cap with a button on top and a short  
peak'?

In Transnistria, Moldova, could the following be sentences passed down  
by a judge: threats in a public place, attempted murder with serious  
consequences, and resistance to a representative of power in the  
pursuance of his duties of defending the public order? Do these  
sentences seem to comply with Moldovan judicial sentences during the  
early nineties? (32)

In Moldova, in the early nineties, could a sentence for a juvenile  
offender include: staying at home from eight in the evening till eight  
in the morning, reporting to the juvenile office ever week, and  
attending school? (32)

Is there a second-hand market in Tiraspol in which one could exchange  
stamps? (33)

Is there a park on the outskirts of Tiraspol that is referred to as  
the Polygon? (34)

Has it been reported that in Moldova police often try to crush the  
hands of young offenders as a 'preventative measure' to give irregular  
features which usually heal badly so that the offenders would never be  
able to close their fist or tightly hold a weapon? (37)

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