- Russian graverobber who turned stolen corpses of young girls into mummies.
- Highly educated professor with Ph.D., fluent in 13 languages, and a specialist on local cemeteries.
- Blamed his macabre hobby for parents taking him for walks in graveyards.
Anatoly Moskvin exclusively “worked” with women and girls. Over the timespan of 10 years, the graverobber turned some of the bodies into mummies, others were reburied near his house again.
The city of Nizhny Novgorod saw a rapid increase of vandalism in cemeteries. In the autumn of 2011, the authorities asked Moskvin, who was not considered a suspect, for assistance to solve the mystery. The highly educated local professor, able to communicate in 13 languages, had a Ph.D. in Celtic studies and was a specialist on local cemeteries. Hence, the reason authorities asked for his help.
When police gave a visit to Moskvin, they quickly realized the man is not their expert but the perpetrator. Inside the home, they saw 29 mummified corpses whom the professor communicated with as human beings.
The "mad scientist" wasn’t motivated by any twisted sexual desires when turning dead children into mummies, in fact, he loathed sex and thought it was disgusting, but was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia. The various explanations for his wrongdoings included:
"I was waiting for science to find ways for these girls to live again."
"I wanted to be an expert in making mummies."
"I listened to what they said. Often they asked me to take them out for a walk."
He admitted the crime of digging up the graves, but the mental health evaluation found him to be unfit to stand trial and incarcerated the man to a psychiatric hospital instead.
At the court hearing, he accused the parents of his victims: "You abandoned your girls in the cold – and I brought them home and warmed them up."
Surprisingly, the parents of Anatoly Moskvin weren't aware of their son's macabre hobby, with whom they lived together with. No smell, or nothing suspicious about all these "dolls".
Allegedly Moskvin was raped as a child and forced as a young boy to kiss the face of a dead 11-year-old girl at her funeral. He wanted to adopt a girl but was refused – since he’s unmarried. He also blamed his parents for taking him for walks in graveyards.
