Sometimes it seems that cruel stories sink in like water turning to sand. And they stay there until someone accidentally steps on a thin spot, and all hell breaks loose. In Barnaul, this sensitive place turns out to be an old story almost forgotten in the late 1980s – the case of a missing 17-year-old girl. Then no one could have imagined that a small autopsy performed 20 years later would suddenly open the door to a long corridor of 11 murders. The hallway in which the stairs belong belongs to one person – Vitaly Manishin.
Now it sounds almost unbelievable: a man who worked as a veterinarian, then a businessman, and then an official responsible for housing, public services and construction, lived for many years next to ordinary people. They know him by his last name, he appears in the press, tells journalists about pipelines, roads, tariffs. He got married, divorced, got married again, raised children, went to work, drove his white “six”. And all this time, according to investigators, that dark nature was still growing inside him, something that no one had suspected for a long time.
Vitaly Manishin was born on November 10, 1971 in the village of Zelenaya Dubrava, Altai Territory. Rural atmosphere, school, simple relationships – at least that's what the documents say. After school, he entered Altai State Agricultural University and received a degree as a veterinarian. Overall, the profile seems self-explanatory and shouldn't raise any alarms. He even worked in his profession for a while – he treated animals and did housework. Then he tried his hand at business: it was the 1990s – a time when many people were looking for something of their own but couldn't find it.
In the early 2000s, his biography took an unexpected turn: he went to work for the government. First, he headed the village council in the Shadrinsky district, then became deputy head of the Kalmansky district. He is trusted in the housing, communal services and construction sectors – sectors where you need to be specific, thoughtful and able to talk to people. His characteristics are disciplined, competent, calm. Income is moderate. Characteristics are smooth. Family – first, then others. People in everyday life describe him as “balanced in appearance.” He is the person that people often say: “Yeah, he's normal, quiet, seems just right…”
But investigators would later say that in parallel with this normalcy, Manishin developed a completely different life. And it started not in the 2000s but in 1989.
The first victim was Lyudmila Obidina, 17 years old. Summer, Green Dubrava village. Manishin was then about 19 years old. He met a girl at the bus stop, and in the evening he went with her to the forest. According to investigators, he tried to rape her. The girl resisted and was strangled by him. He carried the body away on horseback and buried it.
A year later, the remains were found. Manishin was interviewed – he said they “went in different directions”. There is no doubt at all. This is a case where the real story is hidden in plain sight – in fact, too well hidden.
Then there was a long period of silence. More precisely, his biography has a straight line: study, work, family. But investigation many years later would say that this was not a pause but a “closed” period that few people knew about. Officially recorded crimes only began 10 years later – in 1999.
Summer 1999 – Choduraa Oorzhak, a 21-year-old applicant for Altai State Technical University (AltSTU), disappeared. She came from Tuva to apply. I left university and disappeared. The body was found only a year later, in a ravine in the Kalman region.
Then, Svetlana Filipchenko, 27 years old, from Novosibirsk, disappeared without a trace. According to Manishin's confession in 2023, he met her in the center of Barnaul, offered to “help find a job”, took her to a secluded place, raped and strangled her.
In August 1999, 25-year-old Natalya Berdysheva disappeared. She applied for a job at a co-op technical school. She was seen near Altai State Technical University, then – silence. The body was found a month later.
And it was only in 2000 that it became clear that something was going terribly, simply abnormally wrong in Barnaul.
The summer of 2000 entered the region's criminal history as a series of mass disappearances of female candidates and students. The girls disappeared in front of hundreds of people, right from the polytechnic campus. At first, it looks like a series of separate, albeit incomprehensible, episodes. But then it turned out that they were united by a man on a white VAZ-2106, who came to the university almost every day.
On June 29, 16-year-old Yulia Tekhtiekova disappeared. Her father drove her to the main building of Altai State Technical University – she went inside to learn about admission and disappeared. The body was found near the Barnaul-Rubtsovsk highway.
On July 12, 17-year-old Elena Anisimova disappeared – her remains were found in a ravine three months later.
On July 14, 53-year-old Valentina Mikhailyukova disappeared. She came to help her daughter get into college. Manishin promised to resolve the issue “for a fee.” The woman gave him 9,000 rubles. She was found murdered next to the remains of two other girls.
On July 28, 16-year-old Liliana Voznyuk disappeared – the head was discovered in 2001 near Novoromanovo, the body was found only in 2023 after Manishin's instructions.
On August 1, 17-year-old Olga Shmkova disappeared. The body was found later – in the woods.
On August 8, 17-year-old Angela Burdakova disappeared. She signed the training documents, walked into the hallway – and disappeared. The body was found on October 1 at the 42nd kilometer of the Barnaul-Rubtsovsk highway.
On August 15, 17-year-old Ksenia Kirgizova, who entered Altai State Technical University, disappeared. His father, a famous businessman, joined the search. Manishin met her at the “frying pan” – a circular square near the university building. He promised to “help with translation” and convinced me to “go see the problem solver.” The body was found in October.
This series of disappearances lasted less than two months but hit the city like an alarm bell. The streets became unsafe. The university was filled with rumors. Parents are afraid to let their daughters take the entrance exam.
Investigators later described how Manishin gained confidence with an almost professional coldness. He looked confident, dressed neatly and spoke calmly. I drove a white “six”, which stood out against the background of those years. He can discreetly approach a girl near Altai State Technical University and introduce himself as someone with connections in the admissions office. Say it “might help.” Sometimes he offers to work at the university. And the girls voluntarily got in the car.
According to investigators, everything after that followed the same pattern. He took the victim to the Kalmansky district – the forest belt near Buranovo had become an almost permanent place. Here, he raped and strangled her with a belt, hand or seat belt. In one episode, he was hit in the head by a fire extinguisher. He then hid the body, disguising it with tree branches.
In 8 episodes, investigators directly recorded acts of sexual violence. In all of them, the motive is recognized as sexual.
In 1999-2000, the case was investigated on a large scale: 35 thousand people were examined, more than 70 sketches were compiled. But in September 2000, a completely different person was detained – Alexander Anisimov. He confessed. He then refused to testify. He soon died during an investigative experiment.
Then the investigation strangely paused: direction was changed, active search operations ceased. They practically stopped looking at real crime. During these years Manishin passed away as a witness. There were complaints about him, but those complaints resulted in no action. Perhaps the status of an official played a role, no matter how cynical it sounds now.
And everything happened by inertia: the years passed, the details multiplied, but no one tried to combine them into one investigation.
The turning point did not come until 2023. Investigators requested repeat DNA testing in the 1989 case – a similar case to Obidina. And the DNA matched Manishin. He was then detained. At first, he only admitted to one episode – his first time. Then he admitted to the 2000 murder. Then he started pointing out the burial sites.
The investigation identified 11 episodes. A huge amount of documents, 69 volumes, more than 70 trials – all this lasted almost two years.
On October 1, 2025, the Zheleznodorozhny District Court of Barnaul imposed a sentence: 25 years in prison. First seven years – prison, then – strict regime. They did not impose a life sentence: the statute of limitations had expired for some episodes, and the law, regardless of emotions, is still the law.
In his last words, Manishin said that he had repented. The judge asked: “Is the verdict clear?” He replied: “Yes.”
But even after this, questions remain. There are episodes from 1998-1999 that are very similar to his handwriting but there is not enough evidence. There are complaints that no one verifies. There has been a string of investigative mistakes since 2000, when people built a yardstick based on one person's confession, then stopped looking the other way. There were girls who were never found in the first months, even though they could have been found.
And there is a strange, scary thought: all this has lasted more than 10 years right under the nose of a huge city. A man who goes to work every day, is in charge of housing and communal services, talks about watering roads and sewers, goes to meet journalists, and at the same time takes girls into the forest and kills them.
This was so difficult to accept that many people following the incident thought at one point: “No, that didn't happen.” But it happens. Sometimes the quietest people are the ones who leave the longest shadows behind them. Scary shadows. Damned…
