Leonid Panteleev (real surname Pantelkin, changed by him for the sake of conspiracy) was born in 1902 in the city of Tikhvin, now Leningrad Oblast. He finished primary school and professional courses, where he obtained a prestigious profession at the time of a printer - typesetter, then worked at the printing house of the newspaper "Kopeyka". In 1919, Panteleev, not yet of conscription age, voluntarily joined the ranks of the Red Army and was sent to the Narva front. It is reliably known that he took direct part in battles against Yudenich’s army and the White Estonians, rising to the position of a machine gun platoon commander.

In the spring of 1921, the five-million-strong Red Army, victorious in the civil war, was sharply reduced. Thousands of demobilized Red Army soldiers scattered across the country, and each had to arrange their own fate. What Panteleev did after demobilization was not exactly known. Only recently were rumors confirmed – indeed, at that time he served in the organs of the Cheka! It took quite some time to document this fact. Only recently was Panteleev’s personal file found in the FSB archives.

The text of the archival reference is brief but informative: "Materials of the operational funds department... - personal file No. 119135 on Pantelkin Leonid Ivanovich, born in 1902, native of the city of Tikhvin, former Novgorod province. As can be seen from the materials of this file, Pantelkin L.I. on July 11, 1921, was accepted as an investigator in the military control unit of the road-transport Extraordinary Commission (Cheka RTC) of the united Northwestern Railways. On October 15, 1921, he was transferred to the position of agent-controller in the RTC department in the city of Pskov, and in January 1922 was dismissed due to staff reduction. The order number and exact date of dismissal are not specified."

In general, it is clear why these facts were not widely publicized. A Chekist turned bandit is ideal ground for various speculations. Moreover, the reason for Panteleev’s dismissal from the Cheka remains unclear. There are many versions. The most common is that he was corrupt, caught red-handed, etc. Perhaps he had a bad relationship with the leadership. Another possibility is that Panteleev held radical party positions – leftists – and was negatively disposed toward the New Economic Policy, which caused his dismissal.

One way or another, at the beginning of 1922, Panteleev found himself in Petrograd, formed a small gang, and began robbing. The gang’s composition was quite motley. It included Panteleev’s colleague from the Pskov Cheka, Varshulevich, Gavrikov, who during the civil war was a battalion commissar and a member of the RCP(b), as well as professional criminals like Alexander Reintop (nickname Sashka-pan) and Mikhail Lisenkov (nickname Mishka-Koryavy).

The first serious action of Panteleev’s group was a raid on the apartment of the famous Petrograd furrier Bogachov. On March 4, 1922, at three in the afternoon, when the owners were not home, three raiders with revolvers burst into the apartment, tied up the servants. Having broken open cabinets and drawers, the bandits took valuables found in the house and calmly left through the back door. Exactly two weeks later, Panteleev’s gang robbed the apartment of Dr. Grilikhes, who had a private practice. The raiders’ modus operandi was the same – broad daylight, disguised as patients, they entered the apartment, robbed the owner, and disappeared.

In the spring of 1922, the whole of Petrograd was talking about Panteleev’s gang. The thing was, when making raids, Lenka first fired into the air, then always named himself. This was a psychological tactic – the bandits created an aura of authority and at the same time suppressed the will of their victims, their ability to resist. Moreover, the raiders only targeted wealthy NEPmen, not touching ordinary citizens. Furthermore, Panteleev personally gave small sums of money to some sympathetic ragged people and homeless children, earning himself the reputation of the "Petrograd Robin Hood".

The militia seriously took up the daring gang. On June 12, on Zagorodny Prospect, a criminal investigation officer recognized Lenka by description and tried to detain him. A shootout broke out, patrol policemen joined the chase. But Panteleev escaped through side yards, shooting one of the patrolmen. The fact that the militia was on the gang’s tail did not bother its leader at all. On June 26, the gang robbed the apartment of Dr. Levin. This time the raiders were dressed in Baltic sailors’ uniforms.

Then Panteleev bought a leather jacket and a cap at a flea market and began posing as a GPU officer. Using forged orders, the gang conducted searches and requisitioned valuables from NEPmen Anikeev and Ishchens. In August, the bandits stopped a horse-drawn carriage on Mars Field and robbed three passengers – taking money, watches, and gold rings. A few days later, a similar robbery was committed near the "Splendid Palace" nightclub.

On September 1, the raiders decided to rob the shoe store "Kozhtrest," located at the corner of Nevsky Prospect and Zhelyabov Street. But there they were already waiting in ambush. The bandits put up fierce resistance during the arrest, opening fire from revolvers. The shootout soon turned into a hand-to-hand fight. Panteleev was subdued only after being stunned. During the shootout in the store hall, Bardzai, assistant of the 3rd police department, was killed.

Under heavy guard, the raiders were taken to the 1st correctional facility – now the Kresty pre-trial detention center. The investigation progressed quickly, and by October the accused Leonid Panteleev, Nikolai Gavrikov, Mikhail Lisenkov, and Alexander Reintop appeared before the court.

On the defendant’s bench, Panteleev behaved confidently and even brazenly. He peppered his speech with criminal slang, cursed, recited Sergei Yesenin’s poems by heart, tried to sing obscene songs, and even managed to start a "platonic" romance with his lawyer’s fiancée, who regularly attended the trial. In general, he made the most favorable impression on the public.

To the prosecutor’s questions, Lenka answered defiantly and finally declared: "Gentlemen judges, what’s all this circus for? I’ll escape soon anyway." And indeed, on the night of November 10 to 11, Leonid Panteleev, with three accomplices, escaped from the heavily guarded Kresty prison.

Escaping from prison has always been difficult. Especially from Kresty.

The famous Petersburg prison was built in 1893, near the Finland Station. Its name, initially unofficial, came from the fact that two prison buildings were constructed in the form of crosses of equal length. The prison buildings were surrounded by a powerful six-meter fence wrapped with barbed wire. Watchtowers with spotlights (a technical innovation at the time) and guards were installed at the corners of the perimeter. The sentries in the towers were armed with Colt or Lewis machine guns. All this reliably prevented escapes.

Panteleev was held in cell No. 196, located on the second floor of the investigative building. His accomplices were nearby. Lisenkov in the neighboring cell 195, Reintop in 191, and a bit further Gavrikov in cell 185.

The prison telegraph immediately started working. Panteleev managed to contact his colleagues in the criminal business. Reintop, who was part of the prison service, also decided to escape. He managed to establish "business relations" with the guard of the fourth gallery, Ivan Kondratyev. He had long had contacts with the Petrograd criminal world and agreed to help the gang escape.

Kondratyev pointed out a weak spot on the outer wall. Near the bathhouse adjoining Komsomol Street, a pile of firewood was stacked against the wall. Winter was approaching, and the prison was still heated by stoves. The top of the stacked firewood almost reached the upper level of the wall. But jumping down from such a height was dangerous. Therefore, Lisenkov, unnoticed by the guards, began braiding ropes from blankets and sheets, which could be used to descend from the high wall to the ground.

The initial escape was planned for November 7. But something went wrong that day. The next attempt was made on the night of November 10 to 11. Guard Kondratyev released Lisenkov, Reintop, Panteleev, and Gavrikov from their cells and turned off the lights in the gallery. Moreover, he managed to cut power to the entire building.

A reasonable question arises – why, after the lights went out, did the guards not declare a general alarm? The answer is simple – at that time, city substations were operating at the limit of technical wear, and power outages in the prison were common. The Kresty guards did not react to the usual "accident."

In the dark, the four bandits and Kondratyev moved toward the main post. There they unexpectedly ran into the chief guard of the 4th gallery, Vasilyev. He struck a match, recognized Kondratyev, and said:

"What are you doing, Ivan, wandering here in the dark? Are you drunk? You almost knocked me down. And who are these rascals with you?"

Vasilyev did not have time to say more. Panteleev and Reintop jumped on him and strangled him with a laundry rope. Kondratyev was stunned and tied up with another rope for appearance. Lenka put on the uniform greatcoat of the killed guard, donned the cap, stuffed a Nagant revolver into the holster, and began to impersonate a convoy officer. The whole group managed to calmly leave the building. They exited through a side passage used to take prisoners to the bathhouse. On regular days, there was no watch there. The keys to the doors were taken from Kondratyev. Everything went smoothly from there. The raiders ran across the narrow prison yard, climbed the pile of firewood, cut through the barbed wire with special scissors, then unrolled the prepared ropes, secured them, and descended to freedom. In the nearest alley, a getaway car with a covered top was already waiting. The guard in the tower noticed nothing; it was raining heavily with snow, and the spotlight shone in the opposite direction.

Panteleev decided to celebrate his successful escape at the fashionable restaurant "Donon." At that time, it was a notorious place known throughout Petrograd. Raiders, robbers, various shady characters, as well as wealthy merchants and representatives of the new NEP elite regularly gathered there.

On December 9, 1922 (four weeks after the escape!), Panteleev showed up at "Donon" with his right-hand man Gavrikov and another bandit, Varshulevich. Lenka dressed up for the occasion in a new officer’s frock coat and polished his boots to a shine.

At first, everything went well. But Panteleev drank too much cognac and got into a fight with some NEPmen company. To prevent a brawl, the maître d’ called the militia. Seeing patrolmen in the restaurant hall, Panteleev pulled out a Mauser.

The well-known TV series "Born by the Revolution" claims that Panteleev was shot dead in the "Donon" restaurant hall. But this is a creative fiction of the director and screenwriter. In reality, events unfolded differently. In the ensuing shootout, Varshulevich was killed. Panteleev and Gavrikov ran out the back door and scattered. Gavrikov was detained on Nevsky Prospect by a mounted militia patrol. Soon he was executed.

Panteleev was luckier. Wounded in the arm, he escaped the fight. He ran along the Moyka embankment to the Pavlovsky barracks, then moved toward Liteyny Prospect. Agents of the criminal investigation with a service dog arrived at the scene. The dog led the investigators to Mars Field, where the fugitive’s trail ended. The agents walked randomly along Panteleymonovskaya Street, passed the church, and... did not notice Panteleev lying there. The raider lay on the stone floor of the church all night and in the morning hid in one of his "dens."

The shootout in the restaurant caused a lot of noise. Rumors about Panteleev’s elusiveness and extraordinary "luck" spread again throughout the city. After the shootout at "Donon," Panteleev became twice as cautious and careful. He had a new plan. He decided to leave Petrograd and break through to Estonia. The border crossing was planned near Pskov – these places were well known to Lenka from his service in the Red Army. But the raider decided not to leave empty-handed – he needed money and valuables.

Panteleev quickly formed a new gang, which was especially active for three months, leaving bloody traces behind. The raiders split into pairs, lived in different apartments, uniting only during robberies. Then everyone scattered and went underground. Later, the militia calculated that Lenka had more than thirty reliable hideouts in different parts of the city. The new tactic paid off. The militia lost sight of Panteleev. It is believed that in the last three months, the gang committed 10 murders, 15 raids, and 20 street robberies. But these are approximate figures; no one knows the exact statistics. The "Panteleevites" used weapons without warning.

The bloodiest raid was on the apartment of engineer Romanchenko. Bursting into the hallway, the bandits killed the owner and his wife with knives, and shot dead a dog that rushed at them at point-blank range.

Once Panteleev felt he was being followed. A young sailor had been tailing him for two blocks without turning anywhere. Lenka turned the corner, pulled out a Mauser, and when the "tail" appeared, fired the entire magazine at him. But he was mistaken – the sailor was not from the criminal investigation but was simply going home on leave.

The next day, Panteleev shot a real "ugro" (criminal investigation) officer who had followed him on the street. Panic gripped the city. After dark, people were afraid to go out. Locksmith workshops were overwhelmed with orders for various ingenious locks and chains. All robberies, assaults, and murders in the city were attributed by rumor to Panteleev.

The raiders several times engaged in shootouts with mounted militia patrols, "ugro" agents, and patrolmen and successfully escaped.

To help the criminal investigation eliminate the dangerous gang, the GPU got involved. Several special strike groups were created, including experienced Chekists. They reanalyzed Panteleev’s connections. Twenty ambushes were set up in places where he might appear. One of Panteleev’s "dens" was in house No. 38 on Mozhayskaya Street. Late in the evening of February 12, two unknown persons entered this apartment with their own key. In the ambush were four Red Army soldiers of the GPU special regiment and the group leader, young Chekist Ivan Busko. Everyone was somewhat confused by the surprise. The more experienced Panteleev was the first to recover. He stepped forward sharply and said firmly:

"What’s the matter, comrades, who are you expecting here?" At the same time, he tried to pull a pistol from his pocket. However, the trigger caught on his clothes, and an involuntary shot rang out. The ambush opened fire. Panteleev fell dead on the floor with a bullet wound to the head. Lisenkov, wounded in the neck, tried to escape but was detained.

One of the Red Army soldiers ran to the nearest police station and called the operational group by phone. It arrived very quickly. GPU officers saw the following scene – a huge pool of blood in the corridor, the entire floor in the apartment was stained with it. In the kitchen, right by the entrance, lay a corpse with its head toward the window. In the room, a young man sat on a chair, swaying from side to side, bandaged. He was guarded by two Red Army soldiers with rifles.

One of the operatives sat at the table and began writing the protocol of the crime scene inspection and the corpse identification act:

"February 13, 1923.

We, the undersigned UR officers, having arrived at house No. 38, apt. 21 on Mozhayskaya Street, examined the corpse of the person killed in the ambush, and by all available signs identified... The deceased’s height is approximately 176 cm, hair dyed, thick neck. On the left side, above the eye on the head of the corpse, there is a scar covering the bullet’s passage. The facial features clearly prove the original photographic image of the famous bandit-recidivist Leonid Panteleev. ...In the corpse’s pockets were found: a Spanish Browning and a Mauser, a new black wallet containing 2600 rubles, documents in the name of Ivanov: a work book and an identity card, two yellow metal chains, a medal with the inscription 'For Zeal,' a yellow metal bracelet, a ring with two white and one red stone, a ring with a lady’s portrait, a yellow metal ring with a blue stone."

The next morning, a small note appeared in Petrograd newspapers: "On the night of February 12 to 13, a strike group against banditry at the provincial GPU department, with the participation of the criminal investigation, after a long search, caught the famous bandit, who recently became notorious for his brutal murders and raids, Leonid Pantelkin, nicknamed 'Lenka Panteleev.' During the arrest, Lenka offered desperate armed resistance, during which he was KILLED."

On March 6, 1923, by the verdict of the GPU collegium, the other nine gang members were executed. But rumors stubbornly circulated in Petrograd that Lenka was alive and would show himself again. Several times during raids, unknown bandits called themselves Panteleev, Lisenkov, or Gavrikov. Then the authorities took extraordinary measures. Panteleev’s body was skillfully "restored" and put on public display in the morgue of Obukhov Hospital. Thousands of Petrograd residents came to see the legendary raider. Only after that did the rumor curve sharply decline.

The fate of the young Chekist Ivan Busko, who shot Lenka in the ambush on Mozhayskaya Street, was also strange. Instead of receiving a deserved reward and promotion, Busko was demoted and transferred to Sakhalin Island as assistant chief of a border outpost. He stayed there until June 1941. During the Great Patriotic War, Busko served in SMERSH, retired from the organs with the modest rank of lieutenant colonel, and returned to Leningrad only in 1956. He lived very modestly, categorically refusing to communicate with journalists or make any public appearances. Busko died in 1994, in complete obscurity. A similar fate befell Kondratyev – head of the special operational group of the Petrograd GPU hunting Panteleev’s gang. By the way, his biography served as the basis for the screenplay of the film "Born by the Revolution," with one significant correction – after the Panteleev "case," he also began to be persecuted at work.

Kondratyev was transferred from Leningrad to Petrozavodsk (not to Moscow), where he headed the local criminal investigation for a long time and lived after retirement. Later, his wife claimed that Lenka Panteleev came to their home several times in spring-summer 1922 and had some conversations with her husband – the Chekist who led his search!

Another mystery is the fate of the other four Chekists who were part of the special group: Sushenkov, Shershevsky, Davydov, and Dmitriev. They caught the legendary raider, their signatures appear under the protocol of the inspection of Panteleev’s dead body. All of them were soon dismissed from the "organs" under various pretexts, and their names are not even mentioned in serious historical and scientific literature, including such a solid publication as "Chekists of Petrograd."

Another interesting fact: in the early 1920s, many gangs operated in Petrograd. But the most popular, among all the city’s "Red newspapers," depicted the exploits of only one gang – Panteleev’s – issue after issue. The party newspaper could only do this on instructions from above – in other words, the city’s Petrograd leadership was actively "promoting" Lenka, for some reason making him a criminal "star."

At that time, Zinoviev led Petrograd, who very much wanted to prove to Lenin the error of the NEP and predicted great popular unrest. Perhaps it was beneficial for him to plunge the city into fear of crime and thus provoke popular unrest. He almost succeeded. There were even rumors that Lenka, having completed a special government assignment to eliminate certain NEPmen, returned to service in the organs. It was said that he was seen several times in the corridors of the Big House, in the uniform of a GPU officer.

Lenka’s head, preserved in alcohol, was sent to the forensic criminology classroom. According to Tatiana Konstantinova, an employee of the Police Museum, published in "Police News" No. 9 in 2001, the further story of Lenka Panteleev’s head was as follows. The bandit’s preserved head was exhibited in the Forensic Museum, located on Palace Square. Citizens came to see it as a local attraction. After the museum moved to Voinova Street, 26, public access was closed, and only law enforcement officers could admire Panteleev’s head. This continued until the 1960s, when the authorities unexpectedly decided to liquidate the museum as unnecessary. Since then, Lenka Panteleev’s head was considered lost, and it was forgotten for many years. But in 1977, the Police Museum was established in Leningrad, and its first visitors became interested in this exhibit, especially since many veterans of the Internal Affairs Department had seen it before. Museum staff turned to the former head of the 3rd department of the NTO, Boris Serebryakov, for clarification. He said that all exhibits of the Forensic Museum after its liquidation were dumped into the basement, and the jar with Panteleev’s head was placed in a storeroom. The place was a passageway, and many female employees of the department were afraid of the terrible face of the bandit, gloomily gazing at them from his jar. Once, the jar fell to the floor, broke, and the dead head rolled under the feet of a woman who was scared to death. Fortunately, nothing happened to the specimen – after that, the head was coated with wax and put away. Some time later, according to Boris Serebryakov, it was drowned in the Neva River to avoid further misunderstandings. That seemed to be the end of the story, but it was not.

As it turned out later, not only the Police Museum staff but also other interested persons, including Viktor Bovykine, a correspondent for the newspaper "Petersburg-Express," searched for Lenka Panteleev’s head. For five whole years, he collected information about the fate of Panteleev’s head in various city institutions and eventually turned to the Police Museum. Bovykine was firmly convinced that the head was intact, only its location was unknown. Tatiana Konstantinova decided to join the search. They carefully studied all available documents about the bandit Panteleev, raised other materials – nothing. Only after thoroughly questioning NTO veterans did they learn that Boris Serebryakov lied about drowning the head in the Neva. In fact, he handed it over "for research" to Professor Petrov, a student of the famous sculptor Gerasimov, who developed a method of facial reconstruction from a preserved human skull. And to avoid bothering the busy professor with unnecessary questions, Serebryakov told the lie.

So, something became clear. But where to look for this exotic anatomical specimen? Professor Petrov had already died by that time. They tried searching at the forensic medicine department of the Military Medical Academy, but no one there had heard of it. They asked in several other places – also useless. Finally, NTO veterans advised contacting the late professor’s son – Associate Professor Vadim Vadimovich Petrov of the Forensic Department of the Law Faculty of St. Petersburg State University. He promised to help and, after carefully studying his father’s records, announced that the sought head was stored precisely at his department!

The discovery of Lenka Panteleev’s head became a real sensation in Petersburg, causing a lot of responses in the press and on television.

Sources:

https://www.tonnel.ru/?l=gzl&uid=492

https://pantv.livejournal.com/744657.html

https://diletant.media/articles/43964156/

https://moscow-piter.mirtesen.ru/blog/43289533100/Naletchik-Lenka-Panteleev-byil-chekistom

https://kohama-natalia.livejournal.com/34077.html