Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs and their Chilling True Story (2024)

The fascination with true crime content taps into a fundamental human morbid kuriosity—the desire to experience, albeit secondhand, the darkest actions committed by individuals. This intrigue has fueled a vast array of media, including podcasts, YouTube channels, and specialized websites, all devoted to exploring the most harrowing murder cases and bone-chilling kidnappings for an audience that is seemingly insatiable. Prominently positioned within the accounts of such true crime stories is the series of murders executed in Ukraine during the months of June and July 2007. The culprits, Viktor Sayenko and Igor Suprunyuk, subsequently dubbed the Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs, distinguished their heinous acts with not just unparalleled brutality but also their proclivity for recording these atrocities.

This perverse documentation culminated in one of the videos leaking onto the internet, marking a ghastly milestone in the digital dissemination of criminal acts. Known as Three Men One Hammer, it is one of those videos that went ‘viral’ before going viral was a thing. In a span of merely three weeks, Sayenko and Suprunyuk, both nineteen at the time, were responsible for the merciless killing of twenty-one individuals, encompassing men, women, and children. Their spree cast a pall of fear and horror over the Ukrainian city of Dnipro and its neighboring regions, engulfing the community in a brief yet profoundly violent episode of terror.

The Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs: Two Teenagers?

In their adolescent years, Viktor Sayenko and Igor Suprunyuk were plagued by common fears: dread of heights and apprehension about being bullied. Determined to confront these fears directly, they embarked on a perilous exercise, suspending themselves from the railings of their apartment building, stories high. This unconventional method of facing their anxieties proved effective for them, leading them to adopt a similarly direct approach to help their friend, Alexander Hanzha, overcome his fear of blood. This led them down a dark path of torturing and killing stray animals, a period during which they began to document their heinous acts on film, marking the beginning of a grim fixation.

Following their school years, the trio found themselves in a transient phase, moving between various jobs. Suprunyuk found a niche operating his car as an unlicensed taxi, a venture that soon turned sinister as they used it as a means to abduct and rob passengers. This period marked a pivotal point in their descent into criminality. Eventually, Hanzha distanced himself from Sayenko and Suprunyuk, who were now spiraling towards a more violent and irrevocable path. Left to their own devices, Sayenko and Suprunyuk’s actions escalated from cruel to lethal, setting the stage for a series of events that would etch their names in true crime genre as harbingers of terror.

What Did the Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs Do?

On the evening of June 25, 2007, a tragic sequence of events unfolded, commencing with the loss of a 33-year-old woman named Yekaterina Ilchenko. She was making her way home after visiting a friend’s apartment. During their purported evening stroll, Sayenko and Suprunyuk encountered Ilchenko. In an unexpected and violent act, Suprunyuk utilized a hammer to inflict a fatal blow to her. The discovery of Ilchenko’s remains was made by her mother in the early hours, at approximately 5:00 a.m. Shortly after this initial act, the pair committed another atrocity, targeting Roman Tatarevich while he rested on a bench in the vicinity of the first incident. The attack on Tatarevich was so severe that it left him beyond recognition, with the location of this act being notably close to the local prosecutor’s office.

As the days progressed, the violence continued. On July 1, two individuals, Yevgenia Grischenko and Nikolai Serchuk, met their demise in Novomoskovsk, a town nearby. The night of July 6 witnessed the loss of three more lives in Dnipro. The initial victim of this night was Egor Nechvoloda, a young man returning home from a social outing, whose mother discovered his body the following morning. Subsequently, Yelena Shram, a 28-year-old security professional, was ambushed and attacked with a hammer, a scenario which culminated in further violence as she was struck multiple times. In a chilling detail, her attackers utilized the contents of her bag, which she had been carrying, to clean their instrument of attack before discarding the bag. The final known act of violence that night was against Valentina Hanzha, a mother supporting her family and a disabled spouse, marking a continuation of their indiscriminate and ruthless assaults.

The following day, July 7, a grievous attack took place near the town of Pidhorodne, where two 14-year-old boys, embarking on a fishing expedition, became the targets of an assault. Andrei Sidyuk lost his life in the encounter, while his companion, Vadim Lyakhov, survived by seeking refuge in the woodland. Subsequently, on July 12, a 48-year-old individual, Sergei Yatzenko, who had been contending with the aftermath of a cancer diagnosis, vanished while out on his Dnepr motorcycle. His remains, bearing the marks of a brutal attack, were discovered four days later, with the severity of the assault remaining evident despite the passage of time and the summer heat. Merely two days after this discovery, on July 14, Natalia Mamarchuk, aged 45, encountered a fatal attack while riding her scooter through a wooded area in the village of Diyovka. She was forcefully stopped and subsequently killed with a hammer or pipe, after which her assailants fled on her scooter. Although local residents attempted to pursue the attackers, they ultimately eluded capture.

In the days that followed, the series of heinous acts continued, with thirteen additional murders being recorded, often involving multiple victims within the same day. From July 14 to July 16, two victims were discovered daily. The selection of victims appeared arbitrary, with a notable vulnerability among the targets, including children, the elderly, homeless individuals, or those under the influence of alcohol. The primary method of murder involved blunt instruments such as hammers and steel construction bars, with a particularly vicious focus on the victims’ faces, rendering them unrecognizable. The brutality extended to mutilation and torture, with certain victims enduring the horror of having their eyes removed while still alive. A particularly distressing case involved a pregnant woman from whom the fetus was horrifically extracted. Despite the violence inflicted, there was no evidence of sexual assault on any of the victims. Some of the attacks also involved theft, with cellphones and valuables taken and later sold at second-hand shops, although in many instances, the victims’ personal items were left undisturbed.

It was not until the assault on the two boys in Pidhorodne on July 7 that authorities began to discern a connection among the series of brutal incidents. Following this attack, Vadim Lyakhov, who had managed to escape, was initially detained on suspicion of involvement in his friend’s demise. During his custody, he faced significant adversities, including being denied legal representation and subjected to physical coercion by the police. However, it soon became evident that Lyakhov was not culpable, as the incident was linked to the ongoing series of murders.

In an effort to assist the investigation, Lyakhov collaborated with law enforcement to produce sketches of the assailants. This effort was further supported by the testimony of two children who had unwittingly been eyewitnesses to the July 14 Mamarchuk attack from their concealed position in a tent, providing descriptions that aligned with Lyakhov’s account.

In response to the escalating situation, a specialized task force was dispatched from Kyiv, led by the esteemed criminal investigator Vasily Paskalov. The scale of the manhunt expanded rapidly, involving an extensive contingent of local law enforcement personnel, with reports indicating the involvement of over 2,000 investigators. The initial stages of the investigation were shrouded in secrecy, with no public disclosure of information regarding the murders. The local populace remained largely uninformed of the potential threat, with only rumors serving to deter individuals from venturing out at night.

As the investigation progressed, a strategic decision was made to disseminate sketches of the suspects and details of stolen items to pawn shops, particularly within the Novokodatskyi District of the city. This approach yielded results, with the stolen property being identified in several pawn shops, marking a significant advancement in the ongoing investigation. This meticulous and concerted effort exemplified the law enforcement’s dedication to unraveling the complexities of the case and bringing the perpetrators to justice.

Capture of the Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs

On July 23, 2007, three suspects—Alexander Hanzha, Igor Suprunyuk, and Viktor Sayenko—were taken into custody. In a nearby pawn shop, Suprunyuk tried to sell a stolen cellphone from a victim, requesting ₹150 (about $30 in US dollars) for it. When the proprietor of the shop turned the phone on to test its functionality, law enforcement officials monitored its whereabouts. Sayenko and Suprunyuk were taken into custody close to the store’s cash register. After allegedly succeeding in flushing down other pilfered cellphones and jewelry down the toilet, Hanzha was apprehended at home. The phones’ whole contents was gone, but the things were found. By the time they were 14 years old, the three suspects had become friends from the same school. Sayenko said during interrogation, “Me and Igor [Suprunyuk] were terrified of heights and we were afraid bullies would beat us up.”

The lads spent hours standing on their 14th-floor apartment balcony, leaning over the railing, as a result of Suprunyuk’s instruction to overcome their phobias. Their fear of heights is said to have improved as a result. Of the three, Hanzha was said to be the least squeamish. Because he was worried he would burn his cat, he even refused to give it a bath due to his blood fear. Suprunyuk proposed torturing stray dogs as a way to deal with the worries. In a forested area close to their home, the boys caught dogs, hung them from trees, disemboweled them, and snapped photos of the bodies next to them. Numerous of these juvenile-era images were submitted as evidence by the suspects to the prosecution. In certain pictures, the lads can be seen making Nazi salutes and drawing swastikas and other symbols with animal blood. Suprunyuk is seen in one picture with a toothbrush mustache that resembles Adolf Hitler’s mustache. Suprunyuk made reference to the fact that he was born on April 20, the same day as Adolf Hitler.

In court, a lengthy video of the three abusing a white kitten was played. At the age of seventeen, Suprunyuk assaulted a nearby youngster and took his bicycle, which he later sold to Sayenko. Due of their age, neither of them was placed in jail after their arrests. Hanzha worked a variety of odd jobs after high school, including pastry chef and construction laborer. He had been unemployed for a while before to his arrest. Sayenko worked as a security guard and attended a part-time metallurgy institute. Suprunyuk continued to drive his green Daewoo Lanos as an unregistered taxi cab, even though he was still unemployed legally. It is said that his parents gave him the car as a birthday present. A few months prior to the murderous rampage, Suprunyuk started picking up and robbing travelers with Sayenko and Hanzha’s assistance. The car that was utilized in the murders was frequently characterized as a green Daewoo with a checkerboard pattern similar to a taxicab. Some of the murder victims were picked up as passengers in the taxi, according to the confessions of the suspects. Hanzha allegedly took part in an attack where two guys were robbed, after which he refused to take part anymore.

The defendants’ wealthy, powerful parents had connections to the local law enforcement, according to reports in the local media. Suprunyuk’s father, Vladimir Suprunyuk, told Segodnya in an interview that he had worked as a test pilot at Yuzhmash, frequently flying with Leonid Kuchma, who would go on to become president of Ukraine, and continued to fly domestically for Kuchma even after Kuchma’s ascent to power. Local officials, notably Nikolay Kupyanskiy, the deputy interior minister, first alluded to the suspected involvement of the suspects’ families. However, they then refuted this judgment, asserting that the three suspects were from low-income backgrounds. Sayenko was, however, represented in court by his lawyer father, Igor Sayenko.

Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs — Their Motivation for Murder

The three men faced charges for their alleged roles in 29 distinct instances, which included eight additional attacks in which victims managed to escape and 21 murders. In 27 of the cases, Suprunyuk was charged with 21 charges of capital murder, 8 acts of armed robbery, and 1 offense of animal cruelty. Sayenko faced 25 charges total, which included one count of animal cruelty, five robberies, and eighteen murders. Hanzha was accused of two counts of armed robbery resulting from an incident that happened in Kamianske on March 1, 2007. Though Suprunyuk then revoked his confession, all three promptly made their admissions. June 2008 saw the start of their trial. Upon being charged on all counts, Suprunyuk entered a plea of not guilty. Suprunyuk’s first defense attorney, Viktor Chevguz, reportedly left the case because he was dissatisfied that his client’s insanity plea was rejected.

The killers were fully aware of their acts, according to the lawyers representing the victims’ families, based on the care they took during their crime spree. Bloodstains on the suspects’ clothes and camera footage of the killings were used as prosecution evidence. The defense refuted the identity of the individuals in the videos as suspects, citing significant flaws in the investigation that included at least ten more murders that the prosecution had concealed, alleged cover-ups of further arrests of influential people who were freed without facing charges, and even a list of some of the other suspects that were allegedly connected to the killings. Judge Ivan Senchenko presided over the panel of judges that heard the case. Sayenko and Suprunyuk were sentenced to life in prison, while Hanzha was ordered to perform 15 years of hard labor. The death penalty was declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court in December 1999, and as a result, Ukraine has not had the execution sentence since February 2000.

The prosecution did not establish the motivation for the killings. According to local media, the murderers intended to profit handsomely from the murderous footage they captured. The girlfriend of one suspect claimed that they intended to record forty different murders for separate movies. A former classmate confirmed this, saying he frequently heard Suprunyuk was in contact with an unidentified “wealthy foreign website operator” who placed an order for forty snuff videos and promised to pay much more for them after they were produced. Ivan Stupak, the head of regional security, denied the theory that the killings were carried out in order to create online snuff videos, citing a lack of proof. Nikolay Kupyanskiy, the deputy minister of interior, remarked, “For these young men, murder was like sport or hunting.” During the trial, it was revealed that Suprunyuk gathered clippings from newspapers concerning the case. There were captions added to some photos of the atrocities, such as “The weak must die.” The victorious will be the strongest.”

The Trial of The Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs

Three attorneys, one for each suspect, made up the defense team for the accused. Originally designated by the court, all three attorneys defended Sayenko; however, during the initial hearings, Sayenko asked to be represented by his father, since the appointed attorney had reportedly only graduated from law school two months prior. After the request was approved, the process took a long time since Sayenko’s father needed time to review the evidence. Igor Sayenko emerged as the most well-known representative of the defense, participating in the majority of interviews and leading the court procedures. Hanzha’s defense team centered on the fact that he was not participating in the murderous rampage and was only part of one event, a robbery of two men in the adjacent town of Dniprodzerzhynsk, four months prior to the killings. In an attempt to get a less sentence, Hanzha acknowledged his guilt. The other two suspects’ defense plan called for a broad assault on the prosecution. A number of detectives, including the lead investigator in the investigation and the head of the arrest team, were asked to testify.

The defense alleged faulty record-keeping, unlawful searches, and issues during questioning. Regarding the video recording of the searches done at the suspects’ apartments, Igor Sayenko voiced concerns. Sayenko claims that the tape repeatedly pauses and resumes, displaying the evidence only after it has been retrieved by investigators and never at the actual time of discovery. The defense team refuted the claim that the suspects were the individuals seen in the murder tapes. Igor Sayenko stated in an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda that Danila Kozlov, a fourth suspect, was first accused of carrying out the murders. Elena Shram’s sister, Tatiana Shram, revealed in an interview that she had seen Kozlov’s name referenced in court records and that Kozlov had allegedly been with the suspects just before her sister was killed. According to Shram, the detectives informed her that Kozlov is still at large since he “did not murder anyone,” and the judge “ordered him to sit down” when her lawyer tried to bring up the case in court.

Igor Sayenko went on to conjecture about the impact of the “actual killers'” family, saying he spoke with an escaped victim who asked to have his identity kept secret out of fear for his life. The anonymous victim stated that two further males were recognized and taken into custody after he recognized the accused in his attack. Under pressure from their families, the suspects were reportedly freed an hour later, and two detectives were let go. Sayenko testified in court that police had apprehended two men and a woman for one of the murders four days prior to the three suspects’ apprehension. Although the suspects were not the individuals on trial at the time, they were arrested and jailed under the identities Sayenko and Suprunyuk after attacking the police officers. Sayenko stated in court, “But now this information is being covered up.” According to the investigators, this did not occur. Officers in the Militsiya, however, were informed on July 19, 2007, that those three had been taken into custody.

In addition, unfortunately, it was discovered that the individuals detained had influential parents. “My kid and two of his pals were instead railroaded as the information was swiftly concealed. Additionally, I think the girl who was detained that day has since fled the nation and is currently in Germany.” Moreover, the defense team said that the prosecution concealed information that cleared its clients from the court. According to Igor Sayenko, the police gathered evidence from two more murders and spoke with witnesses. All evidence of these killings was eliminated from the case since the suspects had a solid alibi at the time of the killings. Sayenko’s defense team said that Suprunyuk, the man they referred to as the ringleader, was the source of his “psychological reliance.” They asserted that Sayenko feared for his life and that Suprunyuk had threatened him on several occasions.

Sayenko stated in court that ever since the seventh grade, he has lived in perpetual fear of Suprunyuk. The families of the victims, who were apparently unhappy with the cumbersome judicial system and an alleged cover-up by the investigators, offered some backing to the defense team’s plan. The media was informed by several victims’ relatives that they intended to start a separate organization to keep an eye on the judicial proceedings. The Ukrainian authorities categorically denied that a fourth suspect in the killings might still be at large and dismissed reports that other crimes had been committed since the three suspects were apprehended.

Three Guys, One Hammer — A Horrifying Video

The killings were captured on various video recordings found on the perpetrators’ personal computers and cellphones. Sergei Yatzenko, 48, was murdered in a video that was posted online under the alias “3 Guys 1 Hammer.” In a forested area, he is seen lying on his back while being repeatedly pounded in the face by a hammer that is contained inside a plastic bag. Yatzenko is stabbed in the abdomen and eye by one assailant using a screwdriver. The hammer is then used to strike Yatzenko to make sure he is dead. The sufferer loses consciousness several times over the course of the attack, which lasts more than four minutes.

In the video, one murderer can be seen grinning at the camera. The fact that the killers return to their parked vehicle indicates that the crime was committed next to their vehicle on the side of the road. They spoke calmly about the murder, discussing how surprised they were to find the victim still alive after a screwdriver had been driven into his exposed brain. After using a water bottle to wash their hands and the hammer, the suspects start laughing. The footage seems to show just two individuals, one of whom is usually behind the camera. The suspects were also discovered to be in possession of numerous photos that appeared to show them at the victims’ funerals. Smiling, they are seen “flicking off” the gravestones and caskets.

The suspects were photographed in court with disfigured animal corpses, providing further proof of animal mistreatment. On October 29, 2008, the photographic and video evidence was presented in court alongside more than 300 photos and two films. The defense protested to the presentation, saying that the persons in the photos and video had been digitally manipulated to match the suspects, and that the evidence had been obtained illegally. Sayenko and Suprunyuk said that they did not recognize the people in the photos when asked if they did. In response, Judge Ivan Senchenko said, “You are not blind.” Expert in film and video editing, Valery Voronyuk, attested that the movie was neither manipulated or fabricated. The prosecution argued that the video was authentic, and the court agreed, rejecting all defense objections and displaying the accused killing their victims.

Who is the Victim in the Three Guys One Hammer Video?

Sergei Yatzenko, a resident of the Taroms’ke village, was recognized as the guy whose murder is captured on camera. His body was discovered on July 16, 2007, after he was murdered on July 12, 2007. 48 was Yatzenko’s age. A malignant growth in his neck had recently pushed him into retirement. Yatzenko was unable to speak for a while after the treatment, but he was not thrilled about not being able to work, so he kept taking up odd chores around the community. He fixed automobiles, woven baskets, did some construction jobs, and prepared meals for his family. Just as he was about to regain his voice, he was killed. Yatzenko had one granddaughter and two sons from a previous marriage. He also took care of his mother, who was crippled.

He informed his wife over the phone at about 14:30 on the day of the murder that he was going to fill up his motorcycle and see his grandchild. He never showed up at his grandson’s place, and by 18:00, he had shut off his cellphone. Fearing that her husband might have become unwell or been involved in a motorbike accident, Lyudmila, his wife, called a friend and took a stroll about the hamlet. They were unable to find any evidence of him. Additionally, since a person in Ukraine cannot be considered missing until at least 72 hours after last being seen, they were unable to file a missing person’s report. The following day, Lyudmila put pictures of her husband up around the town and recruited more villagers to assist with the hunt. A neighbor who noticed one of Lyudmila’s posters four days later recalled seeing an abandoned Dnepr bike in a secluded forested area next to a landfill. When he brought Yatzenko’s family to the location, they saw his body was mutilated and decaying.

Public knowledge of Yatzenko’s murder’s videotape recording did not come to light until a court hearing on October 29, 2008. Shockwaves went through the gallery as the prosecution’s massive presentation included the unedited video of the murder. The prosecution’s claims that the video was authentic, depicted Suprunyuk assaulting the victim, and identified Sayenko as the cameraman were accepted by the court. On December 4, 2008, the US-based shock site received a leak of the video that showed Sergei Yatzenko’s murder. Although she acknowledged that controlling footage on the Internet was “nearly impossible,” Ekaterina Levchenko, an advisor to Ukraine’s interior minister, criticized the leak. The Times’s Caitlin Moran saw a portion of the film and wrote about her reaction in a January 2009 column.

Sayenko and Suprunyuk were given life sentences after a Dnipro court judged them guilty of premeditated murder on February 11, 2009. Of the 21 murders Suprunyuk was found guilty of, Sayenko of 18. When they were convicted guilty of the robbery counts, they were also given fifteen-year terms. Hanzha, who did not participate in the murders, was convicted guilty of robbery and given a nine-year prison sentence. Sayenko and Suprunyuk were both convicted guilty of the crimes related to animal abuse. “If I had understood the crimes that they were capable of performing, I would not have gone near them at gunpoint,” Hanzha remarked in reference to Sayenko and Suprunyuk. The judge declared in the decision that the desire for “morbid self-affirmation” had been the primary driving force behind the crimes. The court made notice of “the poverty of their emotional world and their dearth of interest in people and moral principles” in reference to the defendants.

The court’s decision was read aloud over two days and amounted to several hundred pages. Sayenko and Suprunyuk’s attorneys declared they would be filing an appeal, claiming that there was insufficient proof to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the veracity of the photo and video evidence. A lawyer for one of the victims’ families, Edmund Saakian, refuted the claim, saying, “In theory, a photo may be fabricated, but to manufacture, a forty-minute movie would take a studio and an entire year.” Larissa Dovgal, a family spokeswoman for the victims, asserted that additional criminals may still be at large. Sayenko and Suprunyuk’s parents reiterated their trust in their sons’ innocence. According to Vladimir Suprunyuk, Igor was subjected to torture in order to get his confession; he was made to breath cigarette smoke and have his head covered by the police. During a live press conference, he pointed out anomalies in the inquiry and declared that his son’s case was untrue. Sayenko asserted that senior officials’ family were responsible for the crimes and that his kid was being used as a scapegoat.

The parents declared their intention to file an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights and the Ukrainian Supreme Court. Sayenko and Suprunyuk’s parents also contended that Hanzha’s sentence was excessively light. According to a Dnipro opinion poll, 48.6% of respondents thought the punishment should have been more severe, while 50.3% thought it was fair. According to a study conducted in April 2011, around 60% of Ukrainians supported the death penalty when it came to serial killings in cases where judicial mistake was excluded.

The case was returned to the Dnipro regional court of appeals by the Supreme Court of Ukraine on August 18, 2009. Igor Sayenko praised the action, saying it was a step in the right direction to clear his son’s record. Igor Sayenko and Vladimir Suprunyuk reiterated during a press conference that they thought the case was built on false evidence. The decision to send the case back to the appeal court, according to a prosecutor’s office representative, was procedural, and they were certain that the verdict would be sustained. October 5, 2009, was the scheduled date of the appeal. In an interview with Novi Most, Sayenko and Suprunyuk’s moms indicated that their kids were receiving good treatment in prison. Additionally, it was alleged that Igor Sayenko was thinking of creating a website dedicated to the case. The life sentences that Sayenko and Suprunyuk received in February 2009 were maintained by the Supreme Court of Ukraine on November 24, 2009. Hanzha chose not to appeal his nine years in prison.

RIP Victims. Burn in hell, murderers.

Next, read about the Viking Berserkers, and then, about the Unsolved Disappearance of Kenny Veach