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ONE SHORT: Pichushkin boasted that he killed 63 people, one short of filling the chessboard.
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MOSCOW - A RUSSIAN supermarket worker who claimed that he wanted to record a murder for every square on a chessboard was found guilty yesterday of killing 48 people.
The verdict came after Alexander Pichushkin, 33, dubbed 'the chessboard murderer' by the Russian media, confessed in court that the first time he took a life was like falling in love.
Pichushkin boasted of killing 63 people - one short of filling up the chessboard - but prosecutors were able to find evidence only for 48 murders.
A jury also found him guilty of three attempted murders.
The gruesome body count makes him one of Russia's most prolific serial killers.
Judge Vladimir Usov read the verdict for one hour while Pichushkin, inside a reinforced glass cage, leaned against the wall and stared at the floor.
The courthouse was packed with journalists and relatives of victims who had followed the five-week trial closely .
'On all counts Pichushkin has been found guilty with no mitigating circumstances,' the judge said.
Prosecutors say he lured most of his victims to secluded parts of Moscow's Bitsevsky Park, where he plied them with vodka and then smashed their skulls with a hammer or threw them down drains.
The court was told he preyed on victims from the margins of society; many were elderly or disabled. Police often did not know for months that a victim was missing because no relatives came forward.
Moscow chief prosecutor Yuri Syomin asked the judge to sentence him to life in prison, 'taking into account the grave nature of his crimes'.
Russia has imposed a moratorium on the death sentence, but has not abolished it.
According to the prosecution case, Pichushkin lured some of his intended victims by saying he wanted company as he drank to the memory of a dead dog.
'He threw some of his victims down a drain when they were still alive, and in some cases still conscious, even though some of them begged him to spare them,' Mr Syomin said.
Pichushkin was arrested in June last year after a woman left a note at home saying that she was going for a walk with him, and was then found dead.
He said he was aware of the note, but killed her anyway.
Because he gave himself away, 'there is no need for the cops to take credit for catching me', he said during the trial. 'I am a professional.'
REUTERS, ASSOCIATED PRESS
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