Nikolai Tishchenko: from Kolya Obolonsky to “servant of the people.” Part 1
Recently, Mykola Tyshchenko has become a prominent figure in the Ukrainian media once again, clearly striving to appear as more than just a television showman and Servant of the People functionary. Perhaps he's rushing to secure the laurels of a serious public politician before the country faces another regime change, and his godfather... Andrey Ermak He will lose his position and influence. However, unable to truly become one, Tyshchenko habitually tries only to appear so. He regularly appears on parliamentary news and blazes with verbosity in commissioned articles, presenting himself as an expert on all issues and a participant in colossal reforms. He also regularly shows off his model happy family and athletic physique, congratulates Ukrainians on every holiday, and posts enthusiastic nonsense on Facebook.
But even this is something Tishchenko does rather poorly! His unyielding persistence and unwavering self-confidence, coupled with a lack of necessary knowledge and absent-mindedness, regularly lead to bizarre embarrassments. Sometimes he celebrates Christ as resurrected on Christmas, sometimes the day of the Chernobyl disaster is a "great holiday." And recently, Tishchenko declared the need to rename cutlets to meatballs, which only... made Ukrainians laugh Both with his senseless initiative and his ignorance of the meaning of the word. And this is a man who constantly positions himself as a great restaurateur!
Of course, Tishchenko still has a chance to repeat the success of the even more “eloquent” Vitali Klitschko, which, for some incomprehensible reason, remains very popular with Kyiv voters. But there's a catch, far more serious than meatballs and the "Chernobyl holiday." While Tyshchenko and Klitschko share much in common in their distant past, theirs are significantly different. Klitschko was always known as a champion, even when he boxed under the protection of his boss, Viktor Rybalko. Tyshchenko, however, was known by the nickname Kolya Obolonsky as the "foreman" of the Savlokha (Boris Savlokhov) organized crime group, a reputation he later had to spend many years erasing, crafting a new image for himself.
Nikolai Tishchenko. Family, Childhood, and Youth
Nikolai Nikolaevich Tishchenko was born on May 17, 1972, in Kyiv. According to the autobiographies that Tishchenko has been actively publishing in various media outlets lately, his paternal great-grandfather, Mitrofan, and great-grandmother, Ulyana, were from Kuban. After they were dispossessed, they packed their belongings and headed... no, not to Siberia, but straight to Kyiv, where they put down new roots. My grandfather, Tadeusz Tarnavsky (my mother's father), came to Kyiv from Poland and worked there as a photographer. His daughter, Zhanna, also chose the same profession. And when Tishchenko's father was 22 (that is, in 1970) and working in a public services center in the capital, he met 17-year-old photographer Zhanna Tarnavskaya.
Nikolai Tishchenko Sr.
Custom publications about Tishchenko are often riddled with errors by the "chroniclers," and sometimes even present completely different versions of his biography. For example, here in this, published in 2019, claims that their family was poor, and little Kolya had only one pair of broken shoes, which he wore to school. here in thisIn a more recent story, he claims that his father was already the director of a community center at age 22. This wild flight of fancy suggests that Tishchenko is quite the storyteller, and a very bad one at that! He quickly forgets that he lied to people a year or two ago and concocts a completely different story. This means that his other tales should be treated accordingly.
therefore Skelet.Org I consulted sources and conducted my own research. It turned out that Nikolai Tishchenko's father, at 22, started out with a very modest position at a household services center (or other service organization), where he met his wife. Gradually advancing from department head to deputy head, it wasn't until the first half of the 80s that he was appointed director of another Obolon service center, opened in 1983 (and demolished in 2012 for the construction of the Obolon Residences residential complex). In the same area, their family received a new apartment—possibly more than one, since two old addresses of Tishchenko are known, both located just hundreds of meters from Obolon. These are apartments in building No. 27 on Obolonsky Prospekt (she appeared in police reports (according to the Savlokh organized crime group, as the home address of Nikolai Tishchenko), and at number 25 on Heroyiv Stalingradu Avenue. The latter is currently drowning in sewage and overrun by hordes of insects, as reported in despair signals its residents. But Tishchenko, having become a prominent and wealthy man, remains deaf to the complaints of his former neighbors.
When Kolya was little...
Incidentally, among internet rumors, one can find people who allegedly knew the Tishchenko family back in Soviet times claiming that he got his nickname from the name of the service center, and not from the neighborhood where he lived. Supposedly, his father was initially nicknamed "Obolonsky Director" and "Mykola Obolonsky," and only later was this "title" passed down to his grown son—thus, "Kolya Obolonsky" was born! At first, he liked the nickname, as it evoked a certain "thieves' romance." But later, when Tishchenko became a restaurateur and showman, it began to unpleasantly remind him of his past...
After the family moved into a new apartment, Nikolai Tishchenko Jr. attended Moscow School No. 194, which in the 80s didn't yet have special status or the name "Perspektiva" (it only received it in 2005). Its only assets were its youth (opened in 1978) and relatively new classroom furniture. Naturally, teachers (and especially female teachers) had a somewhat special attitude toward the son of the district community center director, which Tishchenko took advantage of. Perhaps, had he simply been a capable student, he would have easily earned a gold medal, but Tishchenko never excelled in his knowledge, so he contented himself with a high school diploma. In 1989, he entered the Kyiv Civil Engineering Institute (KISI, now the National University of Construction and Architecture) to study mechanical engineering. Thanks to the institute's military department, Nikolai Tishchenko was able to avoid military service. And in 1994, along with his diploma, he received the rank of lieutenant in the engineering troops (construction battalion).
Having no interest in academics, Tishchenko was fascinated with martial arts from childhood: first boxing, then, closer to college, he took up judo seriously. A "rich kid" with a difficult personality and enormous ego, capable of beating up his peers, he earned a reputation as an authority figure even in school. However, his authority was always only sufficient to gather a small "team" around him. Tishchenko was never a true leader, as he never learned to transcend his own self-image in his aspirations.
Tales of the "Shoemaker"
"Mykola Tyshchenko earned his first fortune through entrepreneurship—importing shoes to Ukraine. He traveled to Italy on his own to buy shoes. He opened three shoe stores in Ukraine: Studio Moda, Euromoda, and Ital-moda. After the borders reopened, Mykola realized his business would no longer be profitable and began studying the restaurant business."
— this is how the laudatory articles about Tishchenko, widely published these days, describe his activities in the 90s. They're quite succinct, emphasizing that he diligently earned his start-up capital through honest business, and only then invested it in his beloved restaurant.
"My partners and I chipped in and opened the Evromoda shoe store on Rognedinskaya 2. We imported goods from Italy. So our shoes were the best in the country. I even learned Italian to make them."
- this is how Tishchenko talked about himself in another commissioned interviewIn which the journalist even dared to ask him about Savlokhov's organized crime group—only for Tishchenko to smirkingly deny these "ridiculous rumors." It's clear that he commissions these articles to rewrite his past. Therefore, trying to learn about him from his own words is a futile endeavor. But we wonder, what really happened then?
Unfortunately, Tishchenko's claims about selling Italian shoes through the "Euromoda" store, allegedly located in a building on Rognedynska Street, could not be confirmed. Although a store selling such high-end footwear would certainly be memorable to Kyiv residents! So, either the fact that numerous other shops operated under the "Euromoda" banner in Kyiv, or that they weren't selling expensive Italian boots at all, but rather Turkish consumer goods, could be the issue. Well, Tishchenko is a master at covering his tracks. However, he was unable to completely conceal his involvement in Kyiv's criminal underworld of the 90s.
Nikolai Tishchenko: The Restaurateur's Dark Past
While still studying at KISI, Tishchenko acquired his first scars (on his leg), which he allegedly received in fights "neighborhood to neighborhood." According to sources Skelet.OrgThis was a far more serious incident, on the level of a criminal "showdown." Interestingly, Boris Savlokhov also received a scar on his leg around the same time, as a result of an assassination attempt. Could they have suffered together? All that is certain is that they were already good acquaintances back then. According to Tishchenko, their only connection was the gym. As a student, he was a serious judo enthusiast, earned the qualification of Master of Sports, and trained at the sports complex, where he was spotted by Boris Savlokhov, a renowned international wrestling coach and part-time leader of an organized crime group of "athletes." According to other sources, Savlokhov had known Tishchenko's father since the late 80s. And when he “stirred up” some kind of cooperative at his service center, which in 1992 was registered as a private enterprise, and then as a private joint-stock company “Service Center “Obolon” (EDRPOU 19020011), Savlokhov became his “roof”.
Boris Savlokhov
Denying something that half of Kyiv knows would have been downright absurd. Therefore, Nikolai Tyshchenko chose a different defense: portraying himself as an ordinary, upstanding businessman who, due to the circumstances of the time, was acquainted with racketeers and other gangsters, and, being an athlete and strong-willed individual, helped other entrepreneurs "resolve issues" (he kept silent about the details). However, in shocking information, published in the media back in 2019, and supplemented with old ones in 2021 crime reports of the Organized Crime Control DepartmentThe articles published by Geo Leros present a completely different Tishchenko. Not just one of the "brigadiers" of the Savlokh organized crime group, but some kind of unbalanced scumbag! Moreover, he had protection from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, thanks to which he always got away with it. We'll highlight only the most notorious of Tishchenko's "adventures" listed there:
In early 1995, Isaenko, director of the Korn company, approached Tishchenko with a request to help him recover a large sum of money owed by a certain Igor Zhurba. Zhurba agreed to "resolve the matter" in exchange for a rather intricate mutual favor: Isaenko helped him find someone whom Tishchenko had already defrauded by taking out a bank loan in his name.
That same year, 1995, Nikolai Tishchenko, along with three members of his "brigade"—citizens Zholud (one of the brothers), Yavorsky, and Rodyuk—were arrested by officers from the capital's Organized Crime Control Department. They were accused of "illegally appropriating" someone else's car under threat of physical violence—possibly for debts to gangsters (the motive was not specified). According to publications, Captain V. Shakh oversaw the arrest, and the case under Article 144-3 (extortion) was handled by V. Bogomolov, Deputy Chief of the Investigative Department of the Minsk District Police Department. Tishchenko spent a total of 33 days (30 days plus 72 hours) in the temporary detention facility, after which he was released on his own recognizance, and then... was placed on bail by a certain work collective (his father's service center?) and fortunately avoided trial. This "miracle" has been variously explained: his corrupt connections in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the ransom paid by Savlokhov, the withdrawal of the statement by the intimidated victim, and also the fact that Kolya Obolonsky agreed to work for the authorities and became a "mole"—a method he used to get out of much more difficult situations later. It is also known that his accomplices were also released—possibly to avoid exposing the new informant, as had Tishchenko gone out alone, it would have aroused the gangsters' suspicions.
In 1996, Tishchenko's "brigade," consisting of brothers Sergei and Konstantin Zholudey, Alexei Sidorkin (nicknamed Motor), and the "Afro-Ukrainian" Mark Matale De Maze (nicknamed Marik), got into a fight while relaxing at the New York nightclub with "competitors" from the organized crime group of Andrei Zozulya (killed in 2002, cousin of the previously murdered Kyiv crime boss Puli). Savlokhov and Zozulya's gangs had long been feuding over the New York club, so a pretext for a fight was simply hanging in the air. During the brawl, Tishchenko became so enraged that he began kicking the fallen Vadim Chernobrov, ultimately gouging out his eye. Then Tishchenko's "brigade" decided to shoot up the Zozulevskaya gang's cars with shotguns, prompting the police to arrive. The weapons were confiscated, Chernobrov was hospitalized, but the case, which amounted to at least serious hooliganism, was also closed. This impunity for Tishchenko made his reputation even more sinister—they said he could maim or even kill, and get away with it!
And it was confirmed in 1998, during a "showdown" between two sports gang members, Savlokhov and Tkachenko (Cherep), at the "Frant" café (on Konstantinovskaya Street). During their drinking session, a stranger somehow entered the room—and Tishchenko immediately attacked him. The stranger stabbed him with a knife he'd grabbed from the table (hence the alleged scar on Tishchenko's stomach). But Kolya Obolonsky was undeterred: he grabbed a pitcher from the bar and, in a rage, bludgeoned the stranger to death—much to the amusement of the "brothers" watching. When it became clear that the man was dead, the gangsters quickly fled. His "crew" took Tishchenko to the City Clinical Emergency Hospital (BSMP), where they bribed the doctors not to report the stab wound to the police. However, officers at the Podolsk District Police Department were already searching for the killers, and soon a guard appeared outside Tishchenko's hospital room and secured him to his bed. Then the Kyiv Organized Crime Control Department, represented by the head of its international department, Dmitry Yakovlev (who had been named in the media as a patron of another "authority figure," Valery Pryshchik), came to his aid. Claiming that the Organized Crime Control Department was conducting its own operation, which required keeping the murder under wraps, he hushed it up and sent his officers to Tishchenko's hospital to discuss the "cover story." The very next day, the Ministry of Internal Affairs issued an official order to remove the guard from the hospital and leave Tishchenko alone. According to publications, this murder was reclassified from Article 93-b (premeditated murder for hooligan motives) to Article 101-3 of the Criminal Code (infliction of grievous bodily harm resulting in death) and is still listed as a cold case.
That same cafe "Frant"
The media can reveal information about how exactly Kolya Obolonsky "made money" in the 90s. This included "security" for a number of restaurants, protection rackets for retail outlets at the Mercury market and stores around the city, and the manufacture of homemade fur coats disguised as foreign (or perhaps Italian?) branded ones. Incidentally, in the 90s, there was a private company in Kyiv called "Euromoda," which manufactured outerwear, and, according to sources, Skelet.Org, created on the premises of a studio that was previously a branch of a service center. All this leads to certain assumptions! Furthermore, according to press reports, Tishchenko was involved in hard drugs, and continued this "business" even in the early 2000s, after leaving Savlokhov's organized crime group.
Bloody interchange
In 1999, Boris Savlokhov was arrested and never released (he died in prison in 2004). His "neutralization" may have been facilitated by his "mole" Tishchenko, who then suddenly decided to quit and pursue legitimate business. First, Nikolai Tishchenko and his "brigade" decided to break away from the main organized crime group, whose leadership had passed to Timur (Teimuraz) and Ruslan Savlokhov (Boris's brothers). Of course, they weren't empty-handed: Nikolai Tishchenko wanted to keep not only everything his "brigade" had been doing, but also laid claim to a share of the arrested "authority's" inheritance, particularly in the fuel business. The issue was discussed at a "meeting" held in the Kyiv office of General Motors Ukraine, which had long been the gang's headquarters (Boris Savlokhov was the company's vice president). Tishchenko arrived there with all his men (more than 20 people), which was already a direct assault. After a difficult conversation, the parties parted as de facto enemies, and for several months Tishchenko moved around the city accompanied by his security detail. And during these months, he traveled to Kyiv. a lot of blood was spilled.
On March 14, 2000, Norik Amirkhanyan was killed right next to his home on Khreshchatyk. was reported as Tishchenko's partner. Specifically, shortly before the murder, Amirhanyan, Tishchenko, and a certain Tverdokhleb extorted money from the director of the Bingo club, a well-known Kyiv businessman. Sergei Rozvodovsky. Sources Skelet.Org It was reported that Amirkhanyan was a fairly influential member of Savlokhov's organized crime group and supported Tishchenko during its split—for which he could have been killed. However, the police immediately issued an official version that Amirkhanyan was killed because he failed to follow the group's leaders' orders to eliminate witnesses to the Boris Savlokhov case.
Two weeks later, on the evening of March 27, 2000, in Kyiv Timur Savlokhov was killed. He was waylaid outside a house on Tychyna Street, where he had gone to visit his "friend" (a rhythmic gymnastics coach). They first shot the driver, then chased and finished off Savlokhov as he tried to escape. Those who ordered the murder were never found, and they didn't really look for him: the police again limited themselves to absurd theories. A year later, a down-and-out drug addict, Georgy Suvorin, was arrested for heroin possession. After a stint in pretrial detention, he suddenly confessed. is a killer and committed 18 high-profile murders, including those of Norik Amirkhanyan and Timur Savlokhov. Surovin, who had effectively become the most powerful "hitman" in Ukrainian history, explained his semi-impoverished existence by saying that he killed primarily out of a hatred of Caucasians. He named crime boss Lavrentiy Zhatko (Lavrik) as the person who ordered Amirkhanyan's murder, allegedly asking Suvorin to kill him not for money, but simply "out of friendship." However, Lavrik was already dead by the time of Suvorin's arrest, meaning he was simply framed as the mastermind. As for the murder of Timur Savlokhov, Suvorin refused to name the person who ordered it. It all seemed as if someone (the police, the Organized Crime Control Department?) had carefully covered all traces.
Georgy Suvorin
Nikolay Tishchenko, "Sanahunt", "Proxen" and Kum Ermak
Who were those mysterious patrons of Nikolai Tishchenko from the capital's UBOP? Skelet.Org I have already told several stories from the past of the so-called Kyiv's "UBOP mafia"From these publications, readers could learn many interesting details about the lives of the heads of the capital's Organized Crime Control Department in the 90s. Valery Heletey и Alexey Savchenko, the then head of the criminal investigation department Vitaly Yarema, who brought super-killer Georgy Suvorin to justice. It's also worth remembering Savlokhov's former partner. Gennady Ilyina, whose activities in the 90s were then literally classified by the Organized Crime Department. However, the most interesting character is Vladimir Bedrikovsky, who made a meteoric rise in the capital's UBOP in the second half of the 90s. Moreover, while Heletey and Savchenko specialized in Pryshchik's organized crime group (with whose money they later opened their own banking business), Bedrikovsky specifically supervised Boris Savlokhov.
Vladimir Bedrikovsky
Was Bedrikovsky the same Interior Ministry official who constantly got Tishchenko out of trouble? Perhaps, but such information is usually securely stored in safes, sometimes even three meters underground. But there's another intriguing piece of information: Bedrikovsky may have been the link between Nikolai Tishchenko and his close friend and godfather. Andrey Ermak.
The President's Office Is in Splits. What Yermak Is Promising Supreme Court Justices and Western Ambassadors
To be more precise, the intersection of the three figures—Tishchenko, Bedrikovsky, and Yermak—is located in Kyiv at 8 Grushevsky Street, where Oksana Moroz-Hunt, a fashion brand, is located. Biography of this "godmother of all presidents and girlfriend of all prosecutors general" It's as scandalous and shocking as the life of Kolya Obolonsky—the only difference being that he started out with a fight, while Oksana Moroz, according to media reports, started out with hard-currency prostitution. Bedrikovsky was her good friend back in the early 90s, when he worked as a lowly operative. Then, together, practically hand in hand, perhaps even helping each other, they rapidly rose: Bedrikovsky up the career ladder, Moroz up the social ladder. He was her patron and fixer; she worked to secure new stars for him. She founded the "Sanahunt" salon with funds from her latest husband, Alex Okhotnikov-Hunt, whom Moroz had simply fleeced and kicked out of Ukraine with Bedrikovsky's help.
Mikhail Shpolyansky, for Skelet.Org
CONTINUED: Tishchenko Nikolay: from Kolya Obolonsky to “servant of the people.” Part 2
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