Satanic cannibal murderer whose cult told police the DEVIL would protect them because they ‘made lots of sacrifices to him’ is pardoned by PUTIN after serving six months in Ukraine

Vladimir Putin has pardoned a satanic cannibal killer whose cult killed four teenagers before telling police the Devil would protect them because they “gave him many sacrifices” – because the killer had spent six months fighting in Ukraine.

Nikolai Ogolobyak, 33, had served 13 years of his 20-year prison sentence for killing the four Russian teenagers in ritual killings before being released and recruited into Putin’s army.

And after six months of fighting Ukrainian soldiers in Russia’s “Storm Z” convict unit, Ogolobyak is a free man. His father told him 76.ru that the killer, who was due to be released in 2030, returned on November 2 with a ‘serious wound’.

“After he was injured, he is disabled,” he said. ‘He is walking, but the wound was serious. He’s not working at the moment, he’s just recovering.’

Ogolobyak was convicted in 2010 for his part in the murders of victims Anya Gorokhova, 16, Olga Pukhova, 15, Varya Kuzmina, 16, and Andrei Sorokin, 16, in two separate “rituals.”

He and six other members of the satanic cult drugged and stabbed the four victims 666 times before dismembering them in a forest in Russia’s Yaroslavl region in 2008. The criminals, including Ogolobyak, recited a Satanist text found on the Internet.

The killers are then said to have lit a bonfire under a tree near their cottage, where they cooked and ate the tongues and hearts of their victims.

Ogolobyak, who allegedly counted out loud as the victims were stabbed 666 times, was given the harshest sentence of 20 years in 2010 because he was the only member of the group who was an adult at the time of the killings.

Prosecutors said during the trial that members of the cult posed for photographs with the bodies of their victims and that one of them “bathed” in the victims’ blood.

Ogolobyak, known by prosecutors during the trial as the “warrior,” was said to be the member who would first attack the victims.

The first two victims to fall prey to the sadistic cult were friends Anya Gorokhova and Olga Pukhova who had met members of the group at school.

On June 28, 2008, Anya and Olga, both goths, were lured to Ogolobyak’s apartment where members of the cult had gathered. Here they were provided with alcohol before being taken to a forest.

Here the Satanists formed a pentagram and lit a fire in the center. One gave a signal and at that moment the group attacked Anya and Olga with daggers in a gruesome massacre.

Alleged cult member Anton Makovkin allegedly beheaded the girls with a machete before the group began taking photos with the severed heads on their phones.

The group then dismembered the victims’ bodies and allegedly boiled the two girls’ tongues and hearts before eating them in a sadistic ritual.

Ksenia Kovaleva, reportedly the girlfriend of cult member Konstantin Baranov, was then ‘washed’ with the blood of the victims before the bodies of Anya and Olga were dumped in a pit dug at the back of Ogolobyak’s apartment building.

The Satanists would use the same tactics again the next evening – this time against the young couple Varya Kuzmina and Andrei Sorokin.

At some point Varya reportedly felt uncomfortable and said she wanted to leave. “When Varya tried to leave, Kovaleva distracted her, deliberately talked to her and convinced her to stay,” prosecutor Elena Smirnova told 76.ru.

Varya calmed down, but within minutes the Satanists attacked her and Andrei with knives. Andrei had tried to fight back, but he was stabbed to death along with Varya.

Like Anya and Olga, the couple was beheaded and their bodies dismembered.

One of the cult members later reportedly told police that Ogolobyak had stabbed Andrei 666 times – counting each blow out loud. He would be the one to slit the victims’ throats during the attack.

Investigators searched for the victims after they were reported missing, but the investigation was hampered by the fact that the bodies had been dismembered.

But their bodies were discovered by police in August 2008 before they arrested eight members of the gang. The body of a small rodent crucified on an inverted cross was also found at the scene.

When asked what made him do it, a member of the gang is said to have said: ‘I tried to turn to God, but it didn’t make me any money.

“I prayed to Satan and things improved.”

After eight people were arrested in connection with the murders, police realized that all four victims had called the apartment of Ogolobyak, a former church choir boy.

Officers discovered the victims’ body parts in a well 250 meters from Ogolobyak’s apartment building.

A woman who worked as one of Ogolobyak’s teachers at the time of the killings recalled her shock when she learned of the charges against him.

“Those who knew him at university, the teachers, couldn’t believe it was him who had done this. He was quiet, with limited intellectual abilities. For a long time we didn’t believe it was him,” she said, adding that he had had a “difficult family life.”

But now Ogolobyak, who was convicted of murdering two people and desecrating bodies, has been pardoned by Putin after serving six months in Ukraine.

A convict can only be pardoned and released with Putin’s personal signature. The dictator has freed thousands of murderers and rapists, but Ogolobyak is the first known Satanist cannibal killer to be pardoned.

Ogolobyak was injured in the war but is now free, his father has admitted.

“It’s true,” he said. ‘He served there for six months in Storm Z. After he was injured, he is disabled. He can walk, but the wound was serious. He is recovering.

‘It’s unlikely they’ll take him to war again. He returned on November 2.’

The other Satanists were younger than 18 and received lower sentences.

Konstantin Baranov and Alexander Voronov were imprisoned in a colony of the General Regime for ten years, Alexey Solovyov and Alexey Chistyakov for nine years, and Ksenia Kovalyova for eight years.

Sergei Karpenko was sentenced to two years in a penal colony, and Anton Makovkin was diagnosed with schizophrenia and prescribed mandatory psychiatric treatment.

Satanist Ogolobyak – who received the longest prison sentence – now lives with his mother. Details of his war service and injuries have not been released.

The release of rapists and murderers after the fight for Putin is causing increasing unrest in regions across Russia.

More than 30 people have already been killed by pardoned, returned convicts released from prison to fight in the war.

About the convicts who died, Putin said: “They gave their lives for their Motherland and paid for their guilt.”

But is a free man.

Russian officials have hailed the convicted army – many of whom fought for the Wagner mercenaries – as heroes.