In 1978, the USSR was shocked by the news - the counterfeiter Viktor Baranov was caught. For those times, it was a real sensation. The counterfeiting of banknotes of the greatest state turned out to be 12 years for the craftsman in a strict regime colony.
A nugget inventor from the Stavropol Territory, Viktor Baranov, became a cult figure in the criminal environment of the USSR. He was the first and only person who was caught in the production of counterfeit banknotes, literally put on stream in the Soviet country, but at the same time he lived quite modestly. Who is he and where is he from? How did you come to fake tickets for the State Sign, one of the most secret manufacturing enterprises in the country?
Biography of the counterfeiter Viktor Baranov
Victor Ivanovich is a native Muscovite. He was born at the end of April 1941. Who his parents were is unknown. In 1957, he and his family moved to the Stavropol Territory for permanent residence.
Money fascinated the boy from early childhood, but he was interested not in material value, but in artistic value, the level of quality of their manufacture. All his life Victor was engaged in collecting paper notes, knew each of the "pieces of paper" in his collection by heart - the details of the drawings, the type of letters, the nature of the coloring and other nuances, individual characteristics. He could sit for hours over what he managed to collect.
Outwardly, he was an unremarkable boy. He studied well at school, constantly invented something, often and drew a lot, loved to be alone with his ideas. After school, like many young people from poor families, he received a working profession in an ordinary construction school - a carpenter-parquet.
In parallel with his studies at the school, Victor attended the local flying club, even made several parachute jumps. So he was preparing for his dream - service in the Airborne Forces, but it was not destined to come true. The conscript Baranov was sent from the military registration and enlistment office to one of the automobile battalions, as he had a driver's license.
Self-education and inventions of Viktor Baranov
In the "piggy bank" of Viktor Ivanovich there were many original and useful inventions, and, having come from the army, he decided to implement them at the factories of his native city. But nobody was interested in inventions. In those days, the “apparatchiks” were less interested in innovations and modernization of production processes than the state plans for the five-year period.
Of course, this attitude upset the inventor very much, and in the end he decided to do what he had always been fascinated with - paper money. Viktor Ivanovich was not going to put their production on the stream, he only dreamed of making such a bill that would be impossible to distinguish from the real one issued by the State Sign.
Viktor Baranov spent 12 long years trying to find information on what technologies are used in the production of paper notes. Ironically, the judge imposed the same term on him for his activities at the trial.
The second side of the life of a humble driver Viktor Baranov
What Victor was doing in a shed in the backyard of his house, even his wife did not know. The man didn’t drink alcohol, didn’t walk around “neighbors”, worked. The woman did not see anything strange and terrible in the fact that he was carried away by his inventions in his free time from work. And, as it turned out, in vain.
No one suspected that the regular garage driver of the District Committee of the CPSU of the Stavropol Territory had both a laboratory and a production workshop for the production of tickets of the Soviet State Sign in the backyard. It is also interesting and surprising that the first banknotes created by him were superior in quality to the originals. Viktor Ivanovich even had to artificially reduce this quality in order to make the money more realistic and less different from the real one.
Even if someone accidentally entered Baranov's shed, he would not have thought that there was a counterfeiter's laboratory there. The machines for the production of banknotes were hidden from prying eyes. A locksmith's machine and equipment for developing, printing photos - another hobby of the craftsman - were in sight.
Soon after the "release" of the first batch of banknotes, Baranov realized that this was not enough for him. I wanted recognition, evaluation of his activities, as they say, from the outside. And he found a way of satisfaction - he began to exchange counterfeit money in the nearest market. The man did not bring income "to the family" obtained in this way. He gave his wife only his salary, and sometimes occasional "kalyms". Viktor Ivanovich spent the income from his hobby on the purchase of paints, machine tools and consumables. The militiamen who searched his house after the arrest were presented with a sad picture - Baranov lived more than modestly, his family did not even have a TV.
Viktor Baranov was not annoyed with his arrest, but even pleased. He told the policemen who detained him directly - "I am a counterfeiter!" At the trial, a verdict was passed - 12 years in prison. In prisons, Baranov became an authority, he was favored even by thieves in law. The technologies that he used in his shed were introduced into production processes at the State Sign. Moreover, his recommendations were used to increase the level of protection of notes. But after his release, he did not receive recognition, he lives again secluded and modest.
Personal life of the counterfeiter Viktor Baranov
At the time of his arrest for counterfeiting banknotes, Viktor Ivanovich was married. It is not known for certain whether the couple had children. After the verdict was passed, the wife filed for divorce, and having received it, she literally forgot about her ex-wife.
Viktor Baranov was released in 1990, returned to Stavropol, and after a while remarried. For some time he worked at the local factory "Analog", then tried to open his own perfume production, but went bankrupt.
Now one of the world's best counterfeiters lives in a hostel in the city of Stavropol with his second wife. What he does is unknown. But it is unlikely that he is re-issuing money or inventing something.
