Churbanov Yuri Mikhailovich biography children. Why was Brezhnev's son-in-law sent to the dock? The new owner of the Kremlin
After a serious and long illness, former Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR Yuri Churbanov died. It turns out that he died on October 7th. At one time he rose high... and then fell painfully from the highest heights. His name was made downright a symbol of corruption, and indeed of everything bad that happened in the era of stagnation. And now many feel sorry for the deceased...
In his youth, Churbanov held ordinary positions, but after marrying Brezhnev’s daughter Galina, he began to quickly climb the career ladder. However, after the death of his father-in-law, he came under criminal prosecution in the so-called “cotton case” of corruption. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison and stripped of his military rank and awards. In general, “don’t swear off scrip and prison”...
He was released on parole in 1993. After two strokes he was bedridden. He died a month before his 77th birthday. Yuri Churbanov was buried today at the Mitinskoye cemetery.
Stanislav Sadalsky:
Today Yuri Churbanov was buried at the Mitinskoye cemetery
Happy memory, I always respected him. A man worthy of the warmest words of farewell, but not a word in the news.
Galina Brezhneva's first husband, circus performer Milaev, was the last in the balancing act; in the arena, in the rack of other acrobats, the audience saw only him, but he received both a hero of social labor, and the title of People's Artist of the USSR and the Moscow Circus on the Lenin Hills, which he led until the end and place on Novodevichy.
After the death of his father-in-law, Churbanov fell into disgrace, was slandered, arrested, convicted and served five years. Everyone then understood that the deceased General Secretary was being judged in his person. Yes, they didn’t hide this from him, openly declaring that if he had not been Brezhnev’s son-in-law, no one would have been interested in him.
In recent years, Churbanov did not get up; two strokes confined him to bed. I don’t know the attitude of the current heads of the Ministry of Internal Affairs towards their former leader, but I really want to believe that they did not abandon him...
(from here)
I lived under communism for fifteen years!
“Lyosha, what kind of bribes are we talking about? - Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov told me when we were sitting with him in a room at the Oryol Salyut Hotel in the fall of 1998, “I lived under communism for almost fifteen years!” Only a person not very familiar with the party and state hierarchy of the USSR could talk about such things. Look for yourself, I am the “first son-in-law of the country,” the husband of the only and beloved daughter of the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. And don’t forget that not immediately, of course, but I became a colonel general and first deputy minister of internal affairs, a candidate member of the Central Committee, a member of the Central Audit Commission... There was more than enough power and opportunity!
So you brought me the indictment in my case, several volumes... What was I charged with? Some roll of linoleum brought to the dacha, Uzbek robes, but most importantly - bribes. About all sorts of things like linoleum, I will say this: if I wanted something to appear, all I had to do was say it, and the next day I had it! And no signatures on papers or statements. Do you think it was different for Gorbachev? Or from one of the party and government leaders at the highest level? No, of course, everything, as they say, drank from the same trough... It was furnished differently. Some took care of everyday issues themselves, some had wives, and the majority were provided with specially trained, as they say now, people. Why do you think the Administration of the CPSU Central Committee was created? After all, it was a huge structure, the services of which were used by the entire party leadership. But then everything depended on the person. Some simply lost their heads from permissiveness and greed. I don’t want to talk about them, but there were some. And they didn’t sit, by the way! And they remained with their money and their property. How much do you think apartments cost in the buildings of the Administration of the CPSU Central Committee? For example, where I lived, on Bolshaya Bronnaya, or on Shchusev Street? And they will cost even more!
You have been communicating with me for several years now, you see how I live. Do you think this is after prison? No, it’s just that I had enough of everything then, even in abundance, and I still have enough now. It’s just that today I buy everything with my own money, sometimes I use representative or travel allowances, but before this was part of the security in accordance with my position, rank and position.
Why do I need bribes? I received more money than the Secretary General! Leonid Ilyich had a salary of 800 rubles, while mine, taking into account all the components, such as length of service, rank, etc., was 1100. And also the “Kremlin”. And privileges, shops where scarce goods were sold at reasonable prices. It was all part of the system. Not to use this meant to be a black sheep, to risk causing, to put it mildly, misunderstanding of others. Did I need this?
Why did I admit several episodes of bribes? There is only one reason: the investigators quite seriously told me that if I don’t take two or three episodes out of more than forty, then, as they say in the zone, “they will smear green stuff on my forehead.” They will shoot, that is... I myself knew our system very well, both judicial and in the sphere of execution of punishments, I myself served in it at one time. I also knew that if a decision was made by the Politburo of the Central Committee (and KGB Chairman Chebrikov personally told me about this), it would definitely be carried out. At one time, Khrushchev decided to shoot the currency traders, and so they did, although the laws do not have retroactive force. So I was being prepared for the highest punishment... Let's finish this topic. The people who allegedly gave me these bribes were acquitted a long time ago! And for lack of corpus delicti, by the way!”
I’ll be honest, Yuri Mikhailovich’s arguments convinced me. And at that time it seemed to me that Russian President Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin, having said “a” in relation to Churbanov, might think about pronouncing the next letter. After all, not without the knowledge of the first person of Russia, the former colonel general was released, and it was by presidential decree that Yuri Mikhailovich’s three-year “probationary period” was canceled. In addition, Churbanov and Yeltsin were personally acquainted: in the mid-eighties, Yuri Mikhailovich came to Sverdlovsk with instructions from the Minister of Internal Affairs to remove Knyazev, the head of the local police department, from his post. The attitude of Churbanov and Yeltsin towards the chief of the local police was the same - they both believed that he was in the right place. And contrary to the minister’s opinion, the boss he disliked was not removed.
That’s when I asked my leader, Chairman of the Federation Council Yegor Semyonovich Stroev, who knew very well the situation with the conviction of Brezhnev’s former son-in-law, to intervene. As he told me, a direct conversation with the president did not give anything definite. “He’s a good guy,” Yeltsin said about Churbanov, “he got caught for no reason.” At this level the question hung. And Churbanov’s letter with the resolution of the third person in the state was sent to the Prosecutor General’s Office. It is curious that Stroev did not receive an answer, and the former prisoner himself showed me a letter in which the prosecutor’s office reported that the investigation was carried out correctly, that many episodes were eliminated (this, according to the authors of the message, indicated “justice”), so there are no grounds to reconsider the case. I gave a copy of the letter to the chairman of the upper house of parliament. He, of course, was indignant, but said that if the issue of rehabilitation had not been resolved at this level, then, apparently, he would have to wait...
And Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov has less and less time to wait. On November 11 he turned 75 years old. It turned out to be a sad holiday: the practically paralyzed hero of the day hardly understood what even the closest and most pleasant people were saying to him...
(As it turned out, I didn’t wait...)
Fishing with Fidel
- Once Galina Leonidovna and I were in Cuba at the invitation of the local leadership. Then, in the mid-seventies, we had the most wonderful relations with Freedom Island. They loved us very much, especially because we bought local sugar cane, which could not be sold due to the American blockade, sent our specialists and military instructors, supplied the country with weapons and equipment, taught Cubans in our universities, etc. And we were received at a high level. They put us up in a separate government residence, showed us the sights, and took us to resorts. True, in the evening Galina made her way to a plentiful free bar, as a result of which after a couple of hours she did not take part in further events.
In response to my questions about when there would be a meeting with Fidel Castro, to whom Leonid Ilyich ordered to convey great international greetings, as well as a special letter, the friendly Cubans smiled and said “Mañana,” that is, tomorrow. But the next day everything was repeated, and we never saw the legendary Comandante.
And then one day, at about two in the morning, when my wife was already fast asleep, and I was sitting in the hall and smoking, a group of military men arrived at the residence, and I was invited to visit Fidel. We settled into cars - two of our "Seagulls" - and set off along a winding road to one of the residences of the Cuban leader. Like Stalin in his time, there were several of them, and the biggest secret was where the leader of the nation was at that particular moment. For the most part, these villas were hidden in evergreen vegetation and were not visible either from the sea or from the air. We met at one of them.
In the large living room sat Fidel, his brother Raul, and two or three other military men, whose names I never remembered. The brothers took turns (first the eldest, then the youngest) kissed me, the generals greeted me with restrained handshakes. I conveyed greetings from Brezhnev and a letter to Fidel, which was immediately taken away by the secretary. And we went to the table. To my surprise, the Cuban leaders drank not Havana Club rum (by the way, it can be of very good quality), but Johnny Walker whiskey, and the cheapest variety with a red label. They smoked not only cigars, but also American Marlboros. We talked for two hours about the international situation, about the relations between our countries. Fidel was keenly interested in what was happening in the USSR and asked about the health of Leonid Ilyich. And then he suddenly stood up and said: “Now we’ll go fishing.” Before that, I imagined fishing as sitting with a fishing rod or casting a spinning rod. But in Cuba they fished differently. In the pre-dawn twilight we walked along a long winding path and then down the stairs to the shore. There, at the pier, stood a large military boat with full weapons. I asked what kind of fish we would catch with the help of a warship, to which I received the answer: “Barracuda.” This is a shark that lives in those places, not the largest in size, but quite dangerous and sometimes attacks people.
The stern of the ship was adapted for fishermen. There was a table with whiskey, juice and cigars, and closer to the edge in special nests there were two huge fishing rods with powerful reels and thick twisted fishing line. We sailed to some apparently well-fed area of coastal waters, since in the light of the rising sun large fish were quickly swimming in the upper layers of the water. They threw hooks (very large and made of special steel) with pieces of meat attached to them into the water and began to “fish.” The main thing was to gradually pull the one and a half to two meter shark to the side, preventing it from breaking the rod or breaking the fishing line. We didn’t succeed right away, but an hour later we had already caught three predators. And then we went by sea to another residence, where we were supposed to have breakfast.
For breakfast, a shish kebab of freshly caught fish was served. To be honest, I didn’t really like it, the meat was white, tough and with large fibers. However, I didn’t show it, having a whiskey with a shark, and then thanking Fidel for a wonderful evening (however, in the evening it’s difficult to call this time from two in the morning to ten in the morning). Then the Cuban leader left for one of his shelters, and Raul accompanied me to our residence. I slept well during the day, and at exactly two o’clock in the morning a car came for me again. And again we met with Fidel, drank, smoked, talked, and then “went fishing.” So I learned all the intricacies of local fishing, and my instructor was the leader of the Cuban revolution. I think not everyone succeeds in this in life.
Three marriages
Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov was married three times. He did not like to talk about his first marriage. He answered my questions without any enthusiasm, saying only that he couldn’t do without children. He said that cracks in his family life began to appear in the late sixties. When and under what circumstances he divorced his first wife, he preferred to remain silent...
He talked more about Galina Brezhneva, never calling her by a diminutive name: only “Galina” and sometimes (with a special intonation) “Galina Leonidovna.” When he met her, he had just turned thirty-four years old. The acquaintance itself took place in the restaurant of the Central House of Architects on Shchusev Street (now Granatny Lane - Author), where he and his colleague came to celebrate the Old New Year. They drank fifty grams each during the holiday, and then Churbanov noticed in the back of the hall a company of several people sitting at a large table. Igor Shchelokov, the son of the Minister of Internal Affairs, and his wife Nonna were known to him, but he did not know the rest, but he approached and was introduced to them. I will note in parentheses that Galina Brezhneva and Igor Shchelokov have known each other since the times when their parents worked together in Chisinau. The daughter of the Secretary General introduced herself simply: “Galina.”
Brezhnev’s daughter was forty-one years old at that moment, and she was still quite an interesting woman. To be honest, it seemed to me that Yuri Mikhailovich was somewhat dishonest when he said that he did not immediately find out who the young lady who interested him was. Surely Igor Shchelokov immediately informed him. And he also asked for her phone number and (as he later admitted) received it. But he didn’t call, although meeting the General’s daughter could have excited more than one man.
Galina Brezhneva called him herself. Already knowing about his family circumstances, she made a call to work: “And where have you disappeared, Yura? You took the phone from an honest girl and you don’t call?” I had to make excuses and “make amends” by immediately making an appointment. A new friend picked him up in a Volga with a driver. Churbanov, as a correct person, did not talk about the details of the meeting, but the evening began again in a restaurant, this time in “Aragvi”.
The whirlwind romance lasted three months and ended with the registration of the official marriage of Yuri Churbanov and Galina Brezhneva. As Yuri Mikhailovich recalled, the future father-in-law was against celebrating the event in one of the wedding palaces. Therefore, on Saturday, April 17, 1971, a sanitary day was declared at the Oktyabrsky regional registry office on Leninsky, 44. Churbanov, in a classic dark suit, and Galina, in a white trouser outfit and white shoes, signed their signatures in the magazine and exchanged rings in the presence of witnesses. And then we went to the General Secretary’s dacha in Zarechye, where, in fact, the celebration took place in a rather narrow format. The groom's side was attended by his parents, brother Igor (he was 31 years old) and 26-year-old sister Svetlana, as well as about five police chiefs - friends of Churbanov. Galina was represented by Leonid Ilyich and Victoria Petrovna, other family members and several close friends.
It is curious that the next day the celebration continued: Galina Brezhneva turned 42 years old. Moreover, the Holy Resurrection of Christ has arrived...
Gifts to the newlyweds were quite substantial at that time. The main one was a large apartment No. 45 in a “fresh” (built in 1969) building No. 19/21 on Bolshaya Bronnaya Street. The neighbors of the “young” were the secretaries of the Central Committee Mikhail Suslov and Konstantin Chernenko, as well as the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine Pyotr Shelest and “other officials.” Everyone lived differently. Brezhnev's daughter and son-in-law furnished their apartment with modern furniture, having bought it with the financial help of the Secretary General, but, for example, Suslov, as Yuri Mikhailovich told me, furnished his home with official furniture, exactly the same as at work. And on every chair and armchair there was a sign with the inscription “Administration of the Affairs of the CPSU Central Committee.” And the inventory number too...
A few years later, Churbanov and Brezhnev moved to Shchusev Street, to house No. 10, the same one in which they prepared an apartment for Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev himself. Some authors claim that it was the daughter and son-in-law who occupied these apartments (No. 35). Actually this is not true. I had to be in this apartment (Ruslan Khasbulatov lived in it with numerous relatives in 1994), but Galina Brezhneva then, if my memory serves me right, lived in apartment No. 22... Chernenko’s comrades (who moved to with Bolshaya Bronnaya), Tyazhelnikov, Baibakov, Kirilenko and other figures of the CPSU and the Soviet state. At one time, Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife lived there.
Much has been written about the marriage of Yuri Churbanov and Galina Brezhneva. Therefore, I will only note the fact that it officially lasted 20 years: in 1991, when Yuri Mikhailovich was serving his sentence, Galina Leonidovna divorced him.
On the fifth day after returning from the “zone,” as Churbanov told me, he went to see his wife. I bought three carnations and came to the house where I lived for almost eight years. “No emotions, no kisses, no tears, no joy,” he told me, “an ordinary meeting.”
In fact, the divorce would have followed much earlier if not for the arrest and trial. Back in the mid-eighties, as Yuri Mikhailovich told me, at some party he met an interesting woman named Lyudmila. He found out that she was ten years younger than him, that she was married and had children. And he himself, as we know, was not free. But mutual sympathy remained. And she stayed for a long time.
Some time after their release they met. Lyudmila Vasilievna then worked in the rector’s office of Moscow State University. And after a couple of months, Churbanov moved from his sister (he lived with Svetlana Mikhailovna on Alabyan Street for the first time) to an ordinary 75-meter three-room apartment on Academician Anokhin Street, not far from the Yugo-Zapadnaya metro station. In April 1994, Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov and Lyudmila Vasilievna Kuznetsova became husband and wife.
I had to talk to her many times, mostly on the phone - after all, Churbanov and I communicated quite closely for several years. And I was left with the most pleasant impression: a very calm, sincere and intelligent woman. And also, as it turned out, capable of real self-sacrifice: after two strokes that happened in 2005 and 2008, Churbanov found himself bedridden, and his wife tenderly and touchingly looks after him. He does not communicate with the press, does not give interviews. When I recently talked to her once again, inquiring about my husband’s health, she said: “It’s hard, of course, but we believe and hope. Thank you, Alexey, for remembering Yuri Mikhailovich...” And this once again convinced me that General Churbanov’s last marriage was happy. No matter how sad it is what is happening to him today...
I do not want to evaluate Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov, neither in his past nor in the present. I don’t have the right to this, but I don’t want to take it upon myself. I remember only one more episode from our time together.
2000 We walk along the corridor of the Department of Internal Affairs for the Oryol region to the chief - Major General Ilya Petrovich Savchenko. Churbanov, as always, is carefully shaved, his trousers have straight creases (he personally ironed them in the morning at the hotel), his almost non-gray hair is parted in an even thread... A young lieutenant comes across. He stands at attention: “I wish you good health, Comrade Colonel General!” Yuri Mikhailovich smiles: “They are young, but they also know... So, it’s not all in vain...”
(from here)
On Easter, the vice-president of the Ros Stern company, Yuri Churbanov, brought gifts to the Butyrka prisoners. April 1996
Reference
Yu.M. was born. Churbanov November 11, 1936 in Moscow. After graduating from a vocational school, he worked as a mechanic at a factory. Later he was elected secretary of the Komsomol organization of the enterprise. Then he worked as an instructor for the Komsomol district committee, a senior instructor for the Komsomol city committee and head of a department of the Komsomol Central Committee. Graduated from the Faculty of Law of Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov.
In the system of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, he held the position of deputy head of the political department of the Main Directorate of Correctional Labor Institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR from 1967 to 1971. Then - deputy head of the Political Directorate of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR from 1971 to 1975 and head of the Political Directorate of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR from 1975 to 1977 G.
He worked as Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR from 1977 to 1980. Then he was First Deputy Minister from 1980 to 1983. And from 1983 to 1986 he was appointed to the post of Deputy Head of the Main Directorate of Internal Troops of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs.
He had the rank of Colonel General and a number of state awards, including the Order of the Red Banner and the Red Star. He was a member of the CPSU for about 25 years. He was elected a member of the CPSU Audit Commission and a candidate member of the CPSU Central Committee.
In the post-Soviet period, Yu.M. Churbanov worked as vice president of the cement company Rosstern (1997) and deputy president of the city hockey club Spartak (1999). After two strokes suffered in 2005 and 2008, he became bedridden.
It is difficult for me to judge Churbanov. They either elevated him, then trampled him into the dirt, or tried to justify him. But all this is everyday vanity, and Churbanov now holds the real answer where we all will be...
02.01.2012
Why hasn't Brezhnev's son-in-law been rehabilitated yet?
We met Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov a long time ago, in 1994, when he was released after more than six years in the KGB Lefortovo pre-trial detention center and Nizhny Tagil colony No. 13. At first we just met and talked, then I did an interview with him (by the way, for the newspaper “Top Secret”). And since 1996, our communication has taken on a new quality. At that time, I worked as an adviser to the Chairman of the Federation Council and Oryol Governor Yegor Semenovich Stroev, and the Rosstern company, of which Churbanov was then vice-president, had certain interests in the Oryol region.
In March 1997, I brought the former “prisoner number one,” as the Western press called him, to Oryol for the first time. Stroev and Churbanov met on the steps of the Oryol regional administration. Yuri Mikhailovich shed tears, Yegor Semyonovich’s eyes also became moist. With the words “Do you remember, Yura, how you and I walked around the dacha here in 1976?” - he took the guest into the bowels of a large brick house on Lenin Square, 1. And then their regular meetings began, which at one time brought concrete results. More, of course, for Churbanov and his company, since for such a large-scale person as Stroev, supporting a couple of not the largest enterprises in his field was akin to charity.
That’s when I talked to my heart’s content with the disgraced Colonel General. We had breakfast, lunch and dinner together, traveled around the Oryol region and the capital, met in small and large offices. Sometimes our meetings ended well after midnight. And out of journalistic habit, “just in case,” I wrote down what Brezhnev’s former son-in-law and first deputy minister of internal affairs of the USSR told me. Manuscripts don't burn, right? And today I want to offer the readers of our newspaper some of these recordings. I left Yuri Mikhailovich’s words largely unchanged, except that I made minimal editorial changes and omitted my questions. And there were a lot of questions...
I lived under communism for fifteen years!
“Lyosha, what kind of bribes are we talking about? - Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov told me when we were sitting with him in a room at the Oryol Salyut Hotel in the fall of 1998, “I lived under communism for almost fifteen years!” Only a person not very familiar with the party and state hierarchy of the USSR could talk about such things. Look for yourself, I am the “first son-in-law of the country,” the husband of the only and beloved daughter of the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. And don’t forget that not immediately, of course, but I became a colonel general and first deputy minister of internal affairs, a candidate member of the Central Committee, a member of the Central Audit Commission... There was more than enough power and opportunity!
So you brought me the indictment in my case, several volumes... What was I charged with? Some roll of linoleum brought to the dacha, Uzbek robes, but most importantly - bribes. About all sorts of things like linoleum, I will say this: if I wanted something to appear, all I had to do was say it, and the next day I had it! And no signatures on papers or statements. Do you think it was different for Gorbachev? Or from one of the party and government leaders at the highest level? No, of course, everything, as they say, drank from the same trough... It was furnished differently. Some took care of everyday issues themselves, some had wives, and the majority were provided with specially trained, as they say now, people. Why do you think the Administration of the CPSU Central Committee was created? After all, it was a huge structure, the services of which were used by the entire party leadership. But then everything depended on the person. Some simply lost their heads from permissiveness and greed. I don’t want to talk about them, but there were some. And they didn’t sit, by the way! And they remained with their money and their property. How much do you think apartments cost in the buildings of the Administration of the CPSU Central Committee? For example, where I lived, on Bolshaya Bronnaya, or on Shchusev Street? And they will cost even more!
You have been communicating with me for several years now, you see how I live. Do you think this is after prison? No, it’s just that I had enough of everything then, even in abundance, and I still have enough now. It’s just that today I buy everything with my own money, sometimes I use representative or travel allowances, but before this was part of the security in accordance with my position, rank and position.
Why do I need bribes? I received more money than the Secretary General! Leonid Ilyich had a salary of 800 rubles, while mine, taking into account all the components, such as length of service, rank, etc., was 1100. And also the “Kremlin”. And privileges, shops where scarce goods were sold at reasonable prices. It was all part of the system. Not to use this meant to be a black sheep, to risk causing, to put it mildly, misunderstanding of others. Did I need this?
Why did I admit several episodes of bribes? There is only one reason: the investigators quite seriously told me that if I don’t take two or three episodes out of more than forty, then, as they say in the zone, “they will smear green stuff on my forehead.” They will shoot, that is... I myself knew our system very well, both judicial and in the sphere of execution of punishments, I myself served in it at one time. I also knew that if a decision was made by the Politburo of the Central Committee (and KGB Chairman Chebrikov personally told me about this), it would definitely be carried out. At one time, Khrushchev decided to shoot the currency traders, and so they did, although the laws do not have retroactive force. So I was being prepared for the highest punishment... Let's finish this topic. The people who allegedly gave me these bribes were acquitted a long time ago! And for lack of corpus delicti, by the way!”
I’ll be honest, Yuri Mikhailovich’s arguments convinced me. And at that time it seemed to me that Russian President Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin, having said “a” in relation to Churbanov, might think about pronouncing the next letter. After all, not without the knowledge of the first person of Russia, the former colonel general was released, and it was by presidential decree that Yuri Mikhailovich’s three-year “probationary period” was canceled. In addition, Churbanov and Yeltsin were personally acquainted: in the mid-eighties, Yuri Mikhailovich came to Sverdlovsk with instructions from the Minister of Internal Affairs to remove Knyazev, the head of the local police department, from his post. The attitude of Churbanov and Yeltsin towards the chief of the local police was the same - they both believed that he was in the right place. And contrary to the minister’s opinion, the boss he disliked was not removed.
That’s when I asked my leader, Chairman of the Federation Council Yegor Semyonovich Stroev, who knew very well the situation with the conviction of Brezhnev’s former son-in-law, to intervene. As he told me, a direct conversation with the president did not give anything definite. “He’s a good guy,” Yeltsin said about Churbanov, “he got caught for no reason.” At this level the question hung. And Churbanov’s letter with the resolution of the third person in the state was sent to the Prosecutor General’s Office. It is curious that Stroev did not receive an answer, and the former prisoner himself showed me a letter in which the prosecutor’s office reported that the investigation was carried out correctly, that many episodes were eliminated (this, according to the authors of the message, indicated “justice”), so there are no grounds to reconsider the case. I gave a copy of the letter to the chairman of the upper house of parliament. He, of course, was indignant, but said that if the issue of rehabilitation had not been resolved at this level, then, apparently, he would have to wait...
And Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov has less and less time to wait. On November 11 he turned 75 years old. It turned out to be a sad holiday: the practically paralyzed hero of the day hardly understood what even the closest and most pleasant people were saying to him...
Fishing with Fidel
1999 We are sitting in Yuri Mikhailovich’s office in the building of the Rosstern company on Elektrodnaya Street. Secretary Lena had already brought a bottle of Gzhelka, at that time Churbanov’s favorite vodka, sandwiches and Sarova mineral water - according to competent people, the only real and high-quality water in Russia. And then Yuri Mikhailovich raises his glass, drinks dashingly and, as often happened, looking into my eyes, begins another story, which I quote from memory. In one of his books, Yuri Mikhailovich mentioned his visits to Cuba, but without much detail, so our dear readers have the opportunity to find out many unknown details:
- Once Galina Leonidovna and I were in Cuba at the invitation of the local leadership. Then, in the mid-seventies, we had the most wonderful relations with Freedom Island. They loved us very much, especially because we bought local sugar cane, which could not be sold due to the American blockade, sent our specialists and military instructors, supplied the country with weapons and equipment, taught Cubans in our universities, etc. And we were received at a high level. They put us up in a separate government residence, showed us the sights, and took us to resorts. True, in the evening Galina made her way to a plentiful free bar, as a result of which after a couple of hours she did not take part in further events.
In response to my questions about when there would be a meeting with Fidel Castro, to whom Leonid Ilyich ordered to convey great international greetings, as well as a special letter, the friendly Cubans smiled and said “Mañana,” that is, tomorrow. But the next day everything was repeated, and we never saw the legendary Comandante.
And then one day, at about two in the morning, when my wife was already fast asleep, and I was sitting in the hall and smoking, a group of military men arrived at the residence, and I was invited to visit Fidel. We settled into cars - two of our "Seagulls" - and set off along a winding road to one of the residences of the Cuban leader. Like Stalin in his time, there were several of them, and the biggest secret was where the leader of the nation was at that particular moment. For the most part, these villas were hidden in evergreen vegetation and were not visible either from the sea or from the air. We met at one of them.
In the large living room sat Fidel, his brother Raul, and two or three other military men, whose names I never remembered. The brothers took turns (first the eldest, then the youngest) kissed me, the generals greeted me with restrained handshakes. I conveyed greetings from Brezhnev and a letter to Fidel, which was immediately taken away by the secretary. And we went to the table. To my surprise, the Cuban leaders drank not Havana Club rum (by the way, it can be of very good quality), but Johnny Walker whiskey, and the cheapest variety with a red label. They smoked not only cigars, but also American Marlboros. We talked for two hours about the international situation, about the relations between our countries. Fidel was keenly interested in what was happening in the USSR and asked about the health of Leonid Ilyich. And then he suddenly stood up and said: “Now we’ll go fishing.” Before that, I imagined fishing as sitting with a fishing rod or casting a spinning rod. But in Cuba they fished differently. In the pre-dawn twilight we walked along a long winding path and then down the stairs to the shore. There, at the pier, stood a large military boat with full weapons. I asked what kind of fish we would catch with the help of a warship, to which I received the answer: “Barracuda.” This is a shark that lives in those places, not the largest in size, but quite dangerous and sometimes attacks people.
The stern of the ship was adapted for fishermen. There was a table with whiskey, juice and cigars, and closer to the edge in special nests there were two huge fishing rods with powerful reels and thick twisted fishing line. We sailed to some apparently well-fed area of coastal waters, since in the light of the rising sun large fish were quickly swimming in the upper layers of the water. They threw hooks (very large and made of special steel) with pieces of meat attached to them into the water and began to “fish.” The main thing was to gradually pull the one and a half to two meter shark to the side, preventing it from breaking the rod or breaking the fishing line. We didn’t succeed right away, but an hour later we had already caught three predators. And then we went by sea to another residence, where we were supposed to have breakfast.
For breakfast, a shish kebab of freshly caught fish was served. To be honest, I didn’t really like it, the meat was white, tough and with large fibers. However, I didn’t show it, having a whiskey with a shark, and then thanking Fidel for a wonderful evening (however, in the evening it’s difficult to call this time from two in the morning to ten in the morning). Then the Cuban leader left for one of his shelters, and Raul accompanied me to our residence. I slept well during the day, and at exactly two o’clock in the morning a car came for me again. And again we met with Fidel, drank, smoked, talked, and then “went fishing.” So I learned all the intricacies of local fishing, and my instructor was the leader of the Cuban revolution. I think not everyone succeeds in this in life.
Three marriages
Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov was married three times. He did not like to talk about his first marriage. He answered my questions without any enthusiasm, saying only that he couldn’t do without children. He said that cracks in his family life began to appear in the late sixties. When and under what circumstances he divorced his first wife, he preferred to remain silent...
He talked more about Galina Brezhneva, never calling her by a diminutive name: only “Galina” and sometimes (with a special intonation) “Galina Leonidovna.” When he met her, he had just turned thirty-four years old. The acquaintance itself took place in the restaurant of the Central House of Architects on Shchusev Street (now Granatny Lane - Author), where he and his colleague came to celebrate the Old New Year. They drank fifty grams each during the holiday, and then Churbanov noticed in the back of the hall a company of several people sitting at a large table. Igor Shchelokov, the son of the Minister of Internal Affairs, and his wife Nonna were known to him, but he did not know the rest, but he approached and was introduced to them. I will note in parentheses that Galina Brezhneva and Igor Shchelokov have known each other since the times when their parents worked together in Chisinau. The daughter of the Secretary General introduced herself simply: “Galina.”
Brezhnev’s daughter was forty-one years old at that moment, and she was still quite an interesting woman. To be honest, it seemed to me that Yuri Mikhailovich was somewhat dishonest when he said that he did not immediately find out who the young lady who interested him was. Surely Igor Shchelokov immediately informed him. And he also asked for her phone number and (as he later admitted) received it. But he didn’t call, although meeting the General’s daughter could have excited more than one man.
Galina Brezhneva called him herself. Already knowing about his family circumstances, she made a call to work: “And where have you disappeared, Yura? You took the phone from an honest girl and you don’t call?” I had to make excuses and “make amends” by immediately making an appointment. A new friend picked him up in a Volga with a driver. Churbanov, as a correct person, did not talk about the details of the meeting, but the evening began again in a restaurant, this time in “Aragvi”.
The whirlwind romance lasted three months and ended with the registration of the official marriage of Yuri Churbanov and Galina Brezhneva. As Yuri Mikhailovich recalled, the future father-in-law was against celebrating the event in one of the wedding palaces. Therefore, on Saturday, April 17, 1971, a sanitary day was declared at the Oktyabrsky regional registry office on Leninsky, 44. Churbanov, in a classic dark suit, and Galina, in a white trouser outfit and white shoes, signed their signatures in the magazine and exchanged rings in the presence of witnesses. And then we went to the General Secretary’s dacha in Zarechye, where, in fact, the celebration took place in a rather narrow format. The groom's side was attended by his parents, brother Igor (he was 31 years old) and 26-year-old sister Svetlana, as well as about five police chiefs - friends of Churbanov. Galina was represented by Leonid Ilyich and Victoria Petrovna, other family members and several close friends.
It is curious that the next day the celebration continued: Galina Brezhneva turned 42 years old. Moreover, the Holy Resurrection of Christ has arrived...
Gifts to the newlyweds were quite substantial at that time. The main one was a large apartment No. 45 in a “fresh” (built in 1969) building No. 19/21 on Bolshaya Bronnaya Street. The neighbors of the “young” were the secretaries of the Central Committee Mikhail Suslov and Konstantin Chernenko, as well as the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine Pyotr Shelest and “other officials.” Everyone lived differently. Brezhnev's daughter and son-in-law furnished their apartment with modern furniture, having bought it with the financial help of the Secretary General, but, for example, Suslov, as Yuri Mikhailovich told me, furnished his home with official furniture, exactly the same as at work. And on every chair and armchair there was a sign with the inscription “Administration of the Affairs of the CPSU Central Committee.” And the inventory number too...
A few years later, Churbanov and Brezhnev moved to Shchusev Street, to house No. 10, the same one in which they prepared an apartment for Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev himself. Some authors claim that it was the daughter and son-in-law who occupied these apartments (No. 35). Actually this is not true. I had to be in this apartment (Ruslan Khasbulatov lived in it with numerous relatives in 1994), but Galina Brezhneva then, if my memory serves me right, lived in apartment No. 22... Chernenko’s comrades (who moved to with Bolshaya Bronnaya), Tyazhelnikov, Baibakov, Kirilenko and other figures of the CPSU and the Soviet state. At one time, Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife lived there.
Much has been written about the marriage of Yuri Churbanov and Galina Brezhneva. Therefore, I will only note the fact that it officially lasted 20 years: in 1991, when Yuri Mikhailovich was serving his sentence, Galina Leonidovna divorced him.
On the fifth day after returning from the “zone,” as Churbanov told me, he went to see his wife. I bought three carnations and came to the house where I lived for almost eight years. “No emotions, no kisses, no tears, no joy,” he told me, “an ordinary meeting.”
In fact, the divorce would have followed much earlier if not for the arrest and trial. Back in the mid-eighties, as Yuri Mikhailovich told me, at some party he met an interesting woman named Lyudmila. He found out that she was ten years younger than him, that she was married and had children. And he himself, as we know, was not free. But mutual sympathy remained. And she stayed for a long time.
Some time after their release they met. Lyudmila Vasilievna then worked in the rector’s office of Moscow State University. And after a couple of months, Churbanov moved from his sister (he lived with Svetlana Mikhailovna on Alabyan Street for the first time) to an ordinary 75-meter three-room apartment on Academician Anokhin Street, not far from the Yugo-Zapadnaya metro station. In April 1994, Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov and Lyudmila Vasilievna Kuznetsova became husband and wife.
I had to talk to her many times, mostly on the phone - after all, Churbanov and I communicated quite closely for several years. And I was left with the most pleasant impression: a very calm, sincere and intelligent woman. And also, as it turned out, capable of real self-sacrifice: after two strokes that happened in 2005 and 2008, Churbanov found himself bedridden, and his wife tenderly and touchingly looks after him. He does not communicate with the press, does not give interviews. When I recently talked to her once again, inquiring about my husband’s health, she said: “It’s hard, of course, but we believe and hope. Thank you, Alexey, for remembering Yuri Mikhailovich...” And this once again convinced me that General Churbanov’s last marriage was happy. No matter how sad it is what is happening to him today...
I do not want to evaluate Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov, neither in his past nor in the present. I don’t have the right to this, but I don’t want to take it upon myself. I remember only one more episode from our time together.
2000 We walk along the corridor of the Department of Internal Affairs for the Oryol region to the chief - Major General Ilya Petrovich Savchenko. Churbanov, as always, is carefully shaved, his trousers have straight creases (he personally ironed them in the morning at the hotel), his almost non-gray hair is parted in an even thread... A young lieutenant comes across. He stands at attention: “I wish you good health, Comrade Colonel General!” Yuri Mikhailovich smiles: “They are young, but they also know... So, it’s not all in vain...”
─ the future Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR and son-in-law of the unforgettable Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev - began quite in the spirit of those forever gone times, in which calls for the construction of communism did not yet look as ridiculous as they do now, when history has clearly shown their emptiness and meaninglessness.
Komsomol youth
He was born on November 11, 1936 in Moscow, in the family of a high-ranking party functionary. However, after graduating from high school, he did not enter MGIMO or Moscow State University, as is now customary for the children of the powerful, but, at the insistence of his father, he became a student at a vocational school (vocational school), after which he worked at the Znamya Truda plant as an ordinary assembly fitter. Thus, the first stage of Yuri Churbanov’s biography allowed him to subsequently say with good reason that his hands were accustomed to work.
However, he did not stay long in the assembly shop and soon, having been elected, or rather appointed, secretary of the Komsomol organization of the plant, he said goodbye to his work uniform forever. After a short time, the Banner of Labor enterprise itself remained only in memories, giving way to the district committee of the Komsomol, where Yuri received a position as an instructor.
Start of a career
In 1961, the biography and personal life of Yuri Churbanov were marked by an important event - he entered into his first marriage. His chosen one was Tamara Viktorovna Valtseferova, who gave her husband two children. At the same time, Yuri Mikhailovich was transferred to the Central Office of the Komsomol and, holding the position of head of one of the departments, entered the correspondence department of the Faculty of Law of Moscow State University. After graduating in 1964, he received a diploma, but even before that he went to work in the political agencies of the system of correctional labor institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where he very successfully moved up the career ladder. He met 1971 already with the rank of lieutenant colonel.
The meeting that determined the rest of my life
Then, in January 1971, fate presented Churbanov with its main gift. In the restaurant hall, where he and his colleague celebrated the Old New Year, she introduced him to Galina Brezhneva, the daughter of the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. From this moment on, the biography of Yuri Churbanov becomes much more interesting.
In those years, he was a very impressive 35-year-old man, capable of turning the head of a less sensitive woman than the 41-year-old Galina Leonidovna, known for her love of love. He asked her to dance, and she herself made an appointment with him. This evening became the beginning of their whirlwind romance, and a week later she introduced Churbanov to her father, but not as a lover, but as a future groom.
Eligible Groom
It should be noted that by that time Leonid Ilyich’s previous two very eccentric marriages of his daughter were still fresh in his memory. Her first husband was a circus acrobat-strongman, and her second was the illusionist Igor Kio. Moreover, if Milaev was 20 years older than her, then Kio was 18 years younger. Therefore, the handsome and very promising lieutenant colonel of the Ministry of Internal Affairs seemed to the Secretary General a suitable candidate for the position of his next son-in-law.
Galina was only 6 years older than Yuri, which was quite tolerable. In addition, Leonid Ilyich hoped that Churbanov would put an end to his daughter’s love affairs, which, although not covered in the press, were an endless topic of conversation and undoubtedly cast a shadow on the secretary general’s family.
Wedding and career takeoff
Having hastily (while the iron was still hot) filed a divorce from his wife, the young seducer entered into a new marriage. Regarding the children, the biography of Yuri Churbanov only says that they remained with their mother. Now it is difficult to say what role he played in their future lives.
Of course, the close relationship with the head of state immediately bore fruit, because now the Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR Nikolai Shchelokov became his personal friend and patron. At this stage, the biography of Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov is marked by a number of amazing career ups. Soon after the wedding, “son-in-law No. 1,” as people nicknamed him, became deputy head of the Political Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and a few years later its head.
A fly in the ointment
His ranks grew accordingly to the positions he held. In 1974, he tried on the shoulder straps of a major general, and three years later he became a lieutenant general. Note that by that time Churbanov was just over forty years old. He reached the peak of his career growth in February 1980, becoming a colonel general and, at the request of his father-in-law, receiving the post of First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs.
However, despite such a successful promotion, Yuri Mikhailovich’s life at that time was not at all cloudless, and it was Galina who darkened it. There is much evidence from contemporaries that their marriage, which lasted 19 years, was by no means happy. The spoiled daughter of the General Secretary had already become addicted to alcohol, and having become fed up with her new husband, she began to look for an outlet for her irrepressible temperament on the side.
Formally, she was listed in some fairly high positions and received an appropriate salary, but in fact she did not appear in any institutions, but led a free and, as they say, bohemian life. Her constant surroundings were artists, performers, and sometimes businessmen of the black market, which flourished under conditions of total Soviet shortages.
In this regard, one can only sympathize with her husband, who made every effort to achieve self-realization in the high positions he held, but at the same time was sometimes forced to look for his missus in restaurants and, having accepted her from the hands of another suitor, take her home to bring her to her senses there. However, when entering into this marriage, he knew what he was getting into. The year 1980 in the biography of Churbanov’s son-in-law is marked by receiving the State Prize, which was awarded to him for his “tremendous contribution” to ensuring law and order and security during the Moscow Olympic Games. At the same time, he was destined to rise to the heights of the political Olympus, becoming a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and a candidate member of the CPSU Central Committee.
The beginning of the end
Meanwhile, his ascent coincided with the period that is now commonly called the beginning of the collapse of the Land of Soviets. People of the older generation, no doubt, remember those times when store shelves struck even habitual citizens with their squalor, and at enterprises that reported exceeding plans, workers, in fact, only sat through the allotted hours.
The same picture was observed in agriculture. Collective and state farms reported record harvests that did not actually happen. Everyone knew this, but maintained the illusion of general well-being. Against this “gray background,” the party and economic nomenklatura stood out in particular contrast, whose representatives were generously given awards and “slices of the state pie,” many of which ended up on Churbanov’s table.
At the end of the Brezhnev era
In those years when a personal car was a pipe dream for the vast majority of the country's citizens, he was one of the few who drove his own Mercedes, and had several pairs of different license plates in the trunk. From the words of Galina Leonidovna herself, it is known that this car was given to her father by the head of the government of the GDR in those years, and Leonid Ilyich gave it to his son-in-law.
There was endless talk about the luxury in which the leadership lived, and, despite the fact that the people, as usual, remained silent, their general irritation grew. Thus, the era of Brezhnev’s reign was coming to an end.
The new owner of the Kremlin
The turning point in the biography of Yuri Churbanov was November 1982, when his high-ranking son-in-law and patron died. Soon after the death of Leonid Ilyich, Yu. V. Andropov, who replaced him, initiated a number of high-profile anti-corruption processes, necessary primarily in order to reduce the degree of public discontent. The main defendants in the cases were officials who were part of the inner circle of the deceased General Secretary.
Among them was Churbanov’s immediate superior, Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR N. Shchelokov, who, by the way, was a long-time and irreconcilable enemy of the new owner of the Kremlin. Finding himself under investigation and aware of the irrefutable evidence, he could not withstand the psychological stress and in December 1984 committed suicide with a shot from a hunting rifle. Churbanov himself was spared the trouble at that moment. Having summoned him to his office, Andropov made it clear in a short conversation that he did not intend to initiate criminal proceedings against him.
Decline of a career
This period is a very important moment in the biography of Yuri Churbanov. He did not have any children in common with Galina Leonidovna, and therefore the alienation that had long developed between them grew into mutual hostility after the death of his father-in-law. Family life, previously supported by him at the cost of considerable effort, now completely fell apart.
Having lost his high-ranking patron, Yuri Mikhailovich was removed from his previously held position as Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and in a short time, already under Gorbachev, he made a significant journey, this time down the career ladder. As a result, he was sent to a long-service pension altogether.
Arrest and years of imprisonment
However, fate was already preparing an unexpected blow for its darling. In January 1987, Yuri Mikhailovich was arrested as a defendant in the so-called Uzbek, or cotton case. In this case, we were talking about a number of major corruption crimes among the leadership of the Uzbek SSR, in which, according to investigators, Churbanov was also involved.
He was accused of receiving a number of bribes on an especially large scale. Despite the fact that his guilt in most episodes was not proven, by a court decision in 1988 he was sentenced to 12 years in prison with confiscation of property, but after 5 years he received parole. It should be noted that during that period, Churbanov became the highest-ranking official among all those who ended up behind bars. The new authorities intensively created the illusion of fighting corruption, and he served as a bargaining chip in their game.
Last years of life
While Yuri Mikhailovich was in the camp, his Galina Leonidovna filed for a divorce, and their marriage, which had long been just a formality, was finally dissolved. About the personal life of Yuri Churbanov after prison, the biography says that in 1994 he married for the third time, and this time, as people who knew him testify, successfully. His wife was an old friend ─ Lyudmila Vasilievna Kuznetsova. She is characterized as a very calm, intelligent woman who worked at Moscow State University for many years. Upon marriage, she took her husband's surname.
Yuri Churbanov's widow, Lyudmila Churbanova, wrote in her husband's biography that his stay in prison undermined his health, and he was paralyzed for the last five years of his life. Of course, all his care fell on her shoulders. Yuri Mikhailovich died on October 7, 2013 and was buried at the Mitinskoye cemetery in Moscow. According to the biography published along with the posthumous obituary, Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov had children only from his first marriage and, upon returning from prison, did not maintain contact with them.
Yuri Mikhailovich Churbanov(b. 1936) was born into the family of an employee. After graduating from high school, he entered the law faculty of Moscow State University (graduated in 1964) and was sent to Komsomol work, where he quickly made a career.
Upon graduation, Churbanov became the head of the department of the Komsomol Central Committee, where he worked until 1967. Then he was transferred to the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the position of deputy head of the political department of the Department of Correctional Labor Institutions (until 1971).
Yuri Mikhailovich’s further career was facilitated by “personal circumstances” - in 1971. he married L.I. Brezhnev's daughter Galina Leonidovna. L.I. Brezhnev did not interfere with this marriage, despite the fact that Yu.M. Churbanov had a low social status. Yu.M. Churbanov began to quickly rise in career, occupying positions for which he had neither the ability, nor experience, nor knowledge. At first - deputy chief, and in 1977. – Head of the Political Directorate of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in 1980. – Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR N.A. Shchelokova.
In 1981 already Colonel General Churbanov becomes a member of the Central Audit Commission of the CPSU Central Committee and a candidate member of the CPSU Central Committee, a deputy of the Supreme Council of the RSFSR. By this time, he was no longer the Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but the First Deputy, and was awarded many government awards, including military ones - the Order of the Red Banner of the Red Star (although he was not in the war).
Many sought his patronage - S.F. Medunov, first secretary of the Krasnodar regional committee of the CPSU, Sh.R. Rashidov (first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Uzbekistan), G.A. Aliyev (leader of Azerbaijan) and others. Churbanov used his influence to patronize shadow business , receiving large bribes for this, speculated in dachas, foreign cars and apartments. Through dummies, Churbanov played on the stock exchange. He was closely connected with the “diamond mafia” - through the famous film actress Zoya Fedorova and Galina Brezhneva’s friend Boris Buryatse. After the murder of Fedorova and the arrest of Buryatse, Churbanov survived, although the testimony of many witnesses pointed specifically to him as being involved in speculation in jewelry and currency. But he had nothing to do with Fedorova’s murder.
In 1983 Churbanov was removed from the post of first deputy minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and moved to the post of deputy head of the Main Directorate of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. This was due to the fact that Yu.V. Andropov was forced to reckon with Brezhnev’s associates in the country’s leadership. M.S. Gorbachev removed him from this post only in 1986.
In the mid-80s, at the beginning of the Gorbachev period, the “Uzbek Case” was “promoted” in the media - about the facts of large-scale corruption in Uzbekistan, its main “person involved”, Sharaf Rashidov, was dead by that time, and everything could be “attributed” to him . Yu.M. Churbanov was “tied” to this case, although no evidence of his corrupt relations with Rashidov and other accused was found. No one began to remember Churbanov’s real “sins,” since too much that was unpleasant for those in power would come to light.
In 1987 Churbanov was expelled from the CPSU and arrested, and in 1988 he was sentenced to 12 years in prison. In 1990 Galina Brezhneva filed for divorce from Churbanov
In 1993 Yu.M. Churbanov was released on parole.
After his release, Yu.M. Churbanov was engaged in business - he was a consultant to a number of large banks, the head of the security service and vice-president of the Rosstern cement company, and deputy president of the Spartak hockey club. In 1996 supported V.V. Zhirinovsky in the presidential elections in Russia. In 2005, after suffering a stroke, he retired. After a second stroke in 2008, he became disabled.
Yuri Churbanov, Brezhnev's son-in-law, died in Moscow at the age of 77. He went down in history more in this “position” than as a deputy. Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. Later, Churbanov served time, as they say, precisely for the sins of the Brezhnev nomenklatura.
Sitting on business...
True, Telman Gdlyan, once an investigator for particularly important cases, does not agree with this opinion - it was he who investigated the so-called. the cotton business, in which Brezhnev’s son-in-law was also involved.
– The Churbanov case is now called political and is associated with revenge either on Andropov or Gorbachev. They claim that he was convicted only for his robe and skullcap. These are all fables. Churbanov was a total bribe-taker. From the very first day of his arrest, he began to tell stories himself - 7-8 episodes, then added to them. And it didn’t matter whose son-in-law he was, many others were involved in this case, even higher in rank than him. They managed to convict some of them before they started putting pressure on us from above.
During the investigation, Churbanov behaved with dignity, was not a coward, and was mentally prepared for the verdict. But he then sat quietly in the colony, because there were mostly people with official status there, and there were his colleagues from the police - such a gathering point for unworthy workers. Moreover, the status of the “first” son-in-law helped Churbanov get out not after 12 years, but after 4 years. They still worked for him.
I can understand everything in Churbanov’s story - both entering this royal house through marriage and bribery. But there is one act of his that I consider inhuman. And we talked to him off the record. I asked him how he could leave his child, the son from his first marriage. I say, he grew up without you, went to college, you never even tried to see him. He began to beat his chest with tears, saying, yes, I’m a scoundrel, a scoundrel. But he never gave an explanation for this action.
...or hurt?
Churbanov really did not like to talk about relations with the first family, even with his loved ones. Despite many family difficulties, Churbanov never spoke badly about his second, high-status wife.
“Maybe he didn’t have much love for Galina, but he was clearly passionate about her as a woman,” says Churbanov’s friend, writer Alexey Bogomolov. - And he did not pay attention to all this gossip about his arranged marriage. He also worked hard at work. As deputy minister, he did a lot for ordinary police officers.
But when the investigation began, there was no one left with him. Only his brother visited him in the colony, and his former personal driver sent packages. Galina divorced him while he was in prison. But he understood everything. The offense was only against the state, which even took away his awards. Yes, and also, when he came to Galina after the colony with three carnations, it turned out that she had sold all his things, even the general’s jacket. This is why he was offended by her.
However, after the colony he did not look like a broken person. He looked great - clean-shaven, perfect parting, pressed trousers. 2-3 weeks after his release, he met with Resin (then the head of the Moscow construction complex), they were friends, and he made him the head of the security service in a company that dealt with cement. At first, Churbanov drove a Volga, then a Volvo with criminal plates. In general, I joined the new life. And by the way, it seems to me that he tried to the end to be like his famous father-in-law - the same leisurely movements, the same soft embrace of his pleasant interlocutor. At the same time, he himself was a big man. Galina may have made him a colonel general, but she did not make him a general.
Yuri Churbanov married Galina Brezhneva in 1971. In 1977–1980 was the first deputy head of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. In 1987 he was arrested and a year later sentenced to 12 years for corruption. Released on parole in 1993. He worked at the Rosstern cement company, created a fund to help former prisoners, and published a book of memoirs. After a second stroke in 2008, he was bedridden.