She delivered babies of the wives of generals and businessmen. They left the delivery room paralyzed for life. Doctors attributed it to complications. But when forty-year-old midwife Elena Martynova was arrested in 1995, it became clear that this was a 15-year-long revenge. Revenge for what happened to her when she was 20.
Revenge, which she methodically carried out in operating rooms while the elite slept peacefully. Sverdlovsk, now Yekaterinburg, was a city of contrasts in the early nineties. Factories were idle, wages were not paid for months, and bread lines stretched for hours. But at the same time, new wealthy directors of privatized enterprises, cooperative members, and officials emerged who seized power at the moment of the system’s collapse.
They drove foreign cars, built cottages, and sent their wives to give birth not in regular maternity hospitals, but in elite departments through connections, where they could get a private room, good food, and the attention of the best doctors. City Maternity Hospital No. 3 on Malysheva Street was considered one of such places.
The old building, built during Stalin’s time, was equipped with modern equipment, received from Germany as part of humanitarian aid. The wives of generals of the Ural Military District, the spouses of major businessmen, and the daughters of regional officials were brought here. The city’s best obstetricians, anesthesiologists with many years of experience, and non-anesthetists who had completed internships abroad worked here.
Among the medical staff was midwife Elena Sergeevna Martynova. She turned 38 in 1992 . A short, thin woman with short dark hair, always neatly trimmed, and delicate features. And with deep-set grey eyes, she had been working in the maternity hospital since 1980. She worked her way up from a junior nurse to a senior midwife.
Colleagues described her as a high-level professional. Calm, collected, never raised her voice. She worked clearly, without fuss. Patients responded positively: she is attentive, delicate, and able to calm people down at critical moments. Elena’s personal life was meager. Not married, no children.
She lives alone in a two-room apartment in a residential area. My parents died in the mid- eighties, my father from a heart attack, my mother from cancer. There were no brothers or sisters, and practically no friends. Her colleagues only knew about her what was work-related. After her shift, Elena went home on weekends to read medical literature or walk around the city.
No hobbies, no interests, no romances. Life reduced to work and loneliness. But none of her colleagues knew that inside this quiet, inconspicuous woman, rage had been living for 18 years . A rage that did not fade, but on the contrary, turned into a cold, methodical determination. Determination that turned her into one of the most brutal criminals in the history of Soviet post-Soviet medicine.
It all started in 1979. Elena Martynova was 20 years old. She was a third-year student at the Sverdlovsk Medical School, preparing to become a midwife. She was an exemplary student, got good grades, was responsible and disciplined. She lived in a dormitory and worked part-time with a nurse at the hospital to pay for textbooks and clothes.
The parents helped, but the family was not rich. My father worked as a lumberjack at a factory, and my mother was a saleswoman in a store. In November 1979, a classmate invited Elena to a party. She said that it was a friend’s birthday, that there would be interesting people, music, and refreshments. Elena usually didn’t go to such events, but her classmate insisted, saying that she needed to relax and take a break from studying.
Elena agreed. The party took place in an apartment in the center of Sverdlovsk, in an old house with high ceilings and stucco. The apartment was huge, with expensive furniture and imported appliances. For those times, this was a luxury, available only to the children of the nomenklatura. There were about 15 young people at the party, aged between 20 and 25, well-dressed, self-confident, drinking imported alcohol.
They smoked foreign cigarettes, laughed loudly, and discussed the places where they had vacationed in the summer: Crimea, Sochi, Bulgaria. Elena felt out of place. These people were from another world – the sons of factory directors, party workers, and high-ranking military men. They looked at her condescendingly, as if she were a curiosity, a girl from a working-class family who had ended up in their company by chance.
The classmate who brought Elena quickly disappeared into one of the rooms with some young man, leaving her alone. Elena wanted to leave, but it was already late, around 11:00 pm. There was no transport, the hostel closed at midnight. She decided to wait for her classmate, sat in the corner, drank tea, tried not to attract attention, but she did attract attention.
Three young men sat down next to her, started talking, and offered her a drink. She refused. They insisted, became intrusive, grabbed my hands, my waist. Elena tried to leave, but they blocked the exit, dragged her into one of the rooms, and locked the door. Elena could not remember what happened next without physical pain.
Even after 20 years three men took turns raping her for several hours. She screamed, but the music drowned out the screams. She resisted, but they were stronger. When they finished, one of them, tall, fair-haired, with cold blue eyes, spoke to her calmly, almost friendly. If she goes to the police, she will be expelled from school, her parents will fire her from work, and she herself may be accused of prostitution.
They have connections, they have money, they have power. Nobody will believe it. It’s better to forget and move on. Elena left her apartment around 4 a.m. and walked more than 5 km through the night city to the dormitory. It was cold, it was snowing, she was wearing a light jacket, no hat, she got to the dormitory, crept inside through the window in the basement, went up to her room, locked the door, and lay down on the bed.
Without undressing, she lay like that until the morning, not crying, not moving, just looking at the ceiling. She didn’t go to the police, she didn’t go to the hospital , she didn’t tell anyone, not even her parents. She continued studying as if nothing had happened . I passed exams, went to practice, smiled when necessary, but something inside broke, something went out forever.
She stopped trusting people and stopped feeling joy. stopped making plans for the future, lived mechanically, performing necessary actions, but not truly living. The classmate who brought her to the party tried to talk to her a week later and apologized. She said that she didn’t know it would turn out like this, that those guys were just making an unfortunate joke.
Elena looked at her with a cold gaze and said: “Don’t come near me again.” My classmate fell behind. They didn’t communicate anymore. Elena graduated from college in 1980. I was assigned to city maternity hospital number three. Started working. Work became her refuge, a place where she could control the situation, where she was respected, where she felt useful.
She helped women give birth, saw new life coming into the world, and this gave some meaning to her existence. But the rage did not go away. It accumulated, grew, and turned into an obsession. Elena thought about those three men every day. She tried to find them, to find out their names, but she couldn’t.
I only remembered faces, voices, and the furnishings of the apartment. She understood that she would never be able to find them, she would never be able to punish them. They were protected by the system, money, connections. They lived their own lives. They probably didn’t even remember about her. They may have had wives, children, careers.
They were happy, protected, untouchable. And then Elena made a decision: if she couldn’t get them, she would get their entourage, their wives, their daughters, their mistresses, those women who use their money, their power, their protection, who live in luxury, not knowing at what cost this was achieved, who come to give birth in elite maternity hospitals through connections, expecting better service, better conditions.
It was the logic of a sick and crippled mind. But for Elena she was perfectly rational. Working at maternity hospital number three, Elena quickly understood how the system worked. Ordinary women gave birth in general wards, with minimal comfort, often without pain relief, and with rough treatment from overworked staff.
But there were also others, those who came in response to a call from above, who were placed in separate wards, who were provided with the best doctors, imported medications, and increased attention. These were the wives of factory directors who, in the early nineties, became the owners of privatized enterprises.
The wives of generals and colonels of the Ural Military District, the spouses of regional administration officials, the mistresses of businessmen who were just beginning to build their empires on the ruins of the USSR, the daughters of party workers who cleverly disguised themselves as democrats and continued to hold power.
Elena watched them with cold interest, studying their manners, their conversations, their demands. They were self-confident, spoiled by attention, and accustomed to having their wishes fulfilled immediately. They complained about inconveniences that would have seemed like luxury to ordinary women in labor , demanding special food, special care, special treatment.
And Elena saw in each of them a continuation of those who had ruined her life. Maybe they weren’t directly to blame. They may not even have known what their husbands had done in their youth, but they benefited from a system where money and connections decided everything, where some could do whatever they wanted to others and get away with it.
The selection of victims was methodical. Elena studied the incoming patients, read their charts, found out who their husbands were, what position they held, what connections they had, and chose those whose husbands were influential enough, but not so much that they would make too much of a fuss if there were problems.
A mid-level general, the director of a factory with several thousand employees, and the deputy head of the administration—a high enough status to arouse Elena’s hatred, but not so high that the incident would attract the attention of the prosecutor’s office or the FSB. It was also important that the birth be sufficiently difficult.
first birth: age after 5, multiple pregnancy, fetal presentation, weak labor. In such cases, complications would appear natural. The medical commission would have attributed everything to objective circumstances. Elena was in no hurry. She chose her first victim only 12 years after her own injury in 1992. She was 33 years old.
She was already an experienced midwife, knew all the intricacies of the work, had access to medications, medical protocols, and confidential information. The first incident occurred in March 1992. A thirty-seven-year-old woman, the wife of the director of a large machine-building plant, was admitted to the maternity hospital. This is my first pregnancy.
Complicated labor, weak labor activity, large fetus, Elena Martynova was on duty . The labor lasted more than 12 hours. Stimulation and pain relief were required. The baby was born a healthy boy, 3 kg 800 g. But 2 hours after birth, the mother began to complain of numbness in her legs, then lost sensation in her arms.
Then she stopped moving altogether. They called a neurologist and conducted an examination. The picture resembled a stroke or spinal cord injury. The tests showed changes in the blood, but the cause could not be determined. The woman was transferred to intensive care and connected to a ventilator.
A week later she died. The medical commission conducted an investigation. Conclusion: complication of childbirth. Thrombosis of cerebral vessels. No medical error was found, caused by stress and blood loss. The deceased husband raised a fuss and demanded that the doctors be punished, but the commission was adamant. The birth protocol was impeccable.
All manipulations were performed correctly, the medications were administered according to the instructions. Just a tragic coincidence . The second case occurred in August of the same year. The thirty-four-year-old wife of a military prosecutor’s colonel. Another birth, but with complications such as histosis and high blood pressure, Elena was on duty again .
The birth went relatively normally, the girl was born healthy, but the next day the woman in labor woke up paralyzed, unable to move her arms or legs. Speech was difficult. The neurologist diagnosed massive spinal cord damage. of unclear etiology. The woman survived, but remained confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life.
The husband, a colonel in the prosecutor’s office, conducted his own investigation, interrogated all the doctors and nurses, demanded the exhumation of medical waste, testing of the medications, but found nothing. The protocols were clear and all manipulations were documented. Witnesses confirmed that the delivery took place without any problems. The commission again delivered its verdict: rare complication, individual intolerance, no medical error. The third case.
In February 1993 the twenty-nine-year-old daughter of the deputy head of the regional administration gave birth to her first child. The girl is young and healthy. The pregnancy proceeded normally, but labor was protracted. Stimulation was needed, Elena was on duty. The baby was born healthy.
But after 4 hours the woman in labor fell into a coma. Doctors fought for three days, but were unable to save him. Death occurred due to respiratory and cardiac arrest. The father, who died, an influential official, used all his connections to sort things out. invited experts from Moscow and demanded that all drugs used during childbirth be concealed and analyzed. The examination lasted a month.
Result: Death occurred as a result of a severe allergic reaction to one of the drugs used to induce labor. Rare cases that could not have been foreseen. The doctors acted according to protocol. There are no guilty parties. The fourth, fifth and sixth cases followed at intervals of several months, always different women, different circumstances, but the same midwife was on duty during the birth.
Always complications that looked natural but resulted in paralysis or death. The medical commissions threw up their hands. Experts theorized about rare pathologies, statistical anomalies, and bad luck. No one wanted to admit the obvious—that a murderer was working at the maternity hospital—because that would have meant a scandal, the closure of the facility, criminal charges against the management, and investigations by the Ministry of Health and the prosecutor’s office.
It was easier to blame everything on medical errors or tragic coincidences. By the end of 1995, Elena Martynova had been implicated in the deaths or disabilities of nine women, nine wives, daughters, or mistresses of influential people, nine cases that went unpunished because no one wanted to dig deeper. The investigation later reconstructed the method that Elena used.
It was simple, effective, and left virtually no evidence. Elena used Soviet-era medications, which were rarely used by the 1990s but were still stored in the maternity hospital’s utility rooms. These were drugs developed in the fifties and sixties with strong side effects, which were later replaced by safer analogues, but they were not disposed of, they were simply put away in the back of the cabinet, where they gathered dust for years.
One such drug is an old- generation muscle relaxant, which in large doses causes paralysis of the respiratory muscles and can lead to respiratory arrest. Another vasoconstrictor that, when taken in the wrong dosage, has been shown to cause thrombosis and stroke. The third anesthetic, which, when injected into the spinal canal in a certain concentration, caused irreversible damage to nerve endings.
Elena had access to these drugs. As the senior midwife, she was responsible for keeping track of medications and could take them without asking any questions. She knew how to use them, in what doses, at what moments. During labor, when the mother was in a state of stress, pain, fatigue, when the attention of doctors and nurses was focused on the child, Elena administered the drug, sometimes through an IV, adding it to the main solution, sometimes through an injection in the back, disguised as epidural anesthesia, sometimes through an
intravenous catheter, which was in each mother’s arms. The drug’s effect did not begin immediately, but after an hour, two, sometimes several hours. By this time the labor was already over. Elena handed the patient over to other nurses and left her shift. When complications began, she was already at home or in another department.
It was impossible to connect her with the incident. Elena filled out the birth records flawlessly, recording all the procedures and all the medications administered, but only those that were officially approved. No mention of old Soviet medications, no records of additional injections. If one of her colleagues saw her administering something, she would explain vitamins, glucose, painkillers.
Nobody checked, nobody suspected. Psychologically, Elena acted coldly, without emotions. She took no pleasure in killing, and did not sit at the bedside of a dying woman to enjoy her suffering. It wasn’t sadism, it was execution of a sentence. In her distorted perception, she was restoring justice. Every woman who was paralyzed or died was a price to pay for what happened to her at age 20.
She did not kill the innocent, she killed the guilty by association, the wives of those who belonged to the class of rapists, the exploiters of those who enjoyed power with impunity. Elena kept score. In a notebook that she kept at home, in a drawer with linen, she wrote down dates, names, results. no details, just numbers, initials and results, like an accountant keeping track of the work done.
By the end of 1995 in notebooks. Everything changed in December 1995 , when another patient, the thirty-five-year-old wife of a major general of the Ural Military District, was admitted to the maternity hospital. This is my second birth, but I am no longer young, so there were risks. The woman responded to a call from above.
She was placed in the best ward. The best doctors were appointed, Elena Martynova was on duty. She studied the patient’s chart and found out who her husband was: a major general, commander of an artillery brigade, a hero of Afghanistan, a recipient of medals, the ideal victim. Elena decided to act.
The birth went normally, without any particular complications. The boy was born healthy, weighing 3 kg 500 g. The mother in labor felt well, was conscious, talked to her husband on the phone, and was happy. Elena administered the drug through an IV an hour before the end of her shift. Everything is as usual. She handed the patient over to the duty shift and went home.
But this time something went wrong. Two hours after Elena left, the woman in labor began to complain of numbness in her legs. The nurse on duty called the doctor. The doctor examined me, became concerned, and called a neurologist. The neurologist diagnosed incipient paralysis and ordered the patient to be immediately transferred to intensive care.
In intensive care, they connected all possible means: an artificial ventilation machine, lungs, IVs with anticoagulants, drugs to maintain blood pressure. The doctors fought all night. By morning the condition had stabilized. The paralysis did not progress. The woman survived. Consciousness remained, but there was no movement in the legs.
The major general, the injured husband, arrived at the maternity hospital an hour after the complications began. He was furious, demanded explanations, shouted at doctors, and threatened military tribunals. The head doctor tried to calm me down, explaining that this was a rare complication and that the doctors had done everything possible.
The general did not listen. He called Moscow, contacted an acquaintance in the Prosecutor General’s Office, and demanded an immediate investigation. The next day, a commission from Moscow arrived at the maternity hospital , including investigators from the Prosecutor General’s Office, experts, doctors, and specialists in medical crimes.
They confiscated all medical records for the last 5 years: birth records, medication logs, and questioned all staff, including cleaners and orderlies. We checked all the utility rooms, all the medicine cabinets, all the medical waste storage facilities and started to find oddities. It turned out that over the past three years there had been nine cases of death or severe disability in the maternity hospital.
The birth rate is 10 times higher than the national average. All nine cases occurred during the shift of the same midwife, Elena Martynova. All nine patients were wives or daughters of influential people. All nine cases were written off as medical complications without detailed investigation. Investigators reviewed the birth records for all nine cases. The protocols were perfect.
All manipulations are documented, all medications are recorded, all signatures are in place. But experts noticed one detail. Each protocol included a short time interval of 5-10 minutes, when the midwife was left alone with the woman in labor without witnesses. Officially, this time was allocated for hygiene procedures, changing linens, and preparing for transfer to the postpartum ward.
But it was precisely at these moments, as experts’ calculations showed, that an additional substance could have been introduced . checked the drug storage facility. In a back cupboard that was rarely opened, they found old, Soviet- made medications with expired expiration dates that should have been disposed of back in the 1980s.
Among them are muscle relaxants, vasoconstrictors, and old-generation anesthetics. The registration log showed that the quantity of these drugs had decreased over the past three years. Someone took them, but there was no record in the journal . Elena Martynova had a key to this cabinet. As the senior midwife, she was responsible for keeping track of all medications in the department.
No one else had access. On December 23, 1995, Elena Martynova was detained right at her workplace. She went on duty and put on her robe in the locker room. When two investigators and three police officers entered, they showed an arrest warrant. Elena didn’t resist, didn’t try to run, didn’t scream, she simply took off her robe, put on her coat, and silently went with them.
The interrogation lasted 8 hours. Elena was sitting in the investigator’s office. Opposite her is an investigator from the prosecutor’s office, next to her is a protocol clerk, in the corner is a stenographer, on the table is a stack of medical records, photographs of dead and paralyzed women, and medication logs. The investigator asked questions methodically, calmly.
Elena answered just as calmly, without emotion. She did not deny it, did not try to justify herself, did not invent versions of medical errors or tragic coincidences. She simply said, “Yes, it was her. Yes, she administered drugs that caused paralysis or death. Yes, she did it deliberately, planning every action. No, she doesn’t regret it.
No, she doesn’t consider herself a criminal. She was restoring justice.” The investigator asked, “Why these women in particular ? Had they personally done anything bad to her?” Elena replied, “No, they did n’t do anything personally, but they were the wives of those who belonged to the class of rapists.” They used money obtained through power and violence.
They lived in luxury while others suffered. They were part of a system that allowed three men to rape her and get away with it . The investigator asked to talk about the rape. Elena told the story dryly, without details, as if she were talking about someone else. She told me about the party, about the apartment, about the three men.
The investigator asked if she tried to find these men. Elena answered: “Yes.” I tried for the first few years but couldn’t do it. They disappeared into the crowd of the elite, protected by connections and money. And then she realized that she needed to hit not them, but those who were close to them.
The investigator asked the question that had been tormenting everyone: how did she choose her victims? Elena explained her method, studied the files of incoming patients, found out who their husbands were, what position they held, and chose those who were influential enough, but not too influential. Those whose birth was promised to be difficult, so that the complications would appear natural.
Those who came in response to a call from above, expecting special treatment. The investigator asked if she felt guilty. Elena thought for a moment, then answered: “No.” She felt satisfied. Each time another woman died or was left paralyzed, Elena felt that the balance was being restored, that her pain was at least a little compensated, that the system that had protected rapists was now losing its own.
The investigator asked: “The last question: did she plan to stop? Elena looked at him coldly and said: “No, she would stop only when she herself dies or when there is not a single happy family left in the elite .” The interrogation was over. Elena was sent for a psychiatric examination. The experts worked for two weeks.
The result: sane. She was aware of the nature of her actions, was able to control them. She suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder that developed after the rape, has an obsession with revenge, but this does not deprive her of the ability to answer for her actions. It was recommended to find her guilty and sentence her according to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
The trial of Elena Martynova began in March 1996. They tried to keep the process under wraps. There were too many high-profile names among the victims. Too many uncomfortable questions about why no one noticed a series of deaths earlier, why medical commissions turned a blind eye to the obvious, why influential families were unable to protect their wives and daughters.
The hearings were held behind closed doors, journalists were not allowed, and the relatives of the victims were advised not to talk about the case. The official press release was vague. The medical worker was accused of abuse of power, leading to grave consequences. There was no mention of serial murders, the location, or a past rape.
The prosecutor demanded the maximum sentence of 25 years’ imprisonment for the combined crimes. Nine counts of intentionally causing grievous bodily harm resulting in death or disability. Aggravating circumstances, particular cruelty, exploitation of the victims’ helpless state, multiple offenses, the defense attempted to exploit Elena’s psychological trauma.
The lawyer, a young woman assigned to the case, argued that her client was a victim herself, that the rape had broken her psyche, that she needed treatment, not punishment. She asked that mitigating circumstances be taken into account and that compulsory treatment in a psychiatric hospital be ordered instead of a prison colony.
But the court was adamant. Elena Martynova committed nine serious crimes, knowing their nature, planning each action, and covering her tracks. She did not act in a state of passion or lose control . She methodically killed over the course of three years. Her trauma cannot serve as an excuse. Elena Martynova’s story shocked the Russian medical community.
How could this happen? How could a midwife who dedicated her life to helping women and newborns turn into a cold-blooded killer? How could the oversight system allow nine consecutive deaths without investigation? Following the trial, large-scale inspections of all maternity hospitals in the Sverdlovsk region were conducted.
Controls over medication inventory were tightened , mandatory video surveillance in delivery rooms was introduced, and protocols were changed to require the presence of two medical workers during any procedures involving women in labor. The chief physician of Maternity Hospital No. 3 was fired, and several department heads were demoted.
The maternity hospital was closed for six months for reorganization, but the changes to the system did not bring back life. the dead and did not restore the health of the paralyzed. Nine families were left forever. With pain, with emptiness, with the question of why. Elena Martynova is serving time in a women’s penal colony in the Perm region.
Her colleagues, prisoners, treat her with caution, even among those who have committed murder. Helpless women and the deprivation of children, mothers is considered low. She was beaten several times, once doused with boiling water. The colony administration transferred her to an isolated cell for their own safety. Elena does not repent.
According to prison psychologists, she still considers her actions just. She says that the only thing she regrets is that she was not able to find and punish the three men who raped her. Everything else, in her opinion, was a necessary balance. The three rapists were never found. The investigation tried to establish their identities based on Elena’s descriptions. But too many years have passed.
The apartment where the rape took place has changed several times owners. The classmate who brought Elena to the party died of cancer in 1992. There were no other witnesses. Perhaps those three men are still alive somewhere, unaware that their crime thirty years ago led to the deaths of nine innocent women.
Elena will spend 23 years in prison. Nine women will never return to life. Nine children grew up without mothers. The three rapists who started it all remained unpunished. And somewhere in the archives lies a file marked Secret that tells this terrible story, the story of Silent Vengeance, which lasted for years and took too many lives.
