MOSCOW, Mar 18, 2001 -- (Agence France Presse) Russian police have arrested a man who confessed to murdering four people in a basement in the Russian capital in what appears to have been ritual Satanic slayings, Interfax reported on Saturday.
At around 3.30 a.m on Saturday, the fire service received a phone call reporting a blaze in the basement of an apartment building in eastern Moscow, Police Lieutenant-Colonel Fyodor Agapov told the news agency.
When fire fighters arrived at the scene, they found the decomposed bodies of two women and two men. Three of them had been decapitated and one man's chest was cut open.
There were candles around the bodies, which were also decorated with flowers, according to Interfax.
Agapov would not comment on the motive for the crime.
But one of the police investigators quoted by the news agency, said the murder appeared to have been committed by a Satanic cult judging by the way the bodies were mutilated. ((c) 2001 Agence France Presse)