Though in official databases he was (then) still listed as undergoing treatment, in 1991 he was discharged. Once out, he began associating with transients and beggars, and developed a deep-seated hatred of street children; whom he viewed as a byproduct of Russia's emerging democracy. Spesivstev was likewise particularly embittered by an episode during his commitment at the Oryol Hospital, in which he asked another patient to insert a metal ball into his urethra to make him more virile. This had the opposite effect, causing erectile dysfunction and genital pains. Alexander, then Lyudmila began to lure victims into their apartment, chosen at random, where Alexander would torture and eventually kill them. Unaccompanied street children, attending discothèques and playing in construction sites had become commonplace in the impoverished city of Novokuznetsk since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and they became his main target. The bodies of victims would sometimes be cannibalized Lyudmila would dispose of unwanted remains by throwing them from buckets into the Aba River, late at night. The first sign of his victims arose when the gangrenous severed heads, torsos, and arms of unidentifiable children were found washed up on the banks of the River Aba. It was not immediately believed there was a serial killer, and only after several large groups of unattended children disappeared was a serial mass murderer suspected as being active in the city. Otherwise, investigators in the regional Directorate of Internal Affairs suspected that organ smugglers were acting within the city's boundaries. Several criminal gangs from the Caucusus region were active in Novokuznetsk at the time, and police searched the baggage of outward flights. Additionally, several hundred internal troops and police officers were deployed to search for the killer; at some point thought to be Oleg Rylkov. Witness statements following the disappearance of several girls who were seen leaving a store with his mother helped police identify her. Her son was officially listed as undergoing a course of treatment at a psychiatric hospital. One morning, the neighborhood police officer and a plumber complained that a resident refused to let them in his apartment to relieve a clog. The resident claimed he was mentally ill and kept in his apartment. This alarmed police, as her son was ostensibly still at the hospital in Oryol. The two men forced their way into his apartment, where they smelt an intense and putrid odor, resembling unspecified rotting. A woman bleeding from a severe stab wound to the chest, and a decapitated, de-limbed torso was uncovered in the bathtub.