Killer told police of murder plot

A convicted paedophile who killed a man in his home while an undercover police team kept surveillance outside was jailed for life yesterday.

A judge at Manchester Crown Court told Mikhail Gallatinov, 23, who had been targeted by a police operation shortly after being released from jail, that he was a dangerous man who presented a risk to the public. The jury took just an hour to convict Gallatinov of Moston, Manchester, of murder, rejecting his plea of diminished responsibility.

Jurors were told that during a week-long trial that Adrian Kaminsky, 28, was strangled by Gallatinov in his terraced house because of a grudge he held over a previous homosexual encounter.

Gallatinov had been secretly video-taped telling an undercover police officer who befriended him how he was going to carry out a killing.

His plans involved driving his victim across the Pennines to Hull, and after the murder cutting off the hands and burning the body to prevent identification.

But Gallatinov thwarted police efforts to prevent a murder by strangling his victim the day before he had told the undercover officer he was going to do so.

Police only discovered the killing had already been carried out when they stopped Gallatinov's car on the outskirts of Hull in November last year and found Mr Kaminsky's near-naked body in the boot. Gallatinov had even taken photographs of the dead body just after the murder using a camera lent to him by police.

In two taped meetings with the undercover officer - known only as "Steve" - on the day of the murder, Gallatinov was seen by the jury laughing as he described how he was going to lure his victim to an isolated spot near Hull and murder him.

Police did not know the identity of the intended victim until they discovered Mr Kaminsky's body in the boot.

Jailing Gallatinov, the Recorder of Manchester, Judge Rhys Davies QC, told him: "This is a case in which there has been a completely cold-blooded killing carried out by you without apparent motive and without apparent remorse. You, in my view, are a dangerous young man and you present a considerable risk to the public in the future. These are matters which will have to be reflected in the advice I will have to give to the Secretary of State."

Police later defended their operation and said there was nothing they could have done to prevent the killing taking place.