Web-sites: http://www.sledcom.ru/rukovodstvo/17682/, http://www.sledcom.ru/blog/

Alexander Bastrykin (Александр Иванович Бастрыкин) was born on Aug. 27, 1953, in Pskov.

Education: Law, Leningrad State University, 1975 (He was a classmate of Vladimir Putin's.) Ph.D., law, 1987.

1983: Secretary of the Leningrad Region Komsomol

1985: Senior lecturer in the Leningrad State University law department

1988: Director of the Investigative Officers' Training Institute within the Office of the Public Prosecutor of the Soviet Union

1992: Rector of the St. Petersburg Law Institute

2001: Head of the Justice Ministry's department for the Northwest Federal District

2006: Head of the Interior Ministry's department for the Central Federal District

2007: First deputy prosecutor general

2007: Head of the newly formed Investigative Committee of the Prosecutor General's Office

2009: Injured by a bomb while investigating a terrorist attack on the Nevsky Express train

January 2011-present: Head of the Investigative Committee, now independent from the Prosecutor General's Office