The first documentary investigation into the life and murder of the famous pioneer hero, who denounced his father and became one of the main symbols of the Soviet system. What really happened in the early 1930s in the Siberian village of Gerasimovka, in the Kremlin and at Lubyanka? Who benefited from the teenager's death? Who and how sang the exploits of the young informant? Is the informer still a hero today? Druzhnikov’s text was distributed in samizdat, first published in 1988 in London. The book was banned in the Soviet Union, and has now been supplemented with new materials. It is addressed to the Russian reader who wants to know the whole truth about the past, which is still being hidden by the authorities. The publication is illustrated with unique archival photographic documents collected by the author of the book, and photographs taken by him half a century after the events.