A Russian court yesterday sentenced Alexander Pichushkin, a supermarket worker known as the "Bitsa Maniac," to life in prison for murdering 48 people and attempting to murder three others.

Pichushkin, 33, pleaded guilty to 60 murders and three attempted murders. In fact, he has claimed to have killed more people as part of a bizarre fantasy of having a victim for each of the 64 squares on a chessboard.

There is no death penalty in Russia and life in prison is the severest punishment. The jury convicted Pichushkin of murder Wednesday, saying he does not deserve leniency.

"The court bears in mind the extreme danger posed by the criminal in the dock ... The court sentences Pichushkin to life in jail in order to restore justice and prevent new crimes," said Judge Vladimir Usov of the Moscow City Court.

The court also ordered compulsory therapy and psychiatric monitoring. It was confirmed that Pichushkin has a mental disorder but he is sane and cannot avoid criminal responsibility, Russian media reported.

Pichushkin lured his victims to a park in Moscow by offering them vodka and threw most of their bodies into a sewage pit after they got drunk or were knocked out by him with a hammer or vodka bottle, prosecutors said.

Pichushkin said that he killed one of his last victims in February last year to show that he was still at large in response to reports by Russian newspapers that the "Bitsa Maniac" had been caught.

Pichushkin was arrested in June 2006 after a former colleague left a note to her son, which said that she was going for a walk with him, and was then found dead.

Before that, Russia's most notorious serial killer was Andrei Chikatilo, who was convicted in 1992 of murdering 52 children and young women over 12 years.