The "Doctor Pi" scandal: Who is he and why is he back in the spotlight? Discover the details surrounding this controversial figure making headlines again.
Andrey Slyusarchuk, better known as "Doctor Pi," has once again found himself in the spotlight. The former conman, who impersonated a renowned neurosurgeon for years, has returned to the media landscape with an emotional appeal to Donald Trump, reports UNN.
The previously convicted Slyusarchuk is attempting to regain attention by leveraging the war as a tool. In his emotional post, he addresses Trump and Putin, urging them to recognize the true cost of their policies—the bodies of dead children, pregnant women, and the elderly.
He describes the alleged last words of deceased children, parents, and seniors, recounting the most horrific war stories. Slyusarchuk also calls out world leaders, accusing them of inaction and comparing them to "hyenas dividing the corpse of Ukraine."
In times of war, such manipulations only heighten panic and despair among people.
However, it is important to remember that Slyusarchuk himself is a person with a criminal past, caught in lies, schemes, and even murder. His return to the media spotlight through such messages may not just be an emotional outburst but part of a strategy to restore his reputation.
His Facebook message garnered over 6,000 shares within a day, with some of those reposting it including a minister and four members of parliament. However, after the backlash, the politicians deleted their reposts.
Journalist Denis Kazansky criticized the widespread sharing of Slyusarchuk's message, emphasizing that people fail to verify the information.
"This is a convicted fraudster who has served time in prison and is not who he claims to be.
This information is very easy to Google, but why check anything? People see an emotional post and share it without thinking.
The fraudster is pleased. He doesn’t even need to change his name. Just write a heart-wrenching post, mention Trump in a hype-worthy way, and he already has a bunch of new followers—new fans who don't know how to use search engines. A classic technique,” Kazansky noted.
Kazansky points out that comments are already emerging suggesting it doesn't matter if a certain individual is a fraudster, as they highlight important issues. He explains that this is a classic discrediting technique. If the appeal to Trump reaches someone on his team, the reaction will be immediate: the person will be labeled a criminal, and his words will be deemed unreliable because "they're all like that over there."
The journalist emphasizes that all messages shared by Slyusarchuk automatically lose credibility due to his reputation. They become tainted by his name, and perhaps this is exactly what the campaign's initiator aims for. He believes it is successful, as it genuinely engages citizens who do not verify information on Google.
Volunteer Lesya Litvinova also reacted to the widespread sharing of the known fraudster's message.
"Do you have a short memory? Then at least go ask Google who you're reposting. Doctor Pi. A kind of Arestovich, parasitizing on the topic of medicine. No questions—talented. Just like always with any swindler. Because touching you at your most painful points with the most understandable words is the primary trick to hook you. And—voila. You’re already spreading text about 'his morgue' and children's brains with fragments under the caption 'professor of neurosurgery.' In 'his' morgue are exclusively gullible idiots whom he 'treated.' And do you know why they believed him? Because he was incredibly popular. Promoted and spread to the masses just as well as Kashpirovsky and Chumak. A local miracle,” Litvinova wrote.
Doctor Bohdana Murashova from the Kyiv City Clinical Endocrinology Center wrote on social media that the repost of this emotionally charged lie was made by quite sensible people.
"This morning in the news feed (a well-forgotten old) fraudster Slyusarchuk—the infamous Doctor Pi. The repost of this emotionally written lie was made by quite sensible people...
Such is the power of a well-written text. And it's very sad because these people can be made to believe anything,” she noted.
Vasyl Chornyi, a lecturer at Lviv National Ivan Franko University, pointed out that many people have learned to use gadgets but have not learned to use their brains.
Who is Andrey Slyusarchuk?
Slyusarchuk gained fame in the 2000s through television broadcasts, where he showcased supposedly phenomenal abilities—from memorizing millions of digits after the decimal point of Pi to performing complex neurosurgical operations. He claimed to possess unique knowledge about the brain and even alleged to have won a chess game against a computer.
Former President Viktor Yushchenko even personally met with Slyusarchuk in 2009 to discuss the establishment of a Brain Institute. The organization was supposed to seek ways to treat oncology. In 2011, Viktor Yanukovych awarded the fraudster the State Prize of Ukraine in the field of education, amounting to 150,000 hryvnias.
However, in 2009, journalists from the newspaper "Express" published an investigation stating that the man was born in Zhytomyr, although he claimed to have been born in Vinnytsia. His mother abandoned him, so the child was sent to a boarding school, where he studied to be a plasterer-tiler. But Slyusarchuk told a completely different story. He claimed to have enrolled in a medical institute in Moscow and after his studies moved to Lviv region. There, he worked in a district hospital and conducted hypnosis sessions. Subsequently, according to Slyusarchuk, he studied at St. Petersburg University and managed to complete his education in just one year. Furthermore, he asserted that he defended his dissertation in Moscow and received the title of professor. After that, he returned to Lviv, where he worked as a lecturer at a polytechnic university.
It later turned out that Slyusarchuk had no medical education, and all his diplomas were fake. Despite this, he taught at universities and even received the title of professor using forged documents.
But the worst part was that he performed surgeries on people. Investigations revealed that his actions resulted in the deaths of at least five patients in Lviv, Ternopil, and Khmelnytsky regions.
Arrest, trial, and unexpected acquittal
In 2011, Slyusarchuk was arrested in Kyiv on suspicion of fraud. In 2014, he was sentenced to 8 years in prison for illegal medical activity, using forged documents, fraud, and two counts of manslaughter. However, he was released in 2016 under the so-called "Savchenko law," which counted one day in pre-trial detention as two days in prison.
Slyusarchuk did not admit his guilt and sought a review of the case. In 2024, the Shevchenkivsky Court in Lviv acquitted him.
What is he doing now?
After his release, Slyusarchuk continued his "treatment" activities and is now living in luxury in a two-story mansion near Kyiv worth half a million dollars.
It turned out that he is working in pharmaceutical and chemical companies, and he posts photos from surgeries, poems, and reflections on life on social media.