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An axe-wielding dad murdered his wife, mother and six children after losing his temper over his son's "parrot" haircut.

Oleg Belov has been sentenced to life in prison after admitting the ten minute rampage, then hacking up the dead bodies with a chopper.

The 53-year-old said he sprinkled "perfume and cologne" on the bodies to stop them smelling.

He was found guilty despite withdrawing his original confession, claiming it had been extracted under torture, and instead blamed his 32-year-old wife Julia's cousin or neighbours for the slaughter.

Earlier in the trial he told the judge how his wife had cropped their six year old son Fyodor's hair in a "foolish" way.

"She cut him like a parrot," he said, adding that she was seeking to divorce him, and remove the children from his control.

"I asked her: 'Are you kidding or what?'

"I tried to grab the hair clipper, and a fight broke out. I hit her twice in the jaw, she ran into the hallway and started knocking on the neighbours' doors.

"She screamed. I had never heard her screaming so loud. I was very scared.

"I was scared that now they would definitely take away children.

"I took her hand and quietly brought her home. Yulia told me not to touch her, she said she would call the police.

"I felt anger and realised that I would kill her. Or lose the children. I took my hunting knife and approached her from behind.

"I stabbed her with a knife in her right side. I killed the children so that they would stay mine.

"The Bible says that children will be resurrected. So I decided that the kids will resurrect, and we will live together again."

The court in Nizhny Novgorod was told that blue-eyed Belov had suffered from a "mental disorder" but was "not insane" and was judged to be "criminally responsible" for the killing of his family.

In a mea culpa from the courtroom glass cage he begged his mother-in-law Valentina Zaitseva, 62, for forgiveness but she rejected his plea.

State prosecutors said that on 26 July last year the father "committed the murder of his wife Yulia in the presence of their children" and he sought to "cover up the crime by killing all the children".

The court heard that eldest daughter Alena, seven, "rushed to her mother's body", the prosecutors said

"But Belov grabbed her by the hair and stabbed her at least seven times with a knife.

"Then he killed his second daughter, five-year-old Sonia, his son, three-year-old Nikifor, then two-year-old Ilya.

"Then he took his one-year-old daughter Daria, put her onto a bed and stabbed her.

"After killing everyone in the room, he went to the bathroom where six-year-old Fyodor was hiding and stabbed him at least four times."

Next he went to the village where his mother Zinaida Belova, 73, lived, telling her "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" before stabbing her 21 times.

"I took my mother's axe and dismembered the bodies using surgical gloves," he said.

He put the body parts in bags and covered the flat in foam to stop the smell spreading.

"I also bought perfumes and colognes," he said.

During the case, he changed his plea, alleging he had been tortured into confessing to killing "my beautiful young wife" and his "healthy and happy children".

"Why does everyone blame me? Who needs it, who would benefit from the death of my wife?"

He claimed she had faced death threats from a cousin, and from neighbours.

After a six hour reading of the verdict by judge Dmitry Khodak, Belov vowed to appeal his conviction.

He will serve his sentence at one of Russia's harshest penal colonies.