After his service in the army, Taran began working at a sovkhoz as a zoo technician, fireman and inspector.
Taran stayed in Russia, focusing his care on his son Vladimir, who had a drinking problem.
31 December 2002 Fifteen minutes after the festive Battle of the Bells, Taran opened fire at the windows of Erkenov's house.
5 September 2003 Taran shot at the windows of the house of the Head Physician of the District Hospital, Sergey Gresev.
20 October 2003 Taran killed the senior security officer, Oleg Tanchik (38 years old).
21 June 2004 Taran killed the Police Chief of the Criminal Department of the Aleksandrovsky ATS, Vladimir Shtan.
27 November 2005 Taran fired at a commander of a traffic police platoon named Andrei Radchenko with a machine gun.
Five months earlier, Radchenko had stopped Taran's Volga, and when he refused to undergo a medical examination, his car was taken to a penalty area.
In 2008, one of the villagers from Alexandrovskoye found an AK-47 assault rifle with a homemade silencer wrapped in a bathrobe in the forest.
During a walk around the repair shops, one of the local locksmiths identified the silencer and said that it was ordered by Taran, who needed it for a nozzle for a gas burner.
In addition, the court decided that he must pay 1 million and 50 thousand rubles to the family members of the surviving victims for moral damage.
Residents from Alexandrovskoye, where Taran lived until his arrest, expressed mixed feelings towards their fellow villager.
For instance, in the case of Erkenov's murder, the killer had previously disabled the surveillance camera near the house and fired a sighting.