According to the memoirs of Zinoviev, while still in school, he had the idea to kill Stalin, which he repeatedly discussed with close friends; The "plan" failed because they did not find a weapon. In Moscow Institute of Philosophy, Literature and History, at the next Komsomol meeting at the end of 1939, Zinoviev emotionally spoke about the troubles and injustices that took place in the village, openly criticized the personality cult of Stalin. Zinoviev was sent for a psychiatric examination, and then expelled from the Komsomol and Moscow Institute of Philosophy, Literature and History. According to his memoirs, he was arrested and interrogated at the Lubyanka. Zinoviev recalled that the investigators were confident that someone had inspired his views to him, so they planned to let him go to reveal the entire anti-Soviet group. When transferred to one of the apartments of the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs, Zinoviev managed to escape. He hid in different places: he left for Pakhtino for a while, then he wandered, and later returned to Moscow. At the end of 1940 he joined the Red Army to avoid persecution. In the military enlistment office he called himself "Zenoviev", saying that he had lost his passport.