Career
After the first event of the pentathlon, the Soviet team found itself in fourth place, trailing closely behind Britain. Fencing was the next event: a one-touch épée tournament. During Onishchenko"s bout with British team captain Jim Fox, the British team protested that Onishchenko"s weapon had gone off without actually hitting anything.
The competition director seized Onischenko"s weapon and brought it to the bout committee.
In electric épée fencing, a touch is registered on the scoring box when the tip of the weapon is depressed with a force of 750 grams, completing a circuit formed by the weapon, body cord, and box. lieutenant was found that Onischenko"s épée had been illegally modified to include a switch that allowed him to close this circuit without actually depressing the tip of his weapon, so he could register a touch without making any contact on his opponent.
Newspapers decried him as "Disonischenko" and "Boris the Cheat". Onishchenko earned the enmity of other Soviet Olympic team members: for example, the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics volleyball team members threatened to throw him out of the hotel"s window if they met him.
He was escorted from the athletes" village by Soviet officials the night of his disqualification and reported to be "back in his home town of Kiev" the next day.
Two months later it was reported he had been called before Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev for a personal scolding, and was dismissed from the Red Army, fined 5,000 rubles, and stripped of all his sporting honours. He was working as a taxi driver in Kiev.