His attack on Kaiser Wilhelm I in June 1878 was the second attempt on the emperor's life within a month, and its political consequences outlasted the wound itself — Bismarck used the wave of public alarm to push through the Anti-Socialist Laws, suppressing left-wing political organizing in Germany for over a decade. Nobiling shot the 81-year-old emperor from an apartment window along the Unter den Linden, wounding him seriously enough that Crown Prince Frederick briefly assumed imperial duties. The shooter's own motivations were never fully established; he turned his revolver on himself immediately after the attack and never regained coherent consciousness before dying that September.

Operating across Orenburg Oblast over a six-year period, Andreev targeted girls and women in a pattern of abduction, rape, and murder that drew sustained investigative attention. Despite being conclusively linked to at least seven killings and placed on a wanted list, he managed to evade capture — a fact that defined as much of his case as the crimes themselves.