Death of a Dissident - Alex Goldfarb [84]
The sushi scene sold Tregubova’s book. The book earned her many powerful enemies. One day, as Tales was nearing the top of Russia’s best-seller lists, a small bomb exploded in the hallway next to her apartment, denting her door but failing to harm her. Ever since, Tregubova has spent most of her time abroad, and in April 2007, she applied for asylum in the UK.
By the beginning of September Sasha Litvinenko’s case had finally moved through each step of the prosecution process and reached the court. Marina and her lawyer went to see the president of the Moscow district military court, a general.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I am an old man and I promise you that you will get a fair hearing.” He scheduled the trial for the beginning of October and assigned a judge to the case.
The defense immediately moved to change the “restraining measure,” a Russian legal term that resembles a writ of habeas corpus. Sasha’s lawyer was asking that he be released until the trial; as a first offender he was not dangerous to the public and had no reason to flee.
On September 15, Judge Vladimir Karnaukh considered the request. He looked supremely bored. He read the petition, sifted through the case file for a few moments, made faces as he peeked at random pages of the fat volume, and ruled to approve. Marina could not believe it.
“I was doubly shocked,” she recalled. “After all these months, I was close to desperation, and now I realized that within this monstrous system there could be normal, reasonable people—that, after all, justice was possible. But then I got so angry. It took this apathetic man just a few moments to nix months of our agony as if it was nothing! It looked almost like an accident. He could have ruled otherwise, or somebody else could have released Sasha months earlier. There must be something wrong with the world if people can be thrown in jail and released with such ease, I thought.”
The lawyer interrupted these thoughts. “Come on, let’s not lose any time.” For some reason he looked worried.
They rushed to Lefortovo.
The duty officer took the court order, checked something in his records, left the room apparently to make a phone call, and then returned to say, “Sorry, this document is no good. It does not have a court stamp.”
They rushed back to the court.
“Strange,” said Karnaukh. “They know my signature. Why didn’t they call me?”
He went to the court president, made him cosign the release order, stamped it, and handed them the paper, saying, “Good luck.”
They rushed back to Lefortovo.
The officer took the release and went away. He returned in thirty minutes.
“The release order has not been officially delivered. It should have come here with the court messenger, or through registered delivery or some other official channel. We cannot process it.”
“It will take at least two days to arrange that,” said the lawyer somberly.
Marina called Boris, who told them to come see him.
Boris heard them out and placed a phone call to his friends in the Kremlin. Within fifteen minutes an FSO officer arrived in a car with lights flashing and siren wailing, retrieved the court order, and delivered it to Lefortovo in an impressive pouch with federal government seals—as official as can be. Marina arrived a half-hour later; she had not been able to keep up with the FSO car.
“Well,” said the prison officer, “now it seems all right. We can say that we are officially in receipt. But it is almost the end of the day, and we need at least two hours to process the release, so come tomorrow morning.”
The lawyer went to break the bad news to Sasha, who had been waiting in a holding cell since