The Litvinenko Inquiry

Part 8 | Chapters 1 to 6 | Who killed Alexander Litvinenko?
8.70 Given the findings that I have made above regarding the time and place at which, and
the means by which, Mr Litvinenko ingested the fatal dose of polonium 210, these
matters are clearly sufficient to raise a question as to the possible involvement of
Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun in the poisoning. On their own, however, these facts do
not establish anything more than that.
8.71 I have referred above to the forensic evidence of polonium 210 contamination found
in the Pine Bar in the context of my finding that the Pine Bar was the location of
Mr Litvinenko’s fatal poisoning. Similarly, it is the forensic evidence of polonium 210
contamination found in other places associated with Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun that I
regard as the most important evidence of their responsibility for the poisoning. There
are three points that I make in this regard.
8.72 First, the extensive testing for radiation throughout the Millennium Hotel only revealed
one area of primary contamination apart from those found in the Pine Bar. That was in
the plughole of the room occupied by Mr Kovtun and Mr Sokolenko.
8.73 Second, secondary contamination was found in Mr Lugovoy’s bedroom and also (at
particularly high levels) in the gentlemen’s lavatories close to the Pine Bar. CCTV
footage shows that both Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun visited those lavatories prior to
the meeting with Mr Litvinenko. The same footage demonstrates that Mr Litvinenko
did not visit those lavatories during his time in the hotel.
8.74 Third, these findings form part of a wider pattern. Primary polonium 210 contamination
was also found in the bathroom of room 107 of the Best Western Hotel, where
Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun changed prior to their meeting at Erinys on 16 October
2006, and where Mr Lugovoy slept that night, and also in the bathroom of room 848
of the Sheraton Hotel, where Mr Lugovoy stayed between 25 and 27 October 2006.
Secondary contamination was also discovered, as I have recounted in Part 6, in a
large number of places associated with the two men during this period.
8.75 It will be recalled that A1 gave evidence to the effect that a finding of primary
contamination was only consistent with the surface in question being exposed directly
to a source of polonium 210. In practical terms, this means that polonium 210 must
have been handled in each of the three hotel bedrooms to which I have referred above.
This amounts to highly compelling evidence of a connection between Mr Lugovoy,
Mr Kovtun and the (extremely rare) isotope with which Mr Litvinenko was poisoned,
including such evidence found in the very hotel where the poisoning took place.
8.76 I consider that this evidence on its own would have been sufficient to satisfy me
that Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun were responsible for Mr Litvinenko’s poisoning,
and in particular that one or other or both of them handled the polonium 210, which
was used to kill Mr Litvinenko, in the bathroom of room 382 of the Millennium Hotel
(i.e. Mr Kovtun’s room).
8.77 But there is further evidence to consider, to which I shall next turn.
8.78 Before doing so, there is one further point to make about the pattern of primary
contamination found in the hotel bedrooms. There is a striking similarity as to the
location of the primary contamination found in room 382 of the Millennium Hotel and
in room 107 of the Best Western Hotel. In both places, primary contamination was
found inside the plughole in the bathroom. The natural inference is that polonium 210
had been poured down the sink. Since this appears to have happened in both rooms,
193