Talk about a script writing itself! Sony and Warner Bros. who are both developing films about the Alexander Litvinenko murder might just get their third act after all. Johnny Depp won’t need to look too deep to get inspiration for his role as Sasha the Spy. The shooting, ahem . . . carjacking, or is it mugging, no wait, shooting of Paul Joyal has revived a case that by all appearances seemed all but closed. Last week, Paul JoyalLitvinenko acquaintance, security expert and “a longtime critic of the Putin regime,” was shot in his DC suburban neighborhood shortly after he uttered these words on Dateline NBC: “A message has been communicated to anyone who wants to speak out against the Kremlin: ‘If you do, no matter who you are, where you are, we will find you and we will silence you — in the most horrible way possible.’” Talk about prescience!
Of course speculation immediately turned to the Kremlin, whose fabled long reach is not just about ice picks and radioactive substances anymore. However, that assumption was quickly questioned when police told the Washington Post that “Joyal was driving a Chrysler 300, a vehicle sought by carjackers, suggesting that the assailants might have followed Joyal home rather than waited there to attack him. Police have described the suspects as two black males.” The police officers claimed that Joyal was robbed of his wallet and briefcase.
Hey, I’ve seen that episode of the Sopranos! You know the one from the first season where Uncle June learns that Tony is going to a shrink and moves to whack him. He also hires “two black males” to make Tony’s murder seem like a “carjacking.” And I thought this all sounded too Hollywood before! Can we expect Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin™ to get writing credit?
But now Joyal’s wife claims that her husband was neither robbed nor carjacked. Though, “She did not say what happened to the items or how she knew they were not taken.” Okay . . . Well, at least it appears that Joyal is in good condition from the bullet in his belly. We can expect his version of events any day now. I suspect that Berezovsky’s public relations people are on a plane right now to coach Joyal into giving us the necessary hyperbolic twists this unfolding script needs.
I share your skepticism about the media’s paranoia about this whole incident. If it was a professional job, he would not have been shot in the stomach. He would have been killed. And, second, Putin or the Kremlin (even if you believe that they were involved in the whole Litvinenko affiar, which I dont) would not be stupid enough to kill someone so obviously related to this affair on US soil. It just doesnt make sense.
I saw that episode of the Soprano’s also. Considering the crime rates in Washington D.C., it is surprising that more political pundits don’t get wacked.
The Litvinenko murder is all about the smoking gun, in my opinion. Why else wack him with an easily traceable radioactive poison a couple of weeks after he attains British citizenship? Leaving a note saying “We are evil Russians – send Scotland Yard to Moscow” would have been to obvious.
The only way I can see Litvinenko’s murder being tied to the Russian government is if it were deliberately trying to discredit itself, or possibly running a campaign to make it appear outside entities were trying to discredit the Russian government. There are so many cleaner ways to murder someone and certainly the FSB has the means to perform any of them. You only use radiation if you wish to be traced.
The Johnny Depp movie is sure to be lame. Too bad, because I actually like about half of Depp’s work.
The latest news on the Joyal shooting suggests he was shot in the groin (youch), in his own driveway. Considering the shot was heard, he wasn’t killed, and the wound is in such a … ahem … sensitive location – it would appear to be intimidation related.
http://www.gazette.net/stories/030807/prinnew190707_32326.shtml