Sergei & Yulia Skripal Poisoning

Case background and investigation

On the afternoon of March 4, 2018, Sergei Skripal, a former officer of Russian military intelligence who had been jailed in Russia for spying for Britain and released to the UK in a 2010 prisoner exchange, and his daughter Yulia were found unconscious on a bench outside The Maltings shopping centre in Salisbury, England, according to Wikipedia and Al Jazeera. On March 12 the British government identified the poison as Novichok, a military-grade nerve agent, and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons later confirmed the finding.

Both survived. Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey of Wiltshire Police, who became ill after visiting Skripal's home, was discharged from hospital on March 22, Yulia Skripal on April 9, and Sergei Skripal on May 18, 2018, according to Wikipedia. The UK and allied countries expelled more than 150 Russian diplomats in a coordinated response.

On June 30, 2018, Charlie Rowley found a discarded perfume bottle containing Novichok and gave it to his partner, Dawn Sturgess, 44, of Amesbury. She died on July 8, 2018; Rowley survived after treatment. According to Counter Terrorism Policing, the charges brought in the case also cover Sturgess's death and Rowley's poisoning.

In September 2018 British authorities named two suspects travelling as Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, alleged to be GRU officers, and charges were authorised against them. On September 21, 2021, Counter Terrorism Policing announced that charges had also been authorised against a third man, travelling as Sergey Fedotov and identified by police as Denis Sergeev. The charges include conspiracy to murder Sergei Skripal, attempted murder of Sergei and Yulia Skripal and Nick Bailey, and possession and use of a chemical weapon. Arrest warrants are in place for all three, who are believed to be in Russia; none has been tried, and all are presumed innocent.

A statutory public inquiry into Dawn Sturgess's death, chaired by former judge Lord Hughes, published its report on December 4, 2025. According to Al Jazeera and NBC News, it concluded that President Vladimir Putin authorised the operation against Skripal, that those responsible bear moral responsibility for Sturgess's death, and that deploying the nerve agent in a busy city was astonishingly reckless. The UK government responded by sanctioning the GRU in its entirety. The Kremlin continues to deny involvement.