Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko

On November 1, 2006, the Pine Bar inside this building became the site of an assassination that felt pulled from the pages of a Cold War thriller. Former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko met two men here for a meeting that involved tea and business discussions. Unbeknownst to those around them, the teapot he drank from had been laced with a lethal dose of polonium-210, a rare and highly radioactive isotope. This substance was so deadly that it left a trail of contamination across the hotel and several other locations throughout London, eventually leading to Litvinenko's death three weeks later. Continue