‘History made in rollercoaster inquiry into Don Sturgess’

Life has once again become stable for residents in Salisbury, a small town in Wiltshire that found itself at the center of international attention after a shocking murder attempt in 2018.

For the past six weeks, the Don Sturges inquiry has attracted media from around the world, and each session the journalists attending and covering the investigation have brought with them a new revelation.

It was a rollercoaster of espionage and emotional family confessions that enthralled everyone who watched.

Walking through the large wooden doors of the Guildhall in October, you felt the gravity of carrying out an independent inquiry.

There were handheld scanners like you see at airports, searching bags, and you could only have a drink if you took a sip in front of the security guards.

There were big purple signs everywhere with The Don Sturges Inquiry written in bold white letters.

Opening the session, Chairman Lord Hughes said that above all we must remember why we were there, that 44-year-old Ms Sturgess – a mother of three – had lost her life in the Novichok attacks.

Although many locals welcomed the inquest, before it even began on that cold, damp morning we heard: “We know what happened, what’s the point in dragging all this out?”

The answer to that question, of course, is to record what actually happened in 2018, and doing so felt like a big moment in Salisbury history.

New revelations continue to be made – including that of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal Counter terrorism was not on the police radar and the fact that local emergency services additional training was not provided On symptoms of nerve agent poisoning after the first attack on Mr Skripal and his daughter.

The guildhall usually hosts craft fairs, weddings and art exhibitions; My whole life was here.

Directly across from where we sat to watch the proceedings, there was a small plaque commemorating the local men and women who served in that room as a result of the agricultural riots of the 1830s.

You got an immediate sense of history and time, and also the realization that the Novichok poison was now a big part of Salisbury and the timeline of this city.

As the investigation reached Salisbury, it then moved to London where more sensitive intelligence could be heard. It continued in a purpose-built, corporate building with all modern amenities, in the shadow of St Paul’s Cathedral.

Some of the sessions held there were more secret, with the names, faces and even voices of some witnesses hidden from the video feed.

Only three accredited journalists were allowed inside, and even then we could not take any electrical equipment to communicate with the outside world, even smart watches had to be switched off. It was old-fashioned pen and paper reporting.

Watching this process was like a rollercoaster.

We move from spying and poisoned doorknobs, to Don’s mother’s deafening silence Caroline is reading her statement.

After her first sentence, “I am Caroline Sturgess, Dawn’s mother,” people watching around us sighed, a human reaction for a parent standing up in such a high-profile setting and talking about her daughter. Were talking about the death of.

His hand was trembling while holding the paper.

She described her daughter as “intelligent…very selfless and a very kind person.”

Some very shocking moments came to light during the interrogation.

Everyone was astonished when we were shown fresh CCTV footage showing an already poisoned Mr. Skripal giving a piece of bread to a little boy to feed to the ducks.

The little boy later fell ill But testing found no trace of chemical poisoning.

It was shocking to see Russian suspects caught on CCTV looking at their mobile phones in the snow in Salisbury, trying to find her home.

And it was really a revelation to hear Mr Skripal’s statement in which he said, “I never thought that the Russian regime would have tried to assassinate me in Britain, they could have easily killed me while I was in prison”.

At the other end of the scale, we settled on some – apparently – very simple details.

We now probably feel a lot more knowledgeable about Wiltshire Council bin routines, hospital staff shift patterns and the layout of city center car parks.

Sometimes, an inquest can be a very formal process – it’s a room full of lawyers discussing the untimely death of a British citizen – but it is also surrounded by a lot of emotion.

Former Wiltshire Police Det Sgt, Nick Bailey, Who fell ill after touching a door handle contaminated with nerve agent poisonWhen asked how the poisoning had affected his life, he became quite emotional and could only shake his head silently and look at the floor.

He retired from the police force after the attack Left him with ongoing health problems.

Some of the emergency services staff looked really stressed trying to remember details of what they had done on a shift six years earlier, almost as if they were worried about saying the wrong thing.

But there were lighter moments too.

Mr Skripal’s friend and former neighbor in Salisbury, Ross Cassidy, had eyes lit up as he recalled how they used to drink together and enjoy barbecues.

“We will definitely do that,” he said, smiling.

He even raised reluctant smiles and, dare we say, laughter from the legal teams when he revealed that he had exceeded the speed limit while driving Sergei and Yulia back from Heathrow Airport.

When asked whether he had reached home in good time that evening, he repeated the same thing.

He said: “As I said, I was driving at speed.”

The inquiry’s lawyer, Andrew O’Connor Casey, replied: “Well, I was not going to mention Mr Cassidy.”

One of the most remarkable accounts for us was that of a paramedic, Ben Channon, who was called to Charlie Rowley’s flat when he fell ill a few hours after Don Sturgess.

He was the first to say that he had lived through the Salisbury poisoning and that he had seen it all happen.

Yes, he was scared, he told the inquiry, for his patient, and for himself, and that fear was still evident in his testimony six years later.

After the twists and turns of the interrogation it was easy to understand why they were there – and Lord Hughes’s words continued to ring in our ears.

But when creating our podcast – Crime Next Door: The Salisbury Poisonings – we agreed that we would seek to bring justice to Ms. Sturgess and her family in the same way that we told this incredible story.

We hope that we are able to do that.