Bill Browder - Red notice

I had to laugh. «Moral suffering»? Was he kidding?

Moreover, Karpov earned less than $1,500 a month, while the law firm he hired charged around £600 an hour . This meant that just to have this document drawn up and delivered, Karpov would have burned through several years of his official salary.

This appeared to me to be a last-ditch attempt to silence our campaign, and it fit squarely into Putin’s instructions to his government. Days after he resumed office in May 2012 after having been reelected as president in March, he issued an executive order stating that one of his top foreign policy priorities was to stop the Magnitsky Act from becoming law in America. In my mind, this explained how Karpov could miraculously afford the services of this expensive London law firm.

I’m sure that Olswang was happy to take the case. I could imagine some silver-tongued lawyer lecturing a bunch of unsophisticated Russians on what spending £1 million on this lawsuit would do for all their problems with Bill Browder and the Magnitsky Act. What Olswang might not have realized was that a Russian police officer, who didn’t speak English and had been to the United Kingdom only twice for vacation, hardly had standing in the British libel court.

I hired lawyers to contest the suit, but I didn’t let it distract me from my main objective of getting the Magnitsky Act passed. The summer recess ended at the beginning of September, and I called Kyle as soon as he was back in his office to find out when the bill would be voted on.

Kyle laughed. «Bill, we’re nearing peak political silly season right before the presidential election. Magnitsky is too much of a win-win for the leadership to schedule a vote».

«But we have full bipartisan support. This seems to be the one thing in Washington that everyone agrees on».

«That’s the point, Bill. Now that the election is in full swing, no one wants to talk about things that everyone agrees on. None of these guys can afford to make the others look good».

«What are you saying, then?»

«I’m saying that the earliest Magnitsky can come up is after November sixth».

I did some mental math. «So that means we’ll only have seven weeks between the election and when Congress ends».

«Not even seven weeks. With the holidays it’s much less».

While I was concerned about this delay, I could do nothing but wait. I spent September and October catching up with my staff on the Hermitage investment business, which was a shadow of its former self. To build my fund back to what it had been would have required month after month of marketing trips and investment conferences. When I put the idea of doing this against that of getting justice for Sergei, justice won in a heartbeat.

The weeks passed slowly, and finally the US presidential election took place on November 6. Obama easily defeated Mitt Romney, and the day after the election I called Kyle and asked again when Magnitsky would come up for a vote.

To my surprise, he said, «I was just going to call you — the House just announced it’s going to vote a week from Friday».

«Are you serious?»

«Yes. It’s finally happening!»

I looked at my calendar. «That’s November sixteenth…»

Kyle paused as he realized the significance of this date. November 16, 2012, would be the third anniversary of Sergei’s death. «Yes», he said quietly. «It is… but there’s one more problem. The House is insisting that Magnitsky go back to a Russia-only bill, and that’s what they’re going to vote on».

When Senator Cardin made it a global human rights bill, he had become so enthusiastic about its historic, precedent-setting nature that he was ready to risk the whole deal to keep it a global piece of legislation.

«Does that mean Cardin won’t accept the Russia-only version in the Senate?»

«He might not».

If the Senate had a different version of a law than the House, then they would have to reconcile them, and this would take more time — the one thing we didn’t have. If Cardin didn’t back down, then there was a good chance that we would have no law at all.

Naturally, I wanted Cardin’s global version of the bill to pass. Having Sergei’s name on a piece of legislation as broad and meaningful as what Cardin had proposed would have been an ideal way to honor him. But more than that, I wanted the bill to get passed into law, and if that meant going with this Russia-only version, then I thought it was the right thing to do.

I hoped Cardin would too.

Finally, November 16 arrived. It was due to be a big day. Not only was the US House of Representatives going to vote on the Magnitsky Act, but that night, I was hosting the London premiere of a play entitled One Hour Eighteen Minutes , an independent, award-winning production by Russian playwright Elena Gremina that detailed the last one hour and eighteen minutes of Sergei’s life.

In the late afternoon every single person in the office logged on to C-SPAN’s website for the live feed from the US House of Representatives. Before the vote began, members of Congress came to the floor and gave speeches, beautifully telling and retelling Sergei’s story, and calling for justice. This watershed moment was happening right before my eyes in this cavernous room steeped in American history. This was the same chamber where the amendments to abolish slavery and give women the right to vote were passed, and where landmark civil rights laws were approved. I was awed to think that everything that happened had led to this.

Finally, the voting commenced. One by one, the votes trickled in — nearly all were in favor. Whenever there was a vote against, I would hear boos in the office, but these outbursts were few and far between. The bill was going to sail through the House.

When the roll call was about halfway done, my phone rang. Without looking at the caller ID I picked it up, thinking it was Elena or some other well-wisher wanting to talk about what was happening in Washington.

«Bill, it’s Marcel». I recognized the voice as that of an accountant we’d introduced to Alexander Perepilichnyy, the Russian whistle-blower who’d exposed the Swiss accounts.

I was surprised to hear from Marcel because he had nothing to with the Magnitsky Act or anything else I was working on at that moment. «Hey, Marcel. Can this wait? I’m a bit busy right now».

«Sorry to bother you, Bill, but it’s important».

«O'kay, what is it?»

«Bill, I’m not even sure I should be telling you this», he said cryptically.

I swiveled away from the C-SPAN feed. «Telling me what?»

«You have to promise not to share it with anyone — not even the guys in your office».

«Depends. What is it?»

«Alexander Perepilichnyy is dead».

Marcel told me that Perepilichnyy had dropped dead in front of his house in Surrey during an afternoon jog, but that he had no other information.

It took several minutes for this news to sink in. Surrey was not more than twenty miles from where I sat. If this was foul play, which it appeared to be, then our enemies had brought their terror to us.

Marcel’s request to keep this to myself was totally unreasonable, and I immediately pulled Vadim, Vladimir, and Ivan into my office. I told them the bad news, and they were utterly shocked — especially Vadim and Vladimir, both of whom had gotten to know Perepilichnyy well in the last year. As we spoke, Vladimir dropped into a chair and said something quietly to himself in Russian that I couldn’t understand.

Just as we were talking, the Hermitage staff erupted in cheers and started high-fiving each other outside the glass walls of my office. I opened my door and asked what was going on. My secretary turned to me and said, «The Magnitsky Act just passed the House three hundred sixty-five to forty-three!»