Scene one: A courtroom, just off the Strand in London in 2011. The room is small and functional. There are cases of mauve-and-blue files near a wall. Halogen strips illuminate lawyers making polite argument as slips of paper are passed back and forth. Lady Justice Gloster smiles as Laurence Rabinowitz, QC, the counsel for Boris Berezovsky, mispronounces the name of Roman Abramovich, the defendant. Abramovich, a few places away, remains expressionless.

Scene two: An isolation cell in Moscow in 2009. Sergei Magnitsky, a corporate lawyer who has investigated wrongdoing at the highest levels of the Russian state, is lying on the floor. He has been held without trial for 11 months. He has been beaten with batons. He has been deprived of sleep. Pleading for