Illustration: John Shakespeare Why did you locate your missile launcher in the centre of the L980 transcontinental commercial air corridor unless you were hunting an airliner? It was nowhere close to the Ukrainian air power around Donetsk. Do you not feel that such tragic loss deserves explanation? You felt and expressed this type of loss when your Metro Jet was bombed. Do you really think that you have no responsibility to the families of the 80 children on board? What about all the others? Were they your enemy? None of them spoke Russian, none of them spoke Ukrainian. None will ever speak again. Murder demands justice. Evil is as real as the pain of growing old. We feel its effects every day when we arise. In the night it brings a bitter twinge to the sweetest of rests. It is the uneasiness felt after a disturbing dream. It never dies. It is alive in our time. Evil lives among my children and yours. Evil hunts down the ignorant and extinguishes the innocent daily somewhere in this world.

A teddy bear among the debris of flight MH17 at the crash site outside the Ukrainian village of Grabovka in 2014. Credit:Kate Geraghty On July 17, 2014 it shattered 298 souls over Ukraine. Eighty of those souls were innocent children. Did you see the dolls, colouring books and toys among the blood and carnage? Did you see the photo of the hardened rebel fighter holding the soiled teddy bear like a prize from a carnival? Did you feel the presence of evil when you saw these things? I did. My grandfather fought evil from a trench in the mud of France, half a world away and 100 years ago. My uncle fought evil which called itself the rising sun. It rose up and killed him. Cockpit wreckage at the Gilze-Rijen military base in the Netherlands in 2015. Credit:Getty Images My father fought evil across Europe and found evil itself at a sub-camp of Dachau near Bad Tolz in May 1945. He lost his battle and his war when he returned home to a bottle of whiskey and evil memories which he could no longer stand. Finally in July 1969 he succumbed. My brother faced evil many times in 23 years in the US Navy. I am sure you have seen evil too.

You are the head of a great nation with a powerful army that wants its empire back. I'm a lawyer from rural Ohio. I have no army, but I have nearly irrefutable evidence. The rear fuselage of flight MH17 at the Ukrainian crash site in 2014. Credit:Kate Geraghty Some think MH17 must have been a terrible, inevitable mistake of war. I do not think that is the truth. The facts scream intent and motive. It was a calculated military strike as willful as the killing of one more political opponent. You stand as the only man who can set this right. The slaughter of 298 innocents, including 80 children, will be a stain on the Russian Federation for eternity. I will stand and call out this evil before great power, because that it is my duty to seek justice. I stand against your nation for all the nations whose families suffered. But, particularly on behalf of the Malaysian, Australian, New Zealander and Dutch families that I represent. Jerry Skinner, US-based aviation lawyer

I will use the European Court of Human Rights and every other avenue available to bring the Kremlin to accountability. My grandfather, my father, my uncle and my brother would approve. Mr Putin, evil can atone. Your Christian faith should teach you that forgiveness must be sought by the words and deeds of the wrongful actor. The violator can be forgiven, even for death. I am a believer in Christ. I try to think, act and interact with others with a Christ consciousness. You are big Mr Putin, I am small, but God remains bigger than us all. He will be the ultimate arbiter. Still, you and Russia have a responsibility to reach out and take action in this life. Meet me and finally make amends for the victims of this tragedy. You may communicate with me through your embassy contacting the US Department of State. Jerome Skinner is an attorney representing victims of flight MH17 from Australia, Malaysia, New Zealand and the Netherlands.