Not sure if this has been posted anywhere else, sorry if it has, but The Times today ran an article that strongly hinted at the possibility that this could have been something more sinister than a tragic accident:
March 29, 2004
British millionaire feared for his life before fatal helicopter crash
By Daniel McGrory and Simon de Bruxelles
A BRITISH lawyer who helped to create one of the world’s richest companies told a colleague that he feared for his life just before he was killed in a helicopter crash this month.
Stephen Curtis would not identify any specific threat, but talked of his concerns about business rivals in Russia, including some with close links to the Kremlin.
Mr Curtis, who would never allow himself to be photographed, had begun to take extra security precautions, such as telling only his closest aides about his travel plans. One report claims that Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the Moscow oligarch who is in jail in Russia, instructed lawyers to make Mr Curtis the sole signatory to their company’s vast bank accounts.
Mr Curtis, 45, was also allegedly being urged to move his own sizeable financial holdings in Menatep, an oil and banking company, to a different offshore bank amid suggestions that the Kremlin was trying to seize its funds.
Days after confiding his private fears about his safety, the multimillionaire died in a mysterious crash as he was being flown home to his castle in Dorset on March 4. So little wreckage survived the fire that the Air Accidents Investigation Branch says that it may be many months before it can say for certain what happened during the last moments of Mr Curtis’s short flight from London. His remains have still not been formally identified from the wreckage.
His wife, Sarah, a former opera singer, has refused to say anything about his death.
In the world in which he operated Stephen Curtis's violent death was bound to create a glut of rumours and conspiracy theories which will proliferate the longer it takes the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) to deliver its official report.
An AAIB spokesman said yesterday that its investigation could take up to six months to complete. The helicopter's remains are being reassembled in a hangar at the investigation base in Farnborough.
As well as examining the wreckage minutely investigators want to talk to witnesses about the final seconds of the flight. They have contradicted initial reports that the helicopter flew into power lines.
Electricity and telephone companies insist that none of their lines was damaged and there had been no explanation as to why witnesses such as Sarah Price describe hearing the helicopter approach, then a silence before it hit the ground.
The pilot of the six-seater Augusta 109 helicopter, Max Radford, had been in touch with air traffic controllers but had not sent out a distress signal.
Mr Curtis was the closest confidant of Mr Khodorkovsky, arguably Russia’s richest man, who was arrested last October on charges of fraud and tax evasion. Mr Khodorkovsky is an opponent of President Putin and the Kremlin is keeping a close watch on the crash investigation.
Stephen Curtis was the brains behind the creation of a network of offshore companies for the powerful Menatep group, which helped Mr Khodorkovsky and his associates to control the Russian oil giant Yukos. One Menatep insider said: “Stephen was a frightened man. He was the company. He knew everything.”
Menatep is said to be worth more than $30 billion (£16.3 billion). Mr Curtis was appointed its managing director last November when his Russian predecessor was arrested.
His inquest is due to open tomorrow under the direction of the Bournemouth, Poole and East Dorset Coroner. It will be adjourned and a full hearing will take place after air accident investigators conclude their findings.
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For some reason the online article was not as complete as the one printed so I have copied the missing section in above.
If any of those who knew the pilot consider posting this insensitive, I apologise, but I thought that given it was in The Times that it ought to be noted.
Last edited by Wedge; 29th Mar 2004 at 20:33.