> It wasn't that he was particularly dangerous because of his political stance but because he started to dig into other journalists' suspicious deaths. So he might have been a no-name but got close enough to uncover things.

This is exactly what's confusing about these actions. What I'm trying to say is that Americans still don't understand is how little that kind of news would matter if it broke in Russia.

The polls are not rigged, and people are not afraid to speak freely: Russians love Putin. They do not love him for his human rights record, for his stance on democracy, for his actions against corruption. None of that matters. They love him because he dramatically transformed the economic and physical security of almost everyone in the country. He could proudly claim responsibility for these deaths and it wouldn't change anyone's mind.

> A message to the West perhaps?

What is the message, and why send it this way? If they care about western opinion, as you suggest, then poison does not seem like the best strategy. The poison is the only reason anyone in the west knows who Pyotr is.