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A Russian human rights lawyer suspects she and her family have been poisoned by mercury found in her car, making her too ill to attend Wednesday's opening day in the trial of three men accused in the slaying of journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

Karinna Moskalenko, a lawyer who has represented several Kremlin foes and was advising Ms. Politkovskaya's family, said the incident appeared to be an attempt to intimidate her. That assessment was shared by human rights groups and others.

“Karinna Moskalenko's poisoning is causing a great deal of anxiety and shock,” said Anna Stavitskaya, who was representing the journalist's family along with Ms. Moskalenko. “Everyone, including me — thinks it is connected with her professional activity, as she is involved in several big cases.”

Ms. Moskalenko said she and her children have had headaches, dizziness and nausea over the past few days, and told France-24 television Wednesday that she and her husband found a significant amount of a mercury-like substance Monday in their car in Strasbourg, France.

“When we got to the car, we realized something was not normal. My husband is a chemist and the substance looked like mercury,” Ms. Moskalenko said. “I'm worried for my family.”

Ms. Moskalenko said she had been hospitalized for testing and that doctors had given her and other family members a preliminary diagnosis of poisoning, according to Ekho Moskvy radio. It was not clear Wednesday whether she had left the hospital.

A police official in Strasbourg confirmed the discovery of balls of mercury in Ms. Moskalenko's family car. The official said there was no sign that the car had been broken into and investigators were searching for the car's previous owner. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, according to force policy.

Ms. Politkovskaya, whose reports on human rights abuses in Russia and especially Chechnya embarrassed the Kremlin, was shot to death in her Moscow apartment building in October 2006.

This is the first trial held in connection with the journalist's killing. It has already been marred by the absence of the suspected triggerman, who prosecutors say has fled to Western Europe, and the lack of an answer to the crucial question of who was behind the killing.

“The crime is not solved yet. Only a small fraction of the people involved are on trial now,” Ms. Politkovskaya's son Ilya said Wednesday outside the courthouse.

Several Russians who have criticized or angered the Kremlin — including Ms. Politkovskaya herself — have been victims of alleged poisoning attacks in recent years.

Ms. Politkovskaya fell seriously ill with food poisoning after drinking tea on a flight from Moscow to southern Russia in 2004, which prevented her from covering the hostage crisis in Beslan in which more than 330 people were killed. Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko died of radiation poisoning in Britain in 2006, weeks after Ms. Politkovskaya was gunned down.

Ms. Moskalenko has represented imprisoned former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky as well as Garry Kasparov, the former chess champion detained last year during an anti-Kremlin protest.

She spends much of her time helping Russians press claims against the government at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, which puts her at the forefront of challenges to Russia's international image.

Ms. Stavitskaya said the trial judge refused her request to postpone the initial procedural hearings until Ms. Moskalenko could make it to Moscow, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

However, the state-run RIA-Novosti news agency cited a defence lawyer as saying the judge set the next hearing for Nov. 17.

Ms. Politkovskaya's slaying deepened Western concerns about Russia's course and underscored the risks run by independent Russian journalists. She was one of at least 13 journalists killed in contract-style slayings during Vladimir Putin's eight-year presidency, and few suspects have been prosecuted.

Prosecutors say the man accused of pulling the trigger, Rustam Makhmudov, has fled the country. The suspects being tried on murder charges Wednesday were Sergei Khadzhikurbanov — a former Moscow police officer — and Mr. Makhmudov's brothers Ibragim and Dzhabrail.

A fourth man charged in the trial, Pavel Ryaguzov, is a Federal Security Service officer who is accused of criminal links with Mr. Khadzhikurbanov in an earlier case. He is no longer suspected of being linked to Ms. Politkovskaya's killing, but his presence allows the trial to be held in a military court.

Prosecutors believe Mr. Khadzhikurbanov organized the killing, and that one Makhmudov brother followed the journalist and gave information on her movements to his brother, who then relayed those details to the shooter.