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Cui Bono? is a useful question. Here, it should be asked in the following forms:
1) Who benefits from the death of not only Prigozhin but several key Wagner group leaders? One could quite easily and reasonably argue that Putin would benefit from Prigozhin getting his comeuppance for past shenanigan by letting potential upstarts know they wont be countenanced forever. However, Putin also knows Prigozhin is celebrated in his own right by Russians as a kind of hero of the Special Operation, whose sanctioned assassination, even if just susiected, would tend to weaken Putin’s authority. Add to this the decapitation of significant aspects of the vaunted Wagner Group’s leadership, especially when their role in Africa could prove critical, and Putin looks more like a victim here than a beneficiary.
2) Who benefits from taking out Prigozhin in the time and manner in which he died? While it is too early to say precisely what caused the crash of Prigozhin’s plane, we do know that an assassination by plane crash involving the pilot and others presumed to be innocent of Prigozhin’s follies exposes the perpetrator(s) to contempt for indulging in a process that bears no semblance to any kind of justice, even if Prigozhin’s behavior actually does rise to the level of treason. Further, to do this, deed when Prigozhin was preparing Wagner to play a significant role in the Niger coup affair (western hegemonic interests) seems more than poor timing. Add to that the blow this incident is to Russian leadership among “global south” countries virtually on the eve of the BRICS Summit with it’s aspiration of upsetting the dollar’s reserve currency status, and it’s hard to see how the clearly calculating Putin could remotely imagine Prigozhin’s death in this manner at this time could by any measure be beneficial to him or Russian interests.

Color me highly suspicious that an anti-Putin and probably anti-Russian entity executed this very damaging incident at this time and in these circumstances.