Don’t sweep my son’s death under the carpet
As diplomat’s wife who fled to US after crash that killed motorcyclist is named, victim’s mother pleads to PM:
‘What’s happened is inhumane’ ‘Please come back and talk to us’
THE mother of a teenage motorcyclist killed in a crash involving the wife of a US diplomat has begged Boris Johnson to intervene after accusing officials of trying to sweep her son’s death ‘under the carpet’.
Harry Dunn, 19, suffered horrific multiple injuries in the collision outside RAF Croughton – a US intelligence hub in Britain.
The driver – a 42-year-old American woman named last night by Sky News as Anne Sacoolas – left the country shortly afterwards claiming immunity, despite facing possible charges of causing death by dangerous driving.
Sky said it had tried to contact Mrs Sacoolas for comment but she had not returned to her original US address.
The US embassy has refused to grant Northamptonshire Police an immunity waiver to interview her as a suspect.
As anger over the case intensified, Harry’s mother Charlotte Charles called on the Prime Minister to ‘get on the phone’ to President Trump.
Mrs Charles, 44, told the Daily Mail: ‘We would ask Boris Johnson himself, if he hasn’t already, to call President Trump and urge him to right this wrong. It’s inhumane what has happened to us. Please – I’m begging you. Please help us. We won’t be able to grieve and move on and try put the pieces of our shattered lives together until we get justice for Harry.’
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has called on the US ambassador to ‘reconsider’ the decision but it is understood so far his appeals have been refused.
The Government says it is doing ‘eveto rything it can’ but Mrs Charles, 44, said she feared her son’s death would be ‘swept under the carpet’. The mother, who works in a GP’s surgery, said her family, including Harry’s twin brother Niall, were devastated and heartbroken but had been ‘totally deprived of the ability to grieve’.
Asked what message she would give Mrs Sacoolas, she said: ‘Please just come back. We want to talk to you and understand how you are feeling about what happened. Please come back and face the consequences of your actions. It will be better for us both.’
In a direct appeal to President Trump, she added: ‘Sit back and look back at the case.
‘Consider not just the politics side of it, but the fact there is a completely broken family.’
She said for weeks after the crash on August 27 no one from the Ministry of Defence or RAF Croughton had been in contact. ‘We’ve just been left.’
Harry, a petrol station worker, was an avid motorcyclist with more than 50,000 miles under his belt. His family said he was a ‘highly experienced, safe and capable rider’ who was ‘riding perfectly safely. ..travelling on his own side of the road’ when he was in a collision with Mrs Sacoolas’s Volvo.
His family said they have been told Mrs Sacoolas had been travelling for 400 yards on the wrong side of the road. RAF Croughton is currently being leased to the US government, which is using it as a spying station called the Joint Intelligence Analysis Centre. Harry suffered multiple injuries and was pronounced dead in hospital. It is understood Mrs Sacoolas, a mother- of-three, had her eldest child with her at the time.
Mrs Charles, 44, of Banbury, Oxfordshire, told how Harry’s father Tim Dunn received a call from a firefighter at the scene who was a family friend and recognised Harry. She added: ‘We didn’t get to see him before they lost him. His injuries were horrific. They had done all they could.’
Mrs Sacoolas, who lived in Northamptonshire with her husband and children, was spoken to the next day by police when she told officers she had no plans to leave the UK in the ‘near future’.
The Northamptonshire force said during the meeting ‘diplomatic immunity had been raised as an issue’. Officers then sought obtain a waiver from the US embassy – which is required to allow for the arrest and formal interview of a suspect with diplomatic immunity.
But the force said it was later informed that the waiver had been refused and Mrs Sacoolas had left the country despite the fact that officers had been preparing to send a file to the Crown Prosecution Service over charges of causing death by dangerous driving. The family were informed the day after Harry’s funeral.
Government sources said Mrs Sacoolas and her family were ‘put on a plane’ within hours of learning she may face charges. Harry’s family believe she flew out quickly as her husband is a spy and US authorities wanted to ensure his identity was not compromised.
The US state department refused to answer questions on the case but said ‘immunity is rarely waived’. UK sources confirmed Mrs Sacoolas had ‘full diplomatic immunity’. Mrs Charles said, if necessary, the family would travel to the US to seek answers. They are also considering a civil claim for compensation.
Mr Dunn, who is separated from Harry’s mother, said: ‘I echo everything Charlotte says. The pain of our family’s loss is unbearable.’
Northamptonshire Chief Constable Nick Adderley said he and the county’s police commissioner Stephen Mold ‘have written in the strongest terms to the US embassy urging them to apply the diplomatic immunity waiver’.