US anger as Interpol targets Harry’s killer
PM in crisis talks amid ‘berserk’ diplomatic row
BORIS Johnson and Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab held crisis talks last week after a fresh diplomatic storm with the United States over the case of Harry Dunn, The Mail on Sunday has learned.
The No 10 meeting came after it emerged that British law enforcement officers had put an international wanted notice on former CIA agent Anne Sacoolas, who has been charged with death by dangerous driving after killing the teenage motorcyclist and then fleeing Britain, claiming diplomatic immunity.
The high-level talks on Thursday were also attended by Home Secretary Priti Patel and Cabinet Secretary Sir Mark Sedwill, after Washington ‘went berserk’ that it had not been told about the Interpol request to have Sacoolas arrested if she left the United States.
The order given, initially reported as a Red Notice – the world’s most wanted status sent to all member states of the international crime fighting organisation – was actually a Red Diffusion Notice, that was sent only to certain countries, including Canada.
The US authorities, who are refusing to extradite Sacoolas to face justice, were deliberately not told about the plan in the hope she would leave the country and could then be arrested and sent to face trial in Britain.
However, Northamptonshire Police are being blamed at the highest levels of Government for revealing the secret ruse drawn up by the Crown Prosecution Service and ‘Britain’s FBI’, the National Crime Agency.
A law enforcement source said: ‘If she had slipped across the border for a Canadian holiday, we would have had her, but that’s blown now.’
Ministers and officials were caught off guard after the notice was disclosed and they were confronted by furious US counterparts, reigniting the bitter diplomatic spat regarding the case.
The Mail on Sunday has also learned that Northamptonshire Police was ‘pressured’ to put out a statement distancing themselves from the Red Notice leak, despite emailing Harry’s family with news of it last week. At Thursday’s meeting, the senior Ministers also discussed ending the legal loophole that allowed Washington to insist that Sacoolas was above the law through her husband’s work as a diplomat at the US spy base of RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire.
A waiver for criminal immunity drawn up in the 1990s for staff working at the base did not specifically mention spouses, leading to US State Department lawyers to pounce on the loophole and spirit Sacoolas out of the country. Mr Raab has called this an ‘anomaly’ and has vowed to update all US treaties relating to Americans working in the United Kingdom.
Last night, Government sources said No10 had taken ‘a renewed interest in the case’ in the light of revelations by The Mail on Sunday about the botched handling of Mr Dunn’s tragic death by the police and Foreign Office.
The high-level meeting came just two weeks after Harry’s twin brother, Niall, wrote to Downing Street to demand that Mr Johnson ‘get a grip’ on the issue.
The CPS said: ‘In December 2019, the CPS authorised Northamptonshire Police to charge Anne Sacoolas with causing death by dangerous driving.
‘Our aim continues to be that Mrs Sacoolas stands trial in this country. We will continue to do everything we can to seek to ensure that happens.
‘We are unable, however, to give any explanation of what steps may or may not be taken, because to do so may compromise operational effectiveness.’