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:
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.’
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has called on the US ambassador but it is understood so far his appeals have been refused.
Mrs Charles 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’.
She said for weeks after the crash on August 27 no one from the Ministry of Defence or RAF Croughton had been in contact.
Harry’s family said they have been told Mrs Sacoolas had been travelling on the wrong side of the road. RAF Croughton is currently being used by the US government as a spying station called the Joint Intelligence Analysis Centre.
Mrs Charles, of Banbury, Oxfordshire, said 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.’
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 officers sought to obtain a waiver from the US embassy – required to allow for the arrest and formal interview of a suspect with diplomatic immunity.
But the force, which had been preparing to send a file to the Crown Prosecution Service over charges of causing death by dangerous driving, was later told the waiver had been refused and Mrs Sacoolas had left the country.
The US state department refused to discuss the case but said ‘immunity is rarely waived’.
Mrs Charles said that, 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’.
‘What’s happened is inhumane’