LONDON: An independent review in Britain criticised police on Wednesday for failing to arrest a US diplomat’s wife after she killed a British teenager in a car accident before fleeing the country in 2019.
The accident in which Harry Dunn, 19, died became a diplomatic issue between the UK and United States, leading to his family meeting US President Donald Trump at the White House.
Anne Sacoolas, who was driving on the wrong side of the road outside the US military base at RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire, claimed in the ensuing days to have diplomatic immunity.
Sacoolas, whose husband was an intelligence official and has herself been reported to have been a CIA operative, left Britain soon after hitting Dunn on his motorbike in the August 2019 accident.
The review, commissioned by Northamptonshire’s chief constable, Ivan Balhatchet, said the decision not to arrest her was partly based on “information received that Anne Sacoolas was in shock”.
“While the welfare of any person is a concern for officers, this should not have prevented the arrest of Anne Sacoolas,“ it said.
The review said officers made the decision believing Dunn’s injuries to be survivable and that had this not been the case they would have made an arrest.
But it found that after his death there was no further discussion documented of whether Sacoolas should be detained.
“The review has potentially highlighted a culture of not arresting... which could lead to evidence not being obtained and influencing a charging decision or a sentence on conviction,“ it said.
The review also criticised the Northamptonshire force’s former chief Nick Adderley.
After relations with Dunn’s family broke down there were “multiple areas of direct involvement from CC (Chief Constable) Adderley which had a detrimental impact” on the senior investigating officer and their team as they tried to “rebuild trust”, it added.
After her return to the United States, Sacoolas refused to go back to the UK to face court proceedings.
She eventually pleaded guilty to causing death by careless driving via video link from the US to a London court.
She was handed an eight-month prison sentence in December 2022, suspended for 12 months, meaning she would not serve jail time unless she committed another offence in that time.
Reacting to the review, Dunn’s mother Charlotte Charles said it “confirms what we have known for years -- that we were failed by the very people we should have been able to trust”.
“Harry was left to die on the roadside. Sacoolas was not arrested, even though the police had every power to do so,“ she said.
