Harry Dunn’s family praise ‘huge step forward’ after UK and US agree to amend ‘anomaly’ that allowed ‘killer’ Anne Sacoolas to flee Britain and claim diplomatic immunity
- Teen was killed when his motorbike crashed into a car outside a US military base
The UK and US have agreed to amend the ‘anomaly’ that allowed Harry Dunn’s alleged killer Anne Sacoolas to claim diplomatic immunity, the Foreign Secretary has said in a written statement.
Despite the ‘anomaly’ being amended in the immunity agreements surrounding RAF Croughton, the base near where the teenage motorcyclist died in a crash last August, his alleged killer still remains in the US.
Speaking to the PA news agency, Harry’s mother Charlotte Charles said Wednesday’s announcement was a ‘huge step forward’ – adding that one of the family’s aims was for this to ‘never happen to another family again’.
Harry Dunn, 19, was killed when his motorbike crashed into a car outside a US military base in Northamptonshire on August 27 last year
She said their campaign would continue for Sacoolas’s return to the UK.
In his written statement, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: ‘First and foremost, the US waiver of immunity from criminal jurisdiction is now expressly extended to the family members of US staff at the Croughton Annex, thus ending the anomaly in the previous arrangements and permitting the criminal prosecution of the family members of those staff, should these tragic circumstances ever arise again.
‘We have the deepest sympathy for Harry Dunn’s family. No family should have to experience what they have gone through and I recognise that these changes will not bring Harry back.
‘However, I hope that the knowledge that the Croughton arrangements have been revised and that a family in their position would now see justice done brings some small measure of comfort.’
More follows.