Harry Dunn US spy Jonathan Sacoolas wife diplomatic immunity

[TonyGosling]

The New Colonialism: Hague's International Criminal Court Jails Black African Leaders Whites Immune. Black History MonthBritish teen killed in a car crash outside an American spy base in the UK 'was hit by a US diplomat's wife who claimed diplomatic immunity and has now left the country'
Harry Dunn, 19, was killed in August near RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire
The RAF camp is one of the most important bases run by America in Europe
His family received a letter of condolence from US Ambassador Woody Johnson
By RAVEN SAUNT FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 21:49, 4 October 2019 | UPDATED: 08:09, 5 October 2019
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7539395/British-teen-killed-c rash-outside-American-spy-base-UK-hit-diplomats-wife.html

A British teenager who was killed in a car crash outside an American spy base in the UK was hit by a US diplomat's wife who claimed diplomatic immunity and has now left the country, it is claimed.

Harry Dunn, 19, was killed on August 27 near RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire.

The RAF base is one of the most important bases run by America in Europe.

Harry Dunn, 19, was killed on August 27 in a car crash near RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire +5
Harry Dunn, 19, was killed on August 27 in a car crash near RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire

It was reported in initial findings by police were that Harry had been driving on the correct side of the road when a woman in a car pulled off of the airbase on to the wrong side of the carriageway.

The car hit Harry head-on and he died soon after in hospital after suffering multiple injuries.

Sky News has reported that the suspect involved is the wife of a US diplomat who quickly claimed diplomatic immunity following the incident.

It was reported in initial findings by police were that Harry had been driving on the correct side of the road when a woman in a car pulled off of the airbase +5
It was reported in initial findings by police were that Harry had been driving on the correct side of the road when a woman in a car pulled off of the airbase

She had reportedly pulled on to the wrong side of the carriageway as she left the junction +5
She had reportedly pulled on to the wrong side of the carriageway as she left the junction

The car hit Harry head-on and he died soon after in hospital after suffering multiple injuries +5
The car hit Harry head-on and he died soon after in hospital after suffering multiple injuries

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Harry's mother, Charlotte Charles, received a letter of condolence from US Ambassador to the UK Woody Johnson +5
Harry's mother, Charlotte Charles, received a letter of condolence from US Ambassador to the UK Woody Johnson

Top diplomatic officials are immune from prosecution under diplomatic immunity, as are their deputies and families.

Northamptonshire Police had attempted to apply a waiver that would allow them to continue to investigate and conduct interviews.

But this application was declined.

The US Embassy has since confirmed that the woman has left the country.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab became aware of the incident and told Sky News: 'I wish to offer my condolences to the family affected by this tragic incident.

'I have called the US Ambassador to express the UK's disappointment with their decision and to urge the Embassy to re-consider it.'

Harry's parents, Tim Dunn and Charlotte Charles, have received a letter of condolence from US Ambassador to the UK Woody Johnson.

In it he said that 'it is with profound sadness' that he offered his condolences to the family but Mr Johnson made no reference to responsibility.

The US Embassy in London and Northamptonshire Police has been contacted for comment.

[Whitehall_Bin_Men]

Anne Sacoolas: US Diplomat’s Wife Identified in Harry Dunn Fatal Crash
https://www.heavy.com/news/2019/10/anne-sacoolas/

By Tom Cleary Updated Oct 7, 2019 at 10:41am

Facebook/Susan Goodwin
Anne Sacoolas.
Anne Sacoolas is the U.S. diplomat’s wife who fled from the United Kingdom to America after a crash that killed 19-year-old British motorcyclist Harry Dunn in Northamptonshire, Sky News reports. She has claimed diplomatic immunity.

The 42-year-old Sacoolas is married to Jonathan Sacoolas, public records show. It is not clear what position he holds in the U.S. government that has provided him and his wife diplomatic immunity. The couple lives near RAF Croughton, a British Royal Air Force base currently being used by the U.S. Air Force as a communications station. Sky News referred to it as a “spy base.”

Sacoolas had only been in the U.K. for three weeks, The Telegraph reports.


Dunn was killed in a head-on collision near the base on August 27. His family and British government officials have spoken out about the incident in order to call for justice for Dunn, encouraging Sacoolas to return to Britain to face questioning and potential charges. She has not been accused of any criminal wrongdoing at this point. Officials in the U.K. have encouraged the U.S. to waive Sacoolas’ diplomatic immunity.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday, “I do not think that it can be right to use the process of diplomatic immunity for this type of purpose. I hope that Anne Sacoolas will come back and will engage properly with the processes of law as they are carried out in this country. That’s a point that we’ve raised or are raising today with the American Ambassador here in the U.K., and I hope it will be resolved very shortly. And to anticipate a question you might want to raise, if we can’t resolve it then of course I will be raising it myself personally with the White House.”


The U.S. State Department issued a statement to CBS News on Monday expressing sympathy and condolences to Dunn’s family but added, “questions regarding a waiver of immunity with regard to our diplomats and their family members overseas in a case like this receive intense attention at senior levels and are considered carefully given the global impact such decisions carry; immunity is rarely waived.”

Sacoolas and her husband could not be reached for comment by Heavy and it is not clear if they have hired an attorney.


Here’s what you need to know about Anne Sacoolas:

1. Anne Sacoolas — Who Struck Harry Dunn With Her Car While on the Wrong Side of the Road — Was Encouraged to Leave Britain by Someone on the American Side, Sky News Reports

Harry Dunn.

Anne Elizabeth Sacoolas struck and killed 19-year-old Harry Dunn with her Volvo XC90 while driving the wrong way on August 27, police said. The crash occurred near the Air Force base. Dunn was riding a Kawasaki motorcycle.

According to The Telegraph, Sacoolas’ 12-year-old son was in the front seat of her car at the time of the crash. The newspaper reports that Sacoolas admitted liability after getting out of her car. But when police went to her home at the Croughton base and told her Dunn had died, lawyers and U.S. Embassy officials stepped in.


Northamptonshire Police Superintendent Sarah Johnson said in a statement, “We can confirm that a 42-year-old American woman being treated as a suspect in our investigation into a fatal road traffic collision on the B4031 Park End, Croughton, on Tuesday, August 27, has left the country.”

EXCLUSIVE: this is Anne Sacoolas, 42, mum of 3, wife of US diplomat Jonathan Sacoolas, who claimed diplomatic immunity after a crash that killed Harry Dunn, 19, near RAF Croughton, Northants, and returned to US #JusticeForHarry pic.twitter.com/pWC7AMI4zC

— Lisa Dowd Sky News (@LisaSkyNews) October 7, 2019

Johnson added, “Northamptonshire Police followed all of its usual procedures following the incident, including liaising closely with the suspect, who engaged fully with us at the time and had previously confirmed to us that she had no plans to leave the country in the near future. Due process was also followed in seeking the necessary documentation to allow for the arrest and formal interview of the suspect, and the Force is now exploring all opportunities through diplomatic channels to ensure that the investigation continues to progress.”


According to Sky News, someone on the American side told Sacoolas to leave Britain. In a statement, the U.S. State Department declined to name Sacoolas and her husband, citing security and privacy considerations.

“We express our deepest sympathies and offer condolences to the family of the deceased in the tragic Aug. 27 traffic accident involving a vehicle driven by the spouse of a U.S. diplomat assigned to the United Kingdom. We can confirm the family has left the U.K.,” the State Department said.


The statement added, “Any questions regarding a waiver of immunity with regard to our diplomats and their family members overseas in a case like this receive careful attention at senior levels are considered carefully given the global impact such decisions carry; immunity is rarely waived.”

Northamptonshire Police said in a statement, “We are also working closely with the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in an effort to come to a resolution regarding this matter. Harry Dunn’s family deserve justice and in order to achieve this, a full and thorough investigation, with the assistance of all parties involved, needs to take place.“Northamptonshire Police is committed to ensuring justice for Harry and specially trained officers continue to support the Dunn family in their loss, including keeping them fully informed of all developments in the investigation.”


2. She & Her Husband Have 2 Young Children & Own a Home in Virginia & She Was Ticketed in Her Home State for Failing to ‘Pay Full Time & Attention’



Anne Sacoolas and her husband, Jonathan Sacoolas, 43, have been married since 2003. They have two young children, both sons, according to her Pinterest profile. It is not clear what job Jonathan Sacoolas currently has within the U.S. government.


The couple owns a home in Fairfax County, Virginia, according to a home sales list from The Washington Post. They purchased the house in the Vienna area in 2015 for $770,000.

In 2006, Sacoolas was cited in Fairfax County, Virginia, for failure to pay full time and attention, a traffic ticket. She does not appear to have any other offenses on her record. She paid a fine on that infraction in 2007.

Public records show that Sacoolas and her husband are both Republicans.

3. Sacoolas — Born Anne Goodwin in South Carolina — Is Herself a Former State Department Employee Who Has a Psychology Degree

Anne Goodwin Sacoolas pictured in her wedding announcement.
Anne Sacoolas was born Anne Goodwin in South Carolina, according to a wedding announcement published in 2003 in the Aiken Standard, her hometown newspaper. She graduated from South Aiken High School and then studied at the University of South Carolina, where she earned a degree in psychology, according to the wedding announcement.

At the time of her wedding, Sacoolas was working for the U.S. State Department in Washington D.C. It is not clear what role she had at the State Department. She and her husband, Jonathan Sacoolas, were married on April 12, 2003, at Wakefield Chapel in Annandale, Virginia.

Jonathan Sacoolas is originally from Salem, Oregon, and graduated from South Salem High School and the University of Southern California, where he earned a degree in electrical engineering. At the time of his wedding, he was working for the Department of Defense in Washington D.C.

Radd Seiger, a lawyer representing the Dunn family, told The Sun that Sacoolas was a senior spy abased in the U.K. “He was working at Croughton, which is a communications base, so he was working with intelligence which is, I guess, why it has been handled in the way that it has,” Seiger told the British newspaper.

4. A Deal Reached Between the U.S. & the U.K. in 1994 Provided Diplomatic Immunity to Those at the RAF Croughton Base, According to Sky News



According to Sky News, the only diplomats with immunity in the U.K. are typically those stationed in London. But a special arrangement between the U.S. and the U.K. has been in place since 1994 for RAF Croughton.

Tim Dunn, Harry Dunn’s father, told Sky News, “It’s appalling, you can’t have this precedence where you can have this immunity. It’s basically saying you can do what you like and you’ll be okay – it’s wrong. That can’t be right.”

Harry’s mother, Charlotte Charles, called the diplomatic immunity “inhumane,” according to Sky News.

Government officials from the U.K. have called on Sacoolas to return to the country to face questioning and be held accountable for the crash.

The U.S. State Department said in a statement, “We cannot speculate on what actions the British Government may take. While we are in close consultation with the appropriate British officials, we cannot comment on private diplomatic conversation with the British Government.”

U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a statement, “I wish to offer my condolences to the family affected by this tragic incident. I have called the US Ambassador to express the UK’s disappointment with their decision and to urge the Embassy to re-consider it.”

Dunn’s family has appealed directly to President Donald Trump.

“President Trump, please listen. We’re a family in ruin. We’re broken,” the family said in a statement. “We can’t grieve. Please, please let her get back on a plane.”

U.S. Ambassador Woody Johnson sent a letter to the family expressing “profound sadness,” according to Sky News.

5. Dunn’s Family Has Started a GoFundMe & Facebook Page to Raise Awareness About the Case & Have Said ‘No One Is Above the Law’


Harry Dunn’s family has started a GoFundMe and a Facebook page to raise awareness, calling them “Justice 4 Harry.”

His mother, Charlotte Charles, told Sky News, “If we don’t get justice we’ll try and use money to get the law changed so people can’t kill and go away.”

According to the GoFundMe, “Harry leaves behind a devastated mother and father Charlotte and Tim, twin brother Niall, step parents Bruce and Tracey and a large close knit family who are struggling to come to terms with the tragic and abrupt end to Harry’s life. The police have now confirmed that Harry was riding perfectly safely on the night of the crash travelling on his own side of the road when he collided with an oncoming vehicle being driven on the wrong side of the road.

The GoFundMe adds:

Harry lived his short life to the fullest with his twin brother and three other brothers and a sister. Harry was bubbly and outgoing and from the age of seven he shared a passion for riding motorbikes with his Gramps and step-dad. That passion eventually grew to become his main interest in life and Harry lived for riding spending all his wages on fuel for his bike. He loved to get out on the road and explore the countryside, with Portland Bill being one of his favourite places. But his travels took him all over the UK and by the age of 19 he had racked up an incredible 50,000 on his bikes, making him a highly experienced, safe and capable rider. The family take enormous comfort from the fact that his riding at the time of the collision was not to blame for the accident.

Harry’s other passion, which he shared with his Dad Tim, was supporting their local football club Northampton Town.

Harry’s love for his family and friends however outshone everything and made him the caring and loving young man he was. The family are so pleased to see how much Harry was loved by so many, as demonstrated by the huge turnout for his funeral.

According to the GoFundMe, “Harry’s loss has left an enormous hole in the lives of the family and they are understandably going through a shattering and life changing time. This funding page is being set up to help the family and his twin brother Niall through these traumatic times and to build up a fund as the family embark on a campaign to search for Justice for Harry as the legal process unfolds. We will update this page as frequently as we can. In the meantime, we would like to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for any amount of money you are able to donate, no matter how big or small.”

[Whitehall_Bin_Men]

Jonathan Sacoolas Is Not, and Has Never Been, a Diplomat 421
8 Oct, 2019 in Uncategorized by craig
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/10/jonathan-sacoolas-is-n ot-and-has-never-been-a-diplomat/

UPDATE: Since I published this article the mainstream media, including at least Sky News and the Guardian, have started to report that Sacoolas does not have diplomatic immunity. This is a massive reversal in the MSM line, though to date none have published that he works for NSA or explained the NSA/GCHQ relationship. The MSM are all quoting the lawyer Mark Stephens, rather than this blog, as the source of the information. I would gently note that I can so far find no evidence of Stephens pointing out Sacoolas is not on the Diplomatic List until some hours after I broke the story, and that when he gave radio interviews yesterday Stephens was unaware of the fact.

Ultimately however it does not matter that I am not credited; what matters is my lead has in practice been followed and there is now a much stronger point of pressure available to get justice for Harry Dunn.
END OF UPDATE

There is no Jonathan Sacoolas on the official Diplomatic list. Neither Sacoolas nor his wife has any right to claim diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention.

Article 31 of the Vienna Convention states that:

A diplomatic agent shall enjoy immunity from the criminal jurisdiction of the receiving state
Article 37 extends this privilege to family members living in his household. A “diplomatic agent” is defined in article 2(d).

The “members of the diplomatic staff” are the members of the staff of the mission having diplomatic rank;
Jonathan Sacoolas does not hold, and has never held, a diplomatic rank. He has never been a member of staff of a diplomatic mission. (All those with diplomatic rank appear in the diplomatic list, see above link. That list also includes some attaches who do not have diplomatic rank (depending on the type of attache), but there is nobody with diplomatic rank not in the list).

Jonathan Sacoolas does not have, and has never had, any entitlement to diplomatic immunity in international law. Sacoolas works as an NSA technical officer at the communications interceptions post at “RAF Croughton”. His role is support to the interception of communications from British citizens. As I explained in Murder in Samarkand, the NSA and GCHQ share all intelligence reports, but each faces legal constraints on mass spying on its own citizens. So the NSA has staff here fronting the spying on British citizens, while GCHQ has staff in the US fronting the spying on US citizens, and the polite fiction is that the results are transmitted back over the Atlantic to the US or UK respectively, before being “shared” with the partner intelligence agency.

None of which has anything to do with diplomacy, and Sacoolas must be the subject of a DSMA notice given that all mainstream media are referring to him constantly as a “diplomat”, when they all know that is not true. The irony is of course that if Sacoolas actually was a real diplomat, the US would very probably have waived the diplomatic immunity of his wife, as the issues around his presence and function would be much less sensitive.

The UK has no Vienna Convention obligation to acknowledge the “immunity” of Sacoolas’ wife, contrary to all reporting to date. What does apparently exist between the UK and US is a secret, bilateral agreement to treat GCHQ and NSA staff as if they had diplomatic immunity. That is not at all the same thing as Vienna Convention protection under international law. I cannot conceive the grief of Harry Dunn’s parents, but I do hope that they are not deceived by the pretence at intervention in this case by Johnson and Raab.

I am not at all convinced, as a matter of law, that the government has the power to grant, by bilateral treaty or otherwise, immunity from criminal prosecution to foreign nationals, plainly outside the provisions of the Vienna Convention. This should be tested by the courts.

[Whitehall_Bin_Men]

The Foreign Office Must Be Challenged Over Sacoolas’ Immunity 139
12 Oct, 2019 in Uncategorized by craig | View Comments
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/10/the-foreign-office-mus t-be-challenged-over-sacoolas-immunity/

The government has stepped up its lies about immunity in the Sacoolas case to a breathtaking degree. I genuinely am astounded by the sheer audacity of the lies now being told, including a staggeringly mendacious FCO-briefed BBC article yesterday stating that “23,000 individuals in the UK have diplomatic immunity” and that it extends to “drivers and cooks”. This follows up the breathtaking FCO statement to Sky News that RAF Croughton “is regarded as an annex to the US Embassy in London” – a total falsehood.

What I cannot understand is why. The entire incident is extremely strange. On the face of it, Harry Dunn’s death was a tragic accident caused by somebody who had not long been in the UK driving on the wrong side of the road. This dreadful mistake is forgivable, as Harry’s very sensible parents have said; there seems little reason to believe the justice system would have been more harsh. There was no conceivable need to run away. That is what they cannot forgive.

Make no mistake; the spiriting of the Sacoolas family out of the UK was a considered act by the US Government and, in the case of a manslaughter in an allied state, the decision not to waive immunity would have been taken right at the top of the State Department. Make no mistake about it either, the FCO would have been informed and complicit in the decision and has only pretended to protest after massive public pressure, got up by Harry’s admirable family a full three weeks after the incident had been, the government would have hoped, successfully buried.

But why? It should be stated that it is the norm to waive diplomatic immunity in serious cases between allied or friendly developed states, where each has confidence in the other’s justice system. Unless the accident did not happen as stated, or there is a Chris Huhne type blame switch involved (Trump yesterday very carefully made the point that cameras had confirmed the identity of the driver – I was not sure why he brought this up when nobody had questioned it), it is very hard to understand why diplomatic immunity has been insisted on in this case. Assuming that Anne Sacoolas was the driver and the incident was as described, the only explanation I can think of is that it was hoped by getting them out the country to avoid all publicity and scrutiny of Jonathon Sacoolas’ real job, which is to spy on British citizens communications’ for GCHQ, who face legal impediments in doing so.

I would like to be able to say that if that cover-up is the plan, it has backfired, except that the media has unanimously censored all reporting of what Sacoolas actually does in the UK. Which is quite extraordinary given the massive but (deliberately) wildly misleading coverage of this case. I wish there were many more places than here you could come to learn the truth, but there are not. In which context, it is worth noting that both Buzzfeed and the Huffington Post have joined the DSMA Notice Committee and become willing tools of the UK security services.

After I pointed out that Sacoolas does not appear on the Diplomatic List, does not hold diplomatic rank and is not accredited to a diplomatic mission, and therefore cannot be a “diplomatic agent” under the Vienna Convention, the FCO first admitted this and claimed his immunity stemmed from a separate bilateral agreement, as reported by Sky News.

Having negotiated many international agreements in my time in the FCO, I know that they need to be given effect in UK domestic law, usually by Order in Council. I therefore searched for legislation giving the Secretary of State authority to grant immunity from criminal prosecution under bilateral agreements for spy bases, and I could find nothing. The legal basis for granting immunities under the Vienna Convention is the Diplomatic Privileges Act 1964, which enacted it into UK legislation. The legal basis for granting military immunity under Status of Forces Agreements, or for NATO personnel, is clear and set out in the Visiting Forces Act of 1952.

I could find nothing that would give legal powers to a Secretary of State to grant immunity to US spies on military bases working on communications interception of UK citizens. No legislation was passed to give legal effect in the UK to the reputed bilateral agreements which cover this.

I therefore wrote to the FCO asking for a copy of the bilateral agreement under which Sacoolas has immunity, and a copy of the UK legislation giving the authority to grant the immunity to the Secretary of State. I have not received any reply, but apparently it concentrated minds because the FCO has now switched to make an aggressive – and nonsensical – assertion that Sacoolas is a diplomat in terms of the Vienna Convention.

Not only that, the FCO’s admission to Mark Stephens, reported in that original article by Sky News, that Sacoolas was not a diplomat under the Vienna Convention has been expunged from history. The Sky News defence correspondent Alistair Bunkall had tweeted a reply to me copying this report, as evidence there was no DSMA notice controlling the reporting of the Sacoolas case.



Yet this article, held up by Bunkall as evidence of a free media, was within 24 hours totally rewritten to remove the FCO’s admission that Sacoolas was not on the diplomatic list, and replace it with the new FCO attack line of strong assertion that Sacoolas is covered by the Vienna Convention, and to highlight Dominic Raab’s entirely insincere and pretend effort to request Sacoolas’ return. The story has in effect been completely rewritten by the FCO. This is what the same page, the same url, Bunkall tweeted out looks like now:



Pretty well all that remains of the original – accurate – story is the url, now totally at odds with the content https://news.sky.com/story/husband-of-us-woman-granted-diplomatic-immu nity-not-registered-diplomat-11830734. There is no acknowledgement that the story has been changed, and the original is strangely not available even on the wayback machine. If Bunkall has not tweeted it, it would be difficult to prove this brief moment of reporting the truth had never existed. The irony of Bunkall’s tweeting a now completely censored report as evidence of press freedom is stunning.

Forgive me but I here must insert my original post on Sacoolas to make plain the actual legal position:

There is no Jonathan Sacoolas on the official Diplomatic list. Neither Sacoolas nor his wife has any right to claim diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention.

Article 31 of the Vienna Convention states that:

A diplomatic agent shall enjoy immunity from the criminal jurisdiction of the receiving state
Article 37 extends this privilege to family members living in his household. A “diplomatic agent” is defined in article 2(d).

The “members of the diplomatic staff” are the members of the staff of the mission having diplomatic rank;
Jonathan Sacoolas does not hold, and has never held, a diplomatic rank. He has never been a member of staff of a diplomatic mission. (All those with diplomatic rank appear in the diplomatic list, see above link. That list also includes some attaches who do not have diplomatic rank (depending on the type of attache), but there is nobody with diplomatic rank not in the list).

Jonathan Sacoolas does not have, and has never had, any entitlement to diplomatic immunity in international law. Sacoolas works as an NSA technical officer at the communications interceptions post at “RAF Croughton”. His role is support to the interception of communications from British citizens. As I explained in Murder in Samarkand, the NSA and GCHQ share all intelligence reports, but each faces legal constraints on mass spying on its own citizens. So the NSA has staff here fronting the spying on British citizens, while GCHQ has staff in the US fronting the spying on US citizens, and the polite fiction is that the results are transmitted back over the Atlantic to the US or UK respectively, before being “shared” with the partner intelligence agency.

None of which has anything to do with diplomacy, and Sacoolas must be the subject of a DSMA notice given that all mainstream media are referring to him constantly as a “diplomat”, when they all know that is not true. The irony is of course that if Sacoolas actually was a real diplomat, the US would very probably have waived the diplomatic immunity of his wife, as the issues around his presence and function would be much less sensitive.

The UK has no Vienna Convention obligation to acknowledge the “immunity” of Sacoolas’ wife, contrary to all reporting to date. What does apparently exist between the UK and US is a secret, bilateral agreement to treat GCHQ and NSA staff as if they had diplomatic immunity. That is not at all the same thing as Vienna Convention protection under international law. I cannot conceive the grief of Harry Dunn’s parents, but I do hope that they are not deceived by the pretence at intervention in this case by Johnson and Raab.

I am not at all convinced, as a matter of law, that the government has the power to grant, by bilateral treaty or otherwise, immunity from criminal prosecution to foreign nationals, plainly outside the provisions of the Vienna Convention. This should be tested by the courts.

ENDS

With this in mind, let us examine the claims made by the FCO to the media in response. From that Sky News report we have:



This is utter nonsense. It is simply untrue. RAF Croughton is not an annex to the US Embassy. The FCO has invented this lie to counter the fact that, to qualify for diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention, Sacoolas must be attached to a diplomatic mission. RAF Croughton is not a diplomatic mission. A RAF base cannot be a US Embassy.

That RAF Croughton is an annex of the US Embassy can be immediately disproved. An Embassy is the sovereign territory of the nation which owns it. Within Embassy premises, the law which applies is the law of the Embassy’s state, not the host state. That is not the case in RAF Croughton. That RAF Croughton is not an Annex of the US Embassy can be instantly proven beyond any doubt or argument by the fact that the bye-laws applicable within it are promulgated by the UK Secretary of State for Defence.



If the base were an annex to the US Embassy, the UK Secretary of State could not make bye-laws for it. There is no mention within the bye-laws covering security and management of and access to RAF Croughton of any area within it being part of the US Embassy. The claim is a simple and straightforward lie, and a rather desperate one.

Finally, if RAF Croughton were an annex to the US Embassy and if Mr Sacoolas were a diplomat, the cars of both he and his wife would have diplomatic CD plates. Mrs Sacoolas was not driving a diplomatic car – an obviously vital fact in this case, again omitted from all mainstream media reporting.

There are further lies in the Sky News report.



On the contrary, the Diplomatic List is a comprehensive record of every diplomat notified to the FCO as having diplomatic status by Diplomatic Note – and as specified in Article 10 of the Vienna Convention, a person must be so notified to become a “diplomatic agent”. There are no “diplomatic agents” not on the Diplomatic List.

I was in the Foreign Office for 20 years and a member of its Senior Management Structure for 6 years. It would be nice if you took my word for this, but you don’t have to – it is very neatly explained at the very start of the Diplomatic List:



The entire purpose of the list is to record those with diplomatic immunity and the legislation under which they get it. From page 127 to 137 it lists those who have diplomatic immunity not under the Diplomatic Privileges Act – which only covers national Embassies and High Commissions – but under other legislation as they work not for nations but for international agencies: and in every individual case the Diplomatic List names the specific legislation which confers the immunity.



The major purpose of the London Diplomatic List is to be a compendium of diplomatic status with a precise attribution of immunity and its source. As Sacoolas is not listed as a diplomat of the US Embassy in the Diplomatic List or the Consular List, he is not a “diplomatic agent” entitled to full diplomatic immunity. Full stop. As explained below, Sacoolas’ wife would only have diplomatic immunity while driving privately if he held a full diplomatic rank (in which case her car would have diplomatic CD plates, which it does not).

The FCO claim that the Diplomatic List only covers London is also ludicrous. The same government webpage gives you the full list of consulates, with their consuls, and even of honorary consuls, outside of London. It does not list Embassy annexes outside London because there are none and the concept does not exist in international law. Embassy outposts from the capital are consulates or consular offices.



The FCO is trying to convince you that their entire section of staff who work on diplomatic accreditations and constantly update the Diplomatic List, are wasting their time on an entirely pointless exercise producing futile and incomplete lists. I wonder how those employees’ morale is today.

But Raab’s FCO did not stop there with the lies. They then briefed the BBC to produce an article on diplomatic immunity so full of lies as to be truly astonishing. I am prepared to confess that I could not complete this blog entry for three days because I was genuinely emotionally upset by the realisation that the UK now has a government whose noted penchant for “aggressive” media and opinion management means it is prepared to employ the big lie on any occasion and subject.

The BBC article is plainly based entirely on an FCO briefing and written with the express and sole intention of obscuring the fact that Sacoolas is not a diplomat. It contains so many outrageous lies that I am afraid this article is going to get still longer. If you have had the patience to stick with me so far, please bear with me a bit further.



This is another quite extraordinary lie, as anybody can easily confirm simply by reading the Vienna Convention. As explained above, full diplomatic immunity is enjoyed only by “diplomatic agents” who must be persons “Having diplomatic rank”.

As very plainly set out in articles 37 of the Vienna Convention:

Article 37
1.The members of the family of a diplomatic agent forming part of his household shall, if they are
not nationals of the receiving State, enjoy the privileges and immunities specified in articles 29 to 36.
2.Members of the administrative and technical staff of the mission, together with members of
their families forming part of their respective households, shall, if they are not nationals of or
permanently resident in the receiving State, enjoy the privileges and immunities specified in articles 29
to 35, except that the immunity from civil and administrative jurisdiction of the receiving State specified
in paragraph 1 of article 31 shall not extend to acts performed outside the course of their duties. They
shall also enjoy the privileges specified in article 36, paragraph 1, in respect of articles imported at the
time of first installation.
3.Members of the service staff of the mission who are not nationals of or permanently resident in
the receiving State shall enjoy immunity in respect of acts performed in the course of their duties,
exemption from dues and taxes on the emoluments they receive by reason of their employment and the
exemption contained in article 33.
So “diplomatic agents” “having diplomatic rank” – which, remember, Sacoolas does not have – hold full immunity as do their families.

“Administrative and technical staff” have immunity from prosecution only while performing acts “in the course of their duties”. That is while actually engaged in work for their governments, not outwith their working time. Their families also have exactly the same immunity, and as the families do not have any official duties to be engaged in, in practice their immunity is only civil ie from taxation.

In the case of another spy, Shai Masot, not on the diplomatic list, when challenged as to his diplomatic status the FCO claimed he was not a “diplomatic agent” but only “technical and administrative staff”. As an NSA communications interception expert Sacoolas could arguably be “technical and administrative staff” if it were true that RAF Croughton were an annex of the US Embassy – but that plainly is not true.

However even were Sacoolas covered by immunity as “technical and administrative work” he and his family would only be covered for events that happened in the direct course of his work, and very, very plainly Anne Sacoolas would not have had diplomatic immunity when she hit Harry Dunn. She only had immunity if Sacoolas is a full blown “diplomatic agent” – which he isn’t. We are yet to be told what “diplomatic rank” he allegedly holds. So for the BBC to try to obscure the case with cooks and gardeners – who as “service staff” have even less immunity and their families none at all – is deliberate obfuscation.



This is an utterly tendentious claim. As explained above, the only people with practical diplomatic immunity outside their actual work are full blown diplomats, and there are just over 3,000 of them, all captured in the Diplomatic List. The BBC report attempts to make out that categories such as “international organisations” account for significant parts of this alleged horde of diplomats, but as noted above those from international organisations entitled to diplomatic immunity are all in the London Diplomatic List pp 127 to 137 and amount to just 220 people. It is also worth remembering that the majority of family members who have immunity are children.

There is a much larger number of military personnel who enjoy immunity under the Visiting Forces Act – a total disgrace, in my view – but this is not diplomatic immunity and it is not claimed Sacoolas has it. I have no idea where the ridiculous 23,000 figure for diplomatic immunity originates. Dominic Raab’s arse seems the best bet.

The Johnson/Raab PR strategy here is plain – to drown investigation of Sacoolas’ extremely dodgy claim to political asylum in a sea of tens of thousands of fictitious holders of dodgy political asylum. The government has decided to make us overlook Sacoolas by pretending that there are 23,000 obscure foreigners roaming our country as “diplomats”, each of whom has the license to burgle your home, piss on your floor, kill your daughter and rape your son without facing any possible criminal prosecution or comeback. If this were true, it would be a catastrophic and alarming state of affairs. Thankfully it is a great morass of fiction the government has created within which to try and bury Sacoolas.

This fake “diplomatic immunity” needs to be challenged in court, but I am not sure anyone except Harry Dunn’s family has the locus to do this. Their son was killed by the wife of a spy and to avoid political embarrassment about his activities, the government has falsely connived at a status of diplomatic immunity and then pretended to be trying to get Mrs Sacoolas back. That is an awful lot to take in for people in a terrible state of grief. After losing a son, the cognitive dissonance involved in uncovering state secrets, and learning that the state is malevolent and senior ministerial office holders are liars, is a huge hurdle to surmount. The Dunn family have first to summon the will to fight it, and then to avoid the attempts to hug them in the suffocating embrace of an establishment lawyer – believe me the powers that be will be covertly thrusting one at them – who will advise them they are most likely to make progress if they rock no boats.

The only people I know of who effectively enjoy secret diplomatic immunity are spies from CIA/NSA like Jonathon Sacoolas or from Mossad like Shai Masot. There are not any other categories of pretend diplomats having immunity, and the elaborate charade to pretend that there are is a nonsense. It must not distract from the fact that the claim that the government can grant US and Israeli intelligence agencies diplomatic immunity at will is a lie. The government is acting illegally here. There is no legislation that covers Raab in allowing Mrs Sacoolas to kill – albeit accidentally – with impunity.

I pray both the government and Mrs Sacoolas will be brought to account. I hope Mr and Mrs Dunn find what peace they can with their loss, and are able to remember with due warmth the eighteen wonderful years that I am sure they had with their son.

[TonyGosling]

Harry Dunn injuries not considered life-threatening despite breaking every bone
UK News | Published: Nov 6, 2019

Harry Dunn was killed when his motorbike crashed into a car outside RAF Croughton on August 27.
https://www.expressandstar.com/news/uk-news/2019/11/06/harry-dunn-inju ries-not-considered-life-threatening-despite-breaking-every-bone/

The injuries suffered by Harry Dunn were not considered life-threatening by emergency call handlers, despite “breaking every major bone” in a collision described as a “crash fireball”.

The 19-year-old was forced to wait for paramedics for 43 minutes after the emergency call was “wrongly categorised” and he was “left to die in a ditch” at the side of the road, the family’s spokesman said.

East Midlands Ambulance Service (EMAS) denied the claim the call was wrongly classified, saying: “Based on the information given to us by the caller at the time of the incident, the call was correctly categorised”.

Mr Dunn’s family met with chief executive of EMAS Richard Henderson and director of quality Nichola Bramhall to discuss the delay on Wednesday.

Harry Dunn death
Harry Dunn’s mother Charlotte Charles and father Tim Dunn with family spokesman Radd Seiger (centre) (PA)
The family’s spokesman Radd Seiger said Harry’s parents, Charlotte Charles and Tim Dunn, are “full of praise” for the work of the paramedics on the scene, but said the delay in getting to their son was “worrying”.

The teenager was killed when his motorbike crashed into a car outside RAF Croughton on August 27.

The family are currently pursuing a civil claim for damages which could be worth “millions of dollars” against the suspect in the case, 42-year-old Anne Sacoolas, after she was granted diplomatic immunity in the days following the crash.

The PA news agency understands that the first call made by a witness to the collision was put in category two, which are incidents of a potentially serious condition, by ambulance staff – which estimates a waiting time of 40 minutes for patients.

If the teenager’s condition was considered as category one, which is described as life-threatening and needing immediate intervention, ambulance crews should aim to attend in seven minutes under NHS England guidelines.

EMAS said Mr Dunn was reported to be conscious and breathing, meaning the call was recorded as a category two.

Harry Dunn death
Floral tributes on the B4031 outside RAF Croughton, in Northamptonshire, where Harry Dunn, 19, died when his motorbike was involved in a head-on collision in August (Steve Parsons/PA)
Speaking to PA about a “constructive” meeting, Mr Seiger said: “Both parties agreed it was not acceptable in the 21st century for a 19-year-old boy to be lying on the side of the road waiting for help for 43 minutes.

“It actually got recorded as a category two call, but that is something that they couldn’t go into.

“A serious road traffic collision should be recorded as category one – he had compound fractures and he was clearly very seriously ill from the start.”

PA understands Mr Dunn’s cause of death was confirmed as hypovolaemic cardiac arrest and multi-site skeletal, abdominal and chest trauma sustained in a road traffic collision.


Radd Seiger
@RaddSeiger
1/ #HarryDunn’s parents and I were pleased to meet with @EMASNHSTrust CEO Richard Henderson and Nichola Bramhall, Director of Quality this afternoon in Nottingham to discuss the 43 min delay in paramedics reaching Harry. The parents are incredibly grateful to all the staff....

19
4:44 PM - Nov 6, 2019
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See Radd Seiger's other Tweets
Mr Seiger said the delay would have been the same regardless because all 22 crews stationed in Northamptonshire were on other calls.

Addressing the reasons given for why there had been a delay, Mr Seiger said: “Mr Henderson made the point that actually, because of the shortage of crews, whether it was a category one or category two wouldn’t have made a difference because the doctors were far away.

“At that point there were lots of tears because the family wanted to know – was he frightened? He was clearly conscious and by the time Tim got there he was still talking.

Harry Dunn death
Colin and Larna Harber, with Harry Dunn and his father Tim Dunn (PA)
“From what they were able to share with us, there were no double-crewed vehicles readily available.”

Mr Seiger said Mr Henderson and Ms Bramhall confirmed all other ambulance crews were responding to incidents “less significant” than Harry’s.

After the meeting, Mr Henderson said: “After a request from the family, this afternoon I met with Harry Dunn’s parents to offer my sincere condolences on the death of their 19-year-old son.

“I wanted to take the opportunity to hear from the family at this stage, whilst recognising the complexities and sensitivities of ongoing external legal investigations.

“I understand that this is a very difficult time for the family and I therefore appreciate the time I had with them.

“In due course there will be a Coroner’s inquest into the death of Harry Dunn and EMAS will cooperate fully with that inquiry.

“I have committed to discuss the issues arising with local health leaders in Northamptonshire together with Harry’s parents.”

[TonyGosling]

Foreign Office asked police not to tell Harry Dunn's family his killer had fled Britain
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/foreign-office-asked-police- not-tell-harry-dunns-family-his-killer-had-fled-britain

A vehicle passes floral tributes on the B4031 outside RAF Croughton, in Northamptonshire, where Harry Dunn, 19, died when his motorbike was involved in a head-on collision in August
THE Foreign Office asked Northamptonshire Police to delay telling Harry Dunn’s family that his killer had left Britain, Dominic Raab has admitted.

The teenager was run over by Anne Sacoolas, the wife of a US diplomat, who was driving on the wrong side of the road outside a US spy base in Croughton, South Northamptonshire on August 27.

Mr Raab admitted that the Foreign Office had asked for a delay of “a day or two, no more than that” to make sure they were clear on their plans going forward.

He said: “The police are in charge of liaising with the family [over] this very difficult and tragic case.

“They asked the Foreign Office for advice and one of our officers said it would be useful to have a day or two, no more than that, just to make sure we were clear on what we’d be doing going forward, and just to make sure that ministers could be consulted.”

Ultimately, the family were kept in the dark for 10 days after police found out Ms Sacoolas had left Britain.

Labour’s shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry is demanding an inquiry into the case.

She said: “It now looks increasingly clear that the Foreign Secretary and his officials have something to hide in terms of how they responded to this dreadful tragedy, why they allowed Anne Sacoolas to leave the country, and why they delayed informing Harry Dunn's family of her departure.

“We need an urgent parliamentary inquiry to uncover who did what in this case, who took the decisions, when they were taken, and why.”

[TonyGosling]

RAF Croughton worker denied workers rights
RAF Croughton is again under fire just weeks after allowing Anne Sacoolas, the American who claimed diplomatic immunity, to leave the UK following the death of Brackley teenager Harry Dunn.
By Stuart Prestidge
Wednesday, 6th November 2019, 4:01 pm
https://www.banburyguardian.co.uk/news/people/raf-croughton-worker-den ied-workers-rights-853600

Firefighter Caroline Wright says she was wrongly forced from her job at the base after she was diagnosed with epilepsy in 2017.

She was joined in her quest for compensation by a second claimant, Anthea Webster, who suffers from a debilitating condition that frequently leaves her in extreme pain.

Despite her illness, she had been rated as “outstanding” by her bosses for each of the last seven years of her employment as a records officer at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk.


An employment tribunal in Cambridge heard last month that both women had been directly employed by the US government as civilian workers.


The hearing was told that a US military presentation for its British staff had stated that “employees are entitled to all rights and entitlements afforded under UK law."

But despite assurances of the protection of UK law, when Mrs Webster and Miss Wright brought separate compensation claims following their dismissals from their jobs, Washington took steps to end the proceedings by invoking "state immunity" rules.

The women were told last week that their legal case had to be thrown out after Washington argued successfully that an employment tribunal had no jurisdiction and the women have no right to pursue discrimination claims - despite the fact that both women were British citizens working in the UK and paying UK taxes.

In a highly unusual move, the tribunal judge expressed sympathy for the women and said it would “undoubtedly appear unjust” to them that they had been barred from exercising a right available to other Britons.


The women last night accused the American government of depriving Britons of the right to justice on their own soil.

They believe the ruling has the effect of barring 1,100 other British civilians directly employed on US air bases in the UK from being able to take grievances to a British court.

The Pentagon hired Professor Dan Sarooshi QC, one of Britain’s leading lawyers and an expert on international law at Oxford University, to successfully argue that America was entitled to state immunity - the concept that a state’s “sovereign acts” cannot be ruled upon by the courts of another state, even when those acts take place on the second state’s territory.

Miss Wright and Mrs Webster, who both represented themselves at the hearing against the heavyweight US legal team, are hoping to appeal the ruling but are unable to afford their own expert lawyers to take their cases further.

Both women told our sister paper, the i, they felt angry and bewildered.

Miss Wright said: “I am shocked and beyond disappointed by what has happened.

"The US government has spent probably hundreds of thousands of dollars on heavy legal representation to deny me my basic human right to not be discriminated against and for fair treatment in the workplace and to shut down any further cases being brought against them.

"Fighting for justice alone was an impossible task leaving me in absolute legal limbo.”


Employment Judge Foxwell challenged a claim from Prof Sarooshi that the US presentation promising “all rights and entitlements” under UK law had not been misleading when it failed to make clear that state immunity might be invoked for employment disputes.

The judge wrote: “In my judgment, most UK employees receiving this information would believe this meant that they had an unfettered right to have employment claims recognised by law adjudicated on in an Employment Tribunal.”

But in his 24-page ruling delivered last week, the judge found that in their roles as employees of the US government both women had carried out “sovereign functions” of another state and therefore the law of state immunity prevented the tribunal from investigating their claims.

Judge Foxwell underlined that the doctrine of state immunity meant he was therefore required to dismiss both women’s claims without considering their merits.


Miss Wright, who recently became a mother, had claimed disability and sex discrimination after she was diagnosed with epilepsy early in 2017 and was forced to resign in January 2018.

She also subsequently claimed constructive dismissal.

The judge praised both women for the “great dignity” with which they had conducted themselves, as well as accepting the sense of injustice felt by the women.

He said: “I have personal sympathy with the position in which the claimants find themselves.

"They had not been told during their employment that they might not be able to seek a judicial determination in this country of their employment rights and it will undoubtedly appear unjust to them that they are excluded from rights most other employees and workers in the UK are entitled to exercise.”

The women’s case comes amid increased tension between London and Washington over America’s longstanding ambivalence towards international legal proceedings involving either its government or its citizens.

The i has approached the American military authorities in Britain and the US embassy in London for comment on the tribunal proceedings.

No response had been received at the time of publication.

[TonyGosling]

Who is Anne Sacoolas’ husband Jonathan and why do they have diplomatic immunity?
By floridapost -October 8, 20190
https://thefloridapost.com/who-is-anne-sacoolas-husband-jonathan-and-w hy-do-they-have-diplomatic-immunity/

JONATHAN Sacoolas is an alleged American spy based in Northampton – but who is he, and why does he have diplomatic immunity?
Here’s our lowdown on where he’s from and when he married Anne Sacoolas.

Anne Sacoolas, 42, was the suspect in the investigation but has left the UK
Who is Anne Sacoolas’ husband Jonathan?

Jonathan Saccolas is a US diplomat and alleged NSA spy.

He was born in Oregon, and attended South Salem High School before studying electrical engineering at the University of Southern California.
He was employed by the Defence Department when he married in 2003.

He is married to Anne Sacoolas, who fled Britain after Harry Dunn, 19, died in a fatal hit-and-run.

Harry died after his motorbike collided with a car close to RAF Croughton.

The US embassy confirmed Anne was behind the wheel of the car.

It was later reported that Anne was driving on the wrong side of the road when she crashed head on, into Harry.

Northamptonshire Police confirmed Anne fled Britain claiming diplomatic immunity.

Why do they have diplomatic immunity?
Anne was able to claim diplomatic immunity after a special deal was put in place between the UK and the US which gives staff and their families based at RAF Croughton diplomatic immunity.

[TonyGosling]

American spy's wife who fled the UK after 19-year-old motorcyclist died in a crash near an RAF airbase ALREADY has a conviction for poor driving in Virginia
Anne Sacoolas was last night revealed as driver who allegedly hit Harry Dunn
Mr Dunn died following a crash near RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire
Mrs Sacoolas claimed diplomatic immunity following the young man's death
She was fined in 2006 in Virginia for 'failure to pay full time and attention'
By SEBASTIAN MURPHY-BATES FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 01:58, 8 October 2019 | UPDATED: 12:28, 8 October 2019
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7548519/American-spys-wife-fl ed-UK-crash-conviction-poor-driving-Virginia.html

Anne Sacoolas (pictured) has a conviction for poor driving in her own country, it emerged last night

The US spy's wife who fled the UK following a crash that killed a 19-year-old man has a conviction for poor driving in her home country.

Anne Sacoolas, who allegedly knocked Harry Dunn off his motorbike near RAF Croughton, was fined in 2006 in Virginia for 'failure to pay full time and attention'.

[TonyGosling]

Donald Trump tried to pay off Harry Dunn’s grieving parents when they visited the White House, the family spokesman has said.


Harry Dunn's family claims Donald Trump was ready to write cheque during meeting over teenager's death
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/11/07/harry-dunns-family-claims- donald-trump-ready-write-cheque-meeting/

Both expensive and outdated, isn't it time we binned match-day programmes?
Wasps chief executive Stephen Vaughan outlines his vi... Read more ›
Robert Mendick, chief reporter
7 NOVEMBER 2019 • 8:49PM

Donald Trump tried to pay off Harry Dunn’s grieving parents when they visited the White House, the family spokesman has said.

The President was “standing by, ready to write a cheque” during the meeting at which the teenager’s parents lobbied for his alleged killer to return to the UK to face justice.

The 19-year-old died after his motorbike was hit by a car being driven on the wrong side of the road by Anne Sacoolas, the wife of an American intelligence agent who then claimed diplomatic immunity.

The Dunn family spokesman Radd Seiger disclosed yesterday that at the October meeting in the White House, Mr Trump had said the “Treasury department will sort this out”. Mrs Sacoolas was waiting in a next door room, but the parents declined Mr trump’s invitation for them to meet her.

–– ADVERTISEMENT ––


Mr Seiger said: “You can imagine how intense the atmosphere was in there. What Trump said was to Robert O’Brien, his National Security Adviser. What he was clearly saying was the Treasury will sort you out.

Clearly the government are expecting to pay the bill.

“The arrangement was let’s get harry’s family to hug and kiss the lady [Mrs Sacoolas] and pay them off. That was the plan. It makes me sick to the stomach.”

Charlotte Charles (R) and Tim Dunn, parents of teenage motorcyclist Harry Dunn
Charlotte Charles (R) and Tim Dunn, parents of teenage motorcyclist Harry Dunn CREDIT: DANIEL LEAL-OLIVAS
Charlotte Charles, the boy’s mother, has said money “is not going to bring Harry back” and that she and the rest of the family just want the authorities involved in the case to “tell us the truth” and “learn that this cannot happen again”.

Mrs Sacoolas, 42, a mother-of-three, is alleged to have been driving out of the RAF Croughton, a US airbase in Northamptonshire, on August 27 when the crash happened.

Mrs Charles and Harry’s father Tim Dunn yesterday met Northamptonshire Police and Crime Commissioner Stephen Mold to discuss the conduct of the force’s Chief Constable Nick Adderley throughout the investigation into their son’s death.

After the meeting Mr Mold admitted there were lessons to be learned from the investigation and said he would look at ways in which the family could be more supported.

Mrs Charles said after the meeting: “It’s harder to lie and withhold information and it’s easier to tell the truth. “That’s all we want. We want her (Mrs Sacoolas) to come back and we want the systems all the way around it to just tell us the truth.”

Anne Sacoolas
Anne Sacoolas
Asked if a cheque from Mr Trump would help them, Mrs Charles said: “No it’s not. It’s not going to bring Harry back.

“Justice has to be done. They all need to learn that this can’t happen again and they need to learn that things need to be put into place to stop this.”

Mr Dunn said he hoped Mrs Sacoolas would come back to the UK to face justice. “It is frustrating,” he added.

The police have passed a file to the Crown prosecution service in which it is understood officers are recommending Mrs Sacoolas be charged with causing death by dangerous driving. It is not clear if prosecutors can charge Mrs Sacoolas with any offence.

The Foreign Office has insisted she has immunity as the spouse of a US diplomat. Her husband Jonathan Sacoolas is understood to be an intelligence agent, almost certainly working for the National Security Agency and was entitled to diplomatic status.

The immunity only applies in the UK however and with Mrs Sacoolas now back in the US, the family can sue her in American courts for civil damages. Lawyers for the teenager’s family believe her diplomatic immunity should not have applied in the UK either and that she should be prosecuted in a British criminal court.

[TonyGosling]

The Disgusting Lies on Harry Dunn’s Death Must Stop 93
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/04/the-disgusting-lies-on -harry-dunns-death-must-stop/

24 Apr, 2020 in Uncategorized by craig | View Comments
Beyond any doubt, it would have been Dominic Raab’s personal decision to grant a fake diplomatic immunity to Anne Sacoolas and permit her to leave the country. I have watched with sheer horror the Tory crocodile tears, the ministerial meetings with Harry Dunn’s brave but distraught family, and the PR pretence that the UK is seeking Anne Sacoolas’ return, now that she is safely back at CIA HQ. It is perhaps the most nauseating display of individual hypocrisy I have ever seen in politics. The callous abuse of Harry Dunn’s suffering family and the sheer cynicism of the patent charade that the government is supporting them, leave me deeply depressed – and very angry.

It may surprise you, but I have known and worked with some Tories who were at heart honorable men. The centre of this government is estranged from the very concept of personal honour.

The Permanent Secretary of the FCO, Simon McDonald, in appearing virtually before the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee this week, stated in evidence that the initial advice from FCO Legal Advisers was that Anne Sacoolas did not have diplomatic immunity, but that this legal advice changed after discussion with the US State Department. Crucially McDonald stated that the legal advice had gone to three FCO ministers including Raab, but he does not seem to have stated who made the actual decision to let Sacoolas go – largely because nobody on the Committee seems to have asked him the right question. With a CIA officer killing a young British lad, it is from my personal FCO experience inconceivable this was not Raab’s call.

I have explained, from long before there was any acknowledgement of the fact in the mainstream media, that Anne Sacoolas did not qualify for diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention. That specifically reserves immunity for families to diplomatic agents carrying diplomatic rank, which Sacoolas’ husband never had.

Please read my detailed explanation here, or the rest of this article will be hard going.



The British government claims that there is a secret bilateral treaty governing the status of American spies at RAF Croughton, under which Anne Sacoolas does have immunity.

Now I want you to follow this very closely. I apologise that, if you are unfamiliar with the concepts, it is difficult to get your head around.

You will recall that in the Julian Assange case, the British government is claiming that Article 4 of the UK/US Extradition Treaty of 2007, which bans “political” extradition, has no force in law. The British government argues that this is because an international treaty the UK has entered into only has legal force in the UK if it is specifically incorporated into law by UK legislation; and the 2007 UK/US Extradition Treaty never was so incorporated. The UK government argues that the 2007 Treaty depends on the 2003 Extradition Act, but as the 2003 Act is (they claim) incompatible with Article 4 of the 2007 Treaty, then Article 4 must fall. Political extradition would therefore become possible.

The UK government position in the Assange case is that the UK government’s treaty commitments are legally void unless specifically passed into UK legislation.

Well – very definitely no “secret treaty” over RAF Croughton has ever been incorporated into UK law. The only legal basis on which Dominic Raab could give Anne Sacoolas immunity is the Diplomatic Privileges Act of 1964, which incorporates the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations into UK law. And Ms Sacoolas’ so-called immunity is incompatible with the Vienna Convention as her husband is not a diplomatic agent carrying diplomatic rank. He could only be technical and administrative staff of the US Embassy (itself a dubious claim). The families of Technical and Administrative staff do not have any immunity under the Vienna Convention. Therefore Dominic Raab had no legal power to grant Anne Sacoolas immunity. There is no UK law that confers that power upon him, whatever any secret treaty might say.

In short, the British government is arguing the opposite in the Sacoolas case to its argument in the Assange case. It claims a secret bilateral treaty with the US could alone give Dominic Raab the legal power to grant Ms Sacoolas immunity. While in the Assange case it argues that a bilateral treaty with the USA carries no legal force.

I should straighten one wrinkle. I understand that the current fig leaf which UK government lawyers are attempting to shrink behind is the provision in the 1964 Diplomatic Privileges Act authorising bilateral arrangements which confer immunities over and above those conferred by the Vienna Convention. There is indeed such a provision, at article 7 of the Act.



But note this: it only provides for special bilateral arrangements already in place “at the commencement of the Act”, ie before 1964. Furthermore those bilateral arrangements must, as specified in the legislation, be listed in the London Gazette. I searched the Gazette, which was as little fun as it sounds. Journalism is tough work if you do it properly, which is presumably why the media no longer even pretend to do it. Eventually I tracked down the list of bilateral arrangements under the Diplomatic Privileges Act on page 8,292 of Issue 4,351 of the London Gazette.

Special bilateral arrangements with the USA were indeed gazetted (and now you know where that term comes from).



But note that this special arrangement for US technical and administrative staff only applies to clause 7 (b) of the Act, not 7(A). That is it only confers exemption from taxation. In effect, the only right Mr Sacoolas was granted was the right to buy duty free booze – a right which may well have its part to play in the death of Harry Dunn. There was no diplomatic immunity for Sacoolas, let alone his family, irrespective of what the FCO might claim.

There is no secret treaty over RAF Croughton, or arrangement for diplomatic immunity there, ever posted in the London Gazette under the 1964 Act or ever embodied in any other primary or secondary UK legislation. The initial FCO legal advice, that Anne Sacoolas had no immunity, was very plainly correct.

The evidence given by Simon McDonald was that a secret treaty purported to give full immunity to spies like Sacoolas, but that this treaty had been recently amended to remove their immunity. However, McDonald continued, in removing the immunity for spies it had not stated that it also removed immunity for their families, so that remained. He called this “apparently illogical” and “a recondite piece of law”.

It is in fact utter nonsense. The only families who have Vienna Convention immunity are the families of diplomatic agents having diplomatic rank. They only have diplomatic immunity through the diplomatic agent. A family cannot have diplomatic immunity while the (alleged) Embassy staff member on whom that immunity depends does not. It is not just illogical, it is impossible in terms of the Vienna Convention, and diplomatic immunity can only be conferred through the incorporation of the Vienna Convention into UK law in the 1964 Diplomatic Privileges Act. All of which Simon McDonald knows very well.

My own interpretation is that McDonald was obviously calling into ridicule a case for which he has great personal distaste, by making bare its absurdity whilst appearing to defend it as a loyal civil servant. Which is as absurd as the rest of this disgusting quagmire of immorality.

I am very grateful to those of you who responded to my call to put in Freedom of Information requests on the UK government position re the applicability of Article 4 of the 2007 UK/US Extradition Treaty. The first results are starting to come through. As suspected the government are being as obstructive and unhelpful as possible.

The FCO has stated that it does hold material on the internal assessment of the official UK government view from 2003 to 2007 of the compatibility of Article 4 of the UK/US Extradition Treaty of 2007 with the Extradition Act of 2003. However it is refusing to retrieve and release the material on grounds of excessive cost, claiming it would take more than the mandated 3.5 man days to process the request.

As all the material in question from those dates will be electronically stored, I know they are lying about excessive time and cost. We are looking to break down the request into several smaller chunks to parcel out. It is however very instructive already that the FCO is admitting it does hold the information. This confirms what I explained, that internal FCO systems, to my certain and direct knowledge, make it impossible that the 2007 US/UK Extradition Treaty could have been ratified by the UK without a preceding very thorough Whitehall assessment of the enforceability of all of its provisions in UK law.

Unfortunately I now have my own quite severe legal difficulties to which I need to attend. I was very keen to get this material to help the Harry Dunn campaign finished and published, which is why I am completing this article at 5.30am after writing it all night. I regret that the haste required has made my explanation of a technically complex subject not as straightforward nor as elegant as I would usually try to achieve. It also means that you need to follow the links and read some of the past material I had written, rather than my setting it out all afresh in a self-sufficient article as I would have wished. I do apologise for this, but will explain the difficult circumstances shortly.

With grateful thanks to those who donated or subscribed to make this reporting possible.

This article is entirely free to reproduce and publish, including in translation, and I very much hope people will do so actively. Truth shall set us free.

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