Harry Dunn’s killer Anne Sacoolas won’t attend sentencing in person on advice of US government

Anne Sacoolas will not attend her sentencing for the death of Harry Dunn on the advice of the US government, a court has confirmed.

The US citizen pleaded guilty via video-link from Washington DC to causing death by careless driving in October and was told by a judge to show “genuine remorse” by returning to the UK for sentence.

Sacoolas, 45, fled from the country just days after she knocked the 19-year-old off his motorcycle outside RAF Croughton, Northants, in August 2019. She has not come back since.

She had been driving on the wrong side of the road at the time of the collision but managed to escape police action after the US government asserted diplomatic immunity on her behalf.

Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb acknowledged in October that Sacoolas’s previous failure to surrender to custody in the UK meant there was a limit to her legal powers.

She added: “The personal attendance and voluntary surrender to the court of Mrs Sacoolas would provide weighty evidence indeed of genuine remorse.”

But, confirming a renewed application for her to appear via video link has been granted, a court spokesman said: “The application made jointly by the prosecution and defence for Mrs Sacoolas to participate and be sentenced by live link has been renewed.

“The defence have supplied material in support of the application, including evidence that Mrs Sacoolas’s government employer has advised her not to attend in person.

“The judge has granted the application.”

It is expected Ms Sacoolas will be sentenced on Thursday at the Old Bailey.

US government ‘interfering in our criminal justice system’

Radd Seiger, the Dunn family spokesman, said: “Harry’s family are victims of a serious crime and they have been kept in the dark completely about what is to come at Thursday’s hearing since Mrs Sacoolas’s guilty plea on October 20.

“We are horrified to learn that the United States government is now actively interfering in our criminal justice system.

“Their ongoing cruel treatment of Harry’s parents is nothing short of inhumane and it continues to take a heavy toll on their mental health.

“If there is a genuine reason why Mrs Sacoolas should not appear in court on Thursday, as directed by the judge, then the parents would happily accept that.

“But on the face of it, it appears that this is nothing short of a cowardly act on the part of an oppressor.”