US diplomat secretly flown home ‘had child abuse images at flat’
thetimes.com
thetimes.com
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jul/29/why-us-milit...
A US diplomat's wife got flown home after killing a motorcyclist.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49984737
And our lads die in their wars.
The "special relationship" is an abusive relationship.
2) She was convicted by the way....
3) and our boys died in yours.
Not according to this[1]
She refused to attend court in the UK. After a lot of pressure she reluctantly agreed to appear via video link. She was sentenced in absence by the UK court to eight months in prison, suspended for 12 months. The UK court had no choice but to suspend her sentence as her lawyers made it clear she would never travel to the UK to serve time.
Meanwhile the Wikipedia entry makes zero mention of any attempts by the US justice system to prosecute her. There was an attempt at a civil lawsuit by the Dunn family in the US, but no sign of a criminal lawsuit.
So in effect she got away with it.
The equivalent crime in the U.S. is "vehicular homicide" which is a state-level crime. The general sentence for that in the U.S. is usually a suspended sentence of 1 year or less, unless substance abuse or extreme negligence was involved, so she's effectively serving the same sentence here as she would in the U.S., i.e., none. (Yes, the U.S. is very lenient about this.) That's why the U.S. won't extradite her. Over here, she wouldn't have served any time for what she did, and the U.S. generally won't extradite citizens to countries where the punishment for the crime is significantly in excess of what it would be in the U.S. This usually works against the U.S., as many countries (including the U.K.) frequently won't extradite to the U.S. because our punishments are harsher.
If she ever travels to a state with an extradition treaty with the U.K. that also has a vehicular homicide equivalent, she can be extradited to the U.K. to serve actual time. The U.K. has one of the largest extradition treaty networks, so basically she's prohibited from traveling outside the U.S.
But you know, keep ranting about the laws without understanding how they work. It will serve you well in life.
"A US embassy staffer accused of possessing indecent images of children, was detained at his south London flat and flown out of the UK in August, without being first questioned by British police."
Sure, I get the overall mechanics. "was... flown" - any brits here to help? What exactly does this mean in BBC English? It implies something, doesn't it?
Americans can recall diplomats back to their home country at any time. He was recalled somewhat more hastily than most.
I imagine they said something to the effect of “you will be deported and stand trial in the US; the only question is whether you’re prosecuted in the UK as well”. I imagine that, plus promises to keep his name out of the media, were convincing.
The problem is the US is a Puritan asylum, so things that'd never register as offenses in sane countries, sexual or otherwise, can get people's names in that registry, destroying their lives.
And several States are weaponizing this by expanding what's legally labeled as sexually offensive so it covers harmless behaviors of minorities, so now there are people under risk of getting included in the registry due basically to existing.
All told no country is ever going to shrug and say, "Sure take our guy, wring him out and let us know what he says." That's not how anything works and it's frankly not how it should work. But again... people here tend to have an extremely black-and-white way of thinking and very little actual knowledge beyond tech.
Yes, but the point in this case is that we are told the person did not have diplomatic immunity.
Not everybody who works at an embassy has diplomatic immunity.
The Geneva Convention dictates who gets diplomatic immunity, and that is based around your job description and rank.
This is not the first time either that the US has flown somebody out of the UK in questionable circumstances before they were questioned by UK police.
The UK is not a third-world country, there is no reason why somebody should not be questioned by UK police or dealt with in UK courts.
You can also bet your bottom dollar that if the tables were turned and the equivalent happend on US soil, there would be little chance of being flown out covertley. Most sensible people don't like "One rule for US, another rule for everyone else", even more so under the present US administration.
And you certainly don’t want an agency asset floating around in the legal/prison system of another country, friend or foe.
https://1997-2001.state.gov/www/about_state/diplomatic_immun...
This person was allegedly looking at CSAM.
Police and courts interrogating someone as to why they were looking at CSAM is a specific line of enquiry and doesn't touch upon their job.
Also from the US State Department website:
Under international law and practice, persons enjoying immunity from the jurisdiction of a receiving State’s laws nonetheless have a duty to respect those laws. Immunity is not a license for misconduct. It is a doctrine intended to benefit the sending State or IO, not individuals.
that's not what it means, though. it means that Immunity is meant to ensure the persons enjoying immunity can fulfill their duties, it doesn't mean that it is only selectively applied or that it can be discarded at will by the host country
a person with diplomatic immunity could murder another person and still be immune from prosecution, and it'd be then up to the sending & host state to figure out what to do. from what I know, the sending state can waive such immunity to allow for prosecution
from what I know, this is not correct.
if the US said he's a diplomat or has diplomatic immunity and/or was given that by the US and notified the UK, then he has immunity and it is up to the US and UK to resolve their grievances through diplomatic channels.
for example, many family members of diplomats and government officials have such status in host countries
Point still remains. They will be family members of people with suitable job description and rank.
As an extreme example, nobody seriously expects a janitor at an embassy to be given diplomatic immunity.
There are a large numebr of roles at an embassy that simply do not require diplomatic immunity. And based on the media reports, it seems this person was in one of those roles that did not require diplomatic immunity.
like I said, this seems to be handled just as I thought, through the UK putting pressure on the US to act according to their wishes
it's really up to the US to classify what staffers are under immunity, that's just how it goes. it may not be right or moral but that's part of what allows them to station staff in other countries without fear of them being compromised and so on.
> based on the media reports, it seems this person was in one of those roles that did not require diplomatic immunity.
if you could give a reference to this, that'd be great. remember though, it doesn't have to be a "diplomat" role. just being in an official role or attached to such, or being family of such person is enough in most cases.