The US military failed to notify British police of an allegation that one of its airmen had been drink-driving in Suffolk, preventing the British authorities from being able to investigate the offence.
The failure broke a longstanding formal agreement with British police that enables the UK to investigate alleged illegality by US military personnel who are stationed in Britain.
The airman, Christopher Mooty, had spent the night drinking with two other American service personnel in a market town before driving them to buy a kebab in the early hours of the morning.
The allegation of drink-driving was later reported to his commanders, who then used their own internal processes to discipline him.
The case raises questions over how many other US military personnel based in the UK have committed crimes that have not been flagged to British police forces.
Mooty went on to commit a second drink-driving offence a year later. This time he was prosecuted in a British court.
The latest disclosures are part of the Guardian’s investigation into crimes carried out by American military personnel who are based in Britain.
The series prompted the UK government and police chiefs to set up a high-level inquiry in the summer to establish whether US military personnel stationed in Britain are being brought to justice properly.
In the latest case, Mooty, then a 21-year-old airman working at the huge United States Air Force (USAF) base at Mildenhall, Suffolk, went on a night out in March 2023.
He met two other American airmen in a pub in Newmarket where he drank two or three bottles of beer in two hours, according to evidence heard at his disciplinary hearing. They then went to another Newmarket pub where he had two or three vodka Red Bulls over another two hours.
They took a taxi to the home of one of the men in Bury St Edmunds. But they soon decided they were hungry and at around 4am Mooty drove them in his car to a kebab shop, according to evidence at the disciplinary hearing.
While he was driving, Mooty received messages from a British woman who had been in a relationship with him. During the exchanges, the woman quickly suspected that he was drunk. Later that night, he went to her home. She said that Mooty was “the most drunk I’ve ever seen him” when he went to her house, adding: “I’m surprised he didn’t crash/get caught,” the disciplinary hearing heard.
She reported him to his superiors at Mildenhall. “He is endangering the lives of the people in this country and should not be here,” she told them.
Mooty was disciplined in a US court martial for being drunk in charge of a vehicle. A military judge convicted him, sentencing him to 20 days of hard labour and a demotion.
However, under the terms of an agreement that has been in force since the 1950s, the British police have the primary responsibility for investigating alleged wrongdoing by US military personnel, unless the offences were committed while the Americans were on duty, or against another member of their armed forces or property.
There are now questions about why the US military prevented the possibility of Mooty being prosecuted in a British court.
Suffolk police said they were “not notified of a drink-driving incident on 3/4 March 2023 involving a US airman from RAF Mildenhall. We understand that the incident was investigated and dealt with by the USAF.”
In a statement, the USAF said: “While we do not have a specific written record of this notification occurring, there is no reason to believe that verbal notification was not provided in line with standard inter-agency coordination procedures.”
Asked why it decided to investigate Mooty instead of handing the case over to the British police, the USAF said he “was not stopped by UK law enforcement while driving. Rather, the allegation was first reported to US military authorities well after the driving incident occurred.
“Thus, no chemical testing (blood and breathalyser evidence) was available nor any first-hand observation of impairment by police forces, as typically desired by local UK prosecutors.”
The USAF added that its military prosecutors could take Mooty to a court martial based on the testimony of witnesses and what it called “indicators of impairment”.
The USAF said it had a policy of prosecuting as many of its personnel as possible within the boundaries of its agreement with the UK. It argues that this is a more effective way of maintaining discipline and good order within its ranks. The USAF asks British police if it can take over the prosecution of cases, requests that British police often agree to.
US military judges subsequently quashed the court martial verdict against Mooty and approved a rehearing of his case, but this has not been held, as he was dismissed from the USAF after he was caught drink-driving a year later.
At 4.20am on 31 March 2024, he was arrested by a Suffolk police officer after driving a car while over the limit in Bury St Edmunds. He resisted being arrested.
He was convicted at Ipswich magistrates court in August 2024 after pleading guilty to both offences. Mooty was banned from driving for a year and ordered to pay fines and penalties totalling £871.
On this occasion, the USAF did not step in and request to take over the prosecution. It said it left it to the British police as it “understood prosecution of the case by local authorities to be perfectly appropriate” under the agreement with the UK.
The USAF communicated with British prosecutors over the second drink-driving offence. It said it helped the British authorities gain access to another member of the US air force who rebutted Mooty’s defence that he was not driving that night.
The conduct of American military personnel driving on British roads is contentious, as there has been a history of them committing offences such as speeding, drink-driving and driving without insurance.
In one well-known case, it took a long campaign to bring to justice Anne Sacoolas, the American intelligence official who killed a 19-year-old motorcyclist, Harry Dunn, in a road accident outside a US base in Northamptonshire in 2019.
