Diplomatic Immunity

[Chris Wilson]

Personally I believe she made an easy but tragic error but the hate here is tangible. I look upon her misdeed as one I could make at any time, as could most here that drive a motor vehicle. I suspect much of the vicious sentiment is politically led, and had she been disassociated with the US military base, and just a tourist who legged it out of the UK this case would have seen little to no media coverage. Or GD rantings

 

[dowie]

Sounds like Sacoolas will face trial next month, albeit all via video link in the US. Although it's very unlikely when she's found guilty that she'll travel back to the UK to serve a sentence. Whole thing seems like a bit of a sham and a waste of taxpayers money. If they can't get her back to the UK to face a trial then they shouldn't bother.

Would be a bit of a farce if she gets found guilty but is handed a suspended sentence. I guess she might be fined too.

The main thing perhaps though is that a guilty verdict would help the family’s civil case in the US.

 

[Jean-F]

Personally I believe she made an easy but tragic error but the hate here is tangible. I look upon her misdeed as one I could make at any time, as could most here that drive a motor vehicle. I suspect much of the vicious sentiment is politically led, and had she been disassociated with the US military base, and just a tourist who legged it out of the UK this case would have seen little to no media coverage. Or GD rantings

It’s true that it is a very easy mistake to make by anyone, experienced or otherwise.
Some 40 something years ago, I drove a 44 ton LHD Mercedes articulated truck off the ferry in Zeebrugge Belgium, headed east, touched a little bit of Holland, then through West Germany, East Germany and eventually to Poland.
I delivered a load of machinery parts to a factory on a trading estate on the outskirts of Poznań, then as I left the trading estate, after driving on the right from the ferry through five countries, I followed the sign for Frankfurt-an-der-Oder, the German border town, by casually moving to the left until a small baker’s truck repeatedly flashed his main beams at me, (it was 11.00 a.m.), and I quickly clocked the rear view mirror and skated back to the right hand side of the road.
No harm, no foul, but I had a cold flush and although I don’t think that I shivered I felt almost giddy with the thought of what might have happened.
For a couple of years prior to that, I’d been driving 44 ton trucks, both LHD and RHD around Europe, from Finland in the north to Greece in the south, but as I lived in London U.K., my brain must have somehow sent me to the left side of the road.

 

[Custor]

Personally I believe she made an easy but tragic error but the hate here is tangible. I look upon her misdeed as one I could make at any time, as could most here that drive a motor vehicle. I suspect much of the vicious sentiment is politically led, and had she been disassociated with the US military base, and just a tourist who legged it out of the UK this case would have seen little to no media coverage. Or GD rantings

Using diplomatic immunity - lol

 

[Hades]

Personally I believe she made an easy but tragic error but the hate here is tangible. I look upon her misdeed as one I could make at any time, as could most here that drive a motor vehicle. I suspect much of the vicious sentiment is politically led, and had she been disassociated with the US military base, and just a tourist who legged it out of the UK this case would have seen little to no media coverage. Or GD rantings

Yes she certainly made a mistake which many of us could, and it was an accident rather than malicious. But the contempt comes from her use of diplomatic immunity to escape personal responsibility. DI is intended to protect a countries embassy and political staff from potentially unfair legal process, not protect someone from this sort of personal accountability. What makes it worse is that the US is using its position to support her. The whole thing goes against the UK publics sense of fairness.

 

[Chris Wilson]

Yes she certainly made a mistake which many of us could, and it was an accident rather than malicious. But the contempt comes from her use of diplomatic immunity to escape personal responsibility. DI is intended to protect a countries embassy and political staff from potentially unfair legal process, not protect someone from this sort of personal accountability. What makes it worse is that the US is using its position to support her. The whole thing goes against the UK publics sense of fairness.

I am afraid diplomatic immunity has always suffered some abuse of its protection. Hell I had a customer who had CD plates on his car as he worked for Rainier in Monaco and he would tell me to use it if I needed to go into Manchester and just park where I found most convenient. I doubt he'd have backed me up if I ran some guy over though. World's unfair, but a lot less stressful once one accepts it is.

I still think this woman was allowed to do a runner under DI to protect her husband's job from scrutiny.

 

[Freddie1980]

Let's trade Assange for her.

We could offer Assange and Prince Andrew as an exchange deal but from what I've read and heard the Americans aren't interested and are hell bent on protecting her at all costs. If that is the case she or her husband must be well connected.

 

[Tefal]

Personally I believe she made an easy but tragic error but the hate here is tangible. I look upon her misdeed as one I could make at any time, as could most here that drive a motor vehicle. I suspect much of the vicious sentiment is politically led, and had she been disassociated with the US military base, and just a tourist who legged it out of the UK this case would have seen little to no media coverage. Or GD rantings

It's q bit concerning you 5hink you could find yourself driving on the wrong side of the road at anytime

 

[Jean-F]

It's q bit concerning you 5hink you could find yourself driving on the wrong side of the road at anytime

It’s equally concerning that you appear, (I stress only to appear), to be harbouring the opinion that having a sudden mental lapse and driving on the wrong side of the road is something that normally would be unlikely to occur.
Sure, if you’ve been driving for 70 or 80 km for a period of time you’d only suddenly switch sides I’d you’d suffered a major brain malfunction.
No one I imagine makes the snap decision to fly in the face of sanity and suddenly deliberately switch to driving on the wrong side.
It can happen to anyone whose brain has been trained that either the left or right is the correct side that you should be on.
One day you get behind the wheel and in an unguarded moment your brain will direct you to drive on the side that it remembered that you always favoured.
Chris Wilson is an experienced driver and he admitted that it could happen to him, I drove trucks for thousands of kilometres all over U.K. and Europe and it happened to me in Poznań, Poland.
The situations on the road that I found tested me were T junctions, 4 way traffic junctions, and roundabouts, I had to put my brain through a mental test on approaching or leaving these examples.
Putting my failings to one side for a moment, 40 odd years ago my elder son came over from Germany to visit me one Christmas, with his German wife.
Along with my wife, all four of us went out for a drink, taking my car which was comprehensively insured for any driver.
My daughter-in-law, who doesn’t drink, drove my car home, she drove for 8 or 9 km like a totally competent professional, then encountered a roundabout and came out of it on the right hand side of the road!
When the screams died down she casually moved over to the left and got us home safely, it’s really that easy for the brain to forget.

 

[Chris Wilson]

It's q bit concerning you 5hink you could find yourself driving on the wrong side of the road at anytime

Here in the UK it would be very concerning, abroad in a drive on the right country a very real possibility if I allowed myself a tiny lack of concentration until a few days of readjustment. I mainly drive a LHD car here in England and sometimes find myself opening the passenger door of other cars to get in and drive them, so I am not so arrogant to think a momentary lapse couldn't occur when actually driving in say the USA.


Millions of human accidents of various kinds occur daily across the globe, many vehicle related, and some are fatal accidents, infallibility is something we can only strive for, not mandate.


Driving on the wrong side of the road occurs quite a bit to people who (even regularly) drive abroad, according to statistics, and signage is often prominent near ports to remind visitors to pay attention to the regulations on which side of the road to drive on.

So yes, I'd be concerned if I erred, but accept it could happen.

 

[Rroff]

according to statistics, and signage is often prominent near ports to remind visitors to pay attention to the regulations on which side of the road to drive on.

I've family who live in the Folkestone/Dover area - a few times over the years their colleagues have been involved in accidents with drivers on the wrong side of the road sadly including fatalities.

 

[arknor]

cars must have the technology to warn you if your driving on the wrong side of the road by now?

Personally I don't drive but I could see how easily it could happen, whenever I used to switch between Europe and the UK a lot I would always get confused when crossing roads.
seems to take a few days to re-adjust my brain

just because your on the wrong side of the road doesn't mean your going to kill someone though she probably wasn't driving with due care and attention.


she wasn't even supposed to have diplomatic immunity was she? makes me wonder if she was a spy.

why do the USA have a listening post on our soil that could be used against us

 

[Rroff]

The one that almost gets me isn't going to a foreign country and driving on the wrong side, it is the first journey after coming back. Fortunately not done it yet and with the way things are in the world probably awhile until I go abroad again.

 

[Jean-F]

The one that almost gets me isn't going to a foreign country and driving on the wrong side, it is the first journey after coming back. Fortunately not done it yet and with the way things are in the world probably awhile until I go abroad again.

I can vouch for that, after spending three of four weeks swanning around Washington DC, Virginia, and North and South Carolina, I’ve driven my wife’s car out of the Long Term C.P. at Gatwick, got to a roundabout and hesitated for a second longer than I needed to, as my brain tried to work out if I could safely merge with traffic coming on to the roundabout from other directions.
As a rule, I’d eye a gap that looked big enough not to inconvenience anyone and slide right into it, but my brain was saying, “will he, won’t he?, and “should I, shouldn’t I?”

 

[Roar87]

cars must have the technology to warn you if your driving on the wrong side of the road by now?

Personally I don't drive but I could see how easily it could happen, whenever I used to switch between Europe and the UK a lot I would always get confused when crossing roads.
seems to take a few days to re-adjust my brain

just because your on the wrong side of the road doesn't mean your going to kill someone though she probably wasn't driving with due care and attention.


she wasn't even supposed to have diplomatic immunity was she? makes me wonder if she was a spy.

why do the USA have a listening post on our soil that could be used against us

The NSA and GCHQ work so closely together that our intelligence services may as well be interconnected, why would the USA possibly be against their closest ally who they sell advanced otherwise highly classified technology and lease nukes to? It's like saying your wife is trying to see you naked in the shower

 

[Terminal_Boy]

The one that almost gets me isn't going to a foreign country and driving on the wrong side, it is the first journey after coming back. Fortunately not done it yet and with the way things are in the world probably awhile until I go abroad again.

Car parks. It’s always car parks that catch me out when there’s no oncoming traffic to keep me on the correct side of the road.

Of course, having driven an LHD car in an LHD country for over three years now, the USA wouldn’t be a problem for me now.

 

[arknor]

The NSA and GCHQ work so closely together that our intelligence services may as well be interconnected, why would the USA possibly be against their closest ally who they sell advanced otherwise highly classified technology and lease nukes to? It's like saying your wife is trying to see you naked in the shower

weren't they caught spying on germany or was that us

 

[Roar87]

weren't they caught spying on germany or was that us

The UK and Germany aren't the same, we have a much closer relationship with the US than Germany. The Germans are basically reluctant allies in most areas who can't be relied upon, much like France.

 

[Custor]

Your mixing up Allies and Subjects.

 

[Jean-F]

The UK and Germany aren't the same, we have a much closer relationship with the US than Germany. The Germans are basically reluctant allies in most areas who can't be relied upon, much like France.

So we go from Anne Sacoolas playing the Diplomatic Immunity Card or more likely the U.S. government playing it for her, to the possible differing aims of NSA and GCHQ, then to the U.K. possibly but unlikely to be spying on Germany.
Culminating in the inevitable knee jerk but childlike swipe at France