By Karim Hammam
Ministry of Defence officials have privately accused Cambridgeshire police of breaching a long-standing US-UK agreement by handing over the investigation of an American fighter pilot to US military authorities, according to documents obtained by the Guardian.
Case details
Capt Jacob Wulfson was accused of sexually assaulting and strangling Sarah Steele in his Cambridge flat in December 2023 after the pair met on the Tinder dating app. Cambridgeshire police allowed US military police to take control of the investigation, meaning Wulfson was prosecuted in a military tribunal at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk rather than in an English criminal court.
Agreement breach
The US-UK visiting forces agreement gives UK police primary jurisdiction over alleged crimes by American personnel stationed in Britain, with narrow exceptions for on-duty offences or crimes against fellow service members. MoD officials wrote in a July 8 memo that the Steele case "does not, on the surface, appear to meet the bar for a visiting force to be awarded jurisdiction." Another official stated the case "should absolutely have been for the UK courts."
Trial outcome
An all-male jury of Wulfson's fellow air force officers convicted him of strangling an intimate partner but acquitted him of sexual assault in April. He was dismissed from the US Air Force and confined to a military jail at Lakenheath for six months. Steele described her experience testifying at the court martial as "degrading and distressing," noting invasive questioning by Wulfson's lawyer.
Government inquiry launched
The disclosure prompted Downing Street to call the situation "deeply distressing" and "very concerning." A cross-government inquiry involving the Home Office, Ministry of Justice, Foreign Office, and police chiefs is now examining how and why UK forces have transferred investigations of serious crimes to US military police. The inquiry is scrutinising a series of similar cases uncovered this year.
Other cases cited
Among other cases: Tyrion Davis was convicted of one sexual assault charge but cleared of ten further counts in Suffolk; Hannes Marschalek admitted indecent conduct after allegedly exposing himself to a 16-year-old and four young women in Cambridgeshire, though his conviction was later quashed on technical grounds. The US maintains more than 12,000 military personnel at 15 bases across the UK, with the largest concentrations at Lakenheath and Mildenhall in Suffolk.
