Imagine being assaulted in your own city, expecting the local police to handle it, and waking up to find your case handed over to a foreign military power.
That is exactly what happened to Sarah Steele, a 42-year-old British academic. She met Jacob Wulfson, a 32-year-old US Air Force fighter pilot, on a dating app. One night at his flat in Cambridge, Wulfson violently strangled her. Because Wulfson was a serving US military officer stationed in the UK, the local British legal system essentially stepped aside.
The investigation was rapidly taken over by the Air Force’s Office of Special Investigations (OSI), a federal US law enforcement agency. Instead of an English crown court, Steele found herself at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk—the largest US military base in the UK. She was forced to testify in a foreign court martial system, sitting in a room full of older men in military uniforms. Her harrowing testimony about intimate partner violence was frequently interrupted by the literal roar of American fighter jets taking off outside.
The trial ended with Wulfson being convicted of domestic strangulation but cleared of sexual assault. His sentence? Six months in prison and a dismissal from the military. Had he been tried under English law, the jail time likely would have been much stiffer.
So why exactly are American military judges and all-male military juries handing down verdicts for violent crimes committed against British citizens on British soil?
How the US Bypasses British Courts
You might assume that if a crime happens on UK soil, British police and British courts have the final say. That is a myth.
Under long-standing diplomatic arrangements, specifically governed by the Visiting Forces Act, a parallel justice system operates right under our noses. This framework dictates who gets to prosecute a visiting soldier when things go wrong. Technically, UK law enforcement holds primary jurisdiction over crimes committed by US personnel while off-duty and outside of military bases.
But there is a massive catch.
British authorities routinely cede this authority to US military prosecutors. In Steele's case, after she initially spoke to military police officers for advice, the OSI moved at lightning speed. Within 24 hours, they arrested Wulfson and notified Cambridgeshire Police that they would handle the prosecution. The British police simply let them take it.
This is not a one-off anomaly. It is standard operating procedure for a system that consistently prioritizes diplomatic and military convenience over local accountability.
Military First, Justice Second
The experience of navigating a US court martial as a civilian victim is fundamentally different—and arguably far more degrading—than going through the modern British court system.
Steele described the process as "military first, justice second." The procedural differences highlight an outdated, insular legal culture that feels entirely alien to British sensibilities.
- No Victim Screening: In an English criminal court, victims of sexual or violent assault are routinely shielded from their attacker by physical screens or video links. No such protection exists in a US court martial. Steele had to endure days on the witness stand, entirely exposed, staring directly at her attacker.
- Aggressive Cross-Examination: Contemporary British judges heavily restrict defense attorneys from launching invasive, irrelevant attacks on a victim's character or private life. The US military court permitted aggressive, archaic questioning that Steele said felt like "being ripped up."
- The All-Male Panel: The "jury" in this trial was not a random selection of peers. It was a panel composed entirely of male Air Force officers. They lacked the cultural context or life experience to understand the nuances of a domestic assault case involving a British civilian.
When a foreign military handles a domestic violence case, the underlying goal shifts. The system is inherently designed to maintain military discipline and protect the institution, not necessarily to deliver justice or closure to a civilian survivor.
A System Free From Local Scrutiny
The biggest issue with this parallel legal setup is the complete lack of transparency. Most people in the UK have no idea these pockets of foreign jurisdiction exist. When British police forces hand over a case to the US military, that decision is rarely subjected to public or political scrutiny.
We are left with a system where a British citizen can be victimized at home, yet forced to abide by the rules of a foreign nation just to see her attacker face a courtroom. The lenient six-month sentence handed down to Wulfson is proof enough that the outcomes of these military tribunals do not align with British judicial standards.
If you want to see this change, the next step is holding local leaders accountable. Ask your local MPs and police crime commissioners for transparency on how many cases involving visiting forces are quietly handed over to foreign authorities each year. True justice shouldn't stop at the gates of a military base.
