A final verdictIt won’t silence the conspiracy theorists, but for most reaonable people a British jury’s finding should lay to rest any lingering suspicions that Princess Diana and boyfriend Dodi Fayed were the victims of a murder conspiracy.
That’s been the persistent claim of Fayed’s father, Mohamed Al Fayed, whose byzantine accusations of a death plot have, at one time or another, implicated Prince Philip, former Prime Minister Tony Blair, Diana’s sister and a brother-in-law, French and British police and the intelligence services of three countries, including the United States. Yet, as earlier investigations indicated, there was never any real mystery about the 1997 Paris accident that killed the popular princess, Fayed and driver Henri Paul. The chauffeur had been drinking to excess and was going recklessly fast when he crashed in a tunnel while trying to elude a swarm of paparazzi. Certainly, the pursuing media jackals bear some of the blame. Yet for all the glitter of the couple’s jet-setting lives, they died from a lethal but all too common combination of alcohol and excessive speed.
More than a decade later, it’s time to let the victims rest in peace and spare their families from further suffering.