Migrant jailed after helping smuggle more than 3,000 others into Europe
An illegal immigrant who was involved in smuggling more than 3,000 others into Europe has been sentenced to 25 years in jail.
Egyptian national Ahmed Ramadan Mohamad Ebid, who arrived in the UK in a small boat in October 2022, worked with people smuggling networks in North Africa to bring hundreds of migrants at a time from Libya to Italy.
The National Crime Agency (NCA) believes the 42-year-old’s case is the first time someone has been convicted for organising migrant crossings of the Mediterranean from the UK.
Ahmed Ramadan Mohamad Ebid being arrested by plain clothes officers. Pic: NCA
Ebid had a “significant managerial role within an organised crime group” and his “primary motivation was to make money out of human trafficking”, Judge Adam Hiddleston said.
He told Ebid the “conspiracy that you were a part of generated millions of pounds” and he must have been a “beneficiary” of “a significant amount”.
He said the “truly staggering” amount of money came from the “hard-earned savings of desperate individuals”, who were “ruthlessly and cynically exploited” by Ebid and the crime group.
Ahmed Ramadan Mohamad Ebid. Pic: NCA
Details of the case emerged during a rare Newton hearing – a trial within a trial that takes place when the prosecution and defence disagree about facts of a case.
Ebid was living in Isleworth, west London, at the time of his arrest in June 2023.
He later admitted to being involved in enabling seven fishing boats to make the dangerous crossing to Europe, with a total of 3,781 migrants on board. He said he only played a minor role in the operation but a judge rejected this claim in March.
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Pictures of small boats used for crossings were found on Ebid’s phone. Pics: NCA
Ebid, who had worked as a fisherman in the Mediterranean, helped two boats carrying hundreds of migrants cross the sea in a convoy just three weeks after he arrived in the UK.
Once the boats were in Italian waters, a satellite phone on board one vessel was used to call the Italian coastguard, who rescued everyone and brought them ashore.
A boat used by Ebid for an illegal crossing. Pic: PA/NCA
Ebid’s mobile phone had been in contact with the satellite phone 34 times over two days, the prosecution told the Newton hearing.
He used the same method to help five more boats make the crossing in the next six months, it added.
Each migrant was charged an average of around £3,200, bringing the criminals involved more than £12m, the NCA said.
Investigators found pictures of boats, conversations about the possible purchase of vessels, videos of migrants making the journey and screenshots of money transfers on a phone seized from him.
In a conversation with an associate which was recorded via a listening device planted by NCA officers, Ebid said migrants were not to carry phones with them on boats, adding: “Tell them guys anyone caught with a phone will be killed, threw in the sea.”
Ebid was sentenced to 25 years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration.
Tim Burton, specialist prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said Ebid “played a leading role” in an operation “which breached immigration laws and endangered lives, for his own and others’ financial gain”.
Jacque Beer, of the NCA, said: “Ebid was part of a crime network who preyed upon the desperation of migrants to ship them across the Mediterranean in death trap boats.
“The cruel nature of his business was demonstrated by the callous way he spoke of throwing migrants into the sea if they didn’t follow his rules.”
The UK-US trade deal has been signed and is “done”, US President Donald Trump has said as he met Sir Keir Starmer at the G7 summit.
The US president told reporters in Canada: “We signed it, and it’s done. It’s a fair deal for both. It’ll produce a lot of jobs, a lot of income.”
Sir Keir said the document “implements” the deal to cut tariffs on cars and aerospace, describing it as a “really important agreement”.
“So this is a very good day for both of our countries – a real sign of strength,” the prime minister added.
Mr Trump added that the UK was “very well protected” against any future tariffs, saying: “You know why? Because I like them”.
However, he did not say whether levies on British steel exports to the US would be set to 0%, saying “we’re gonna let you have that information in a little while”.
Mr Trump also praised Sir Keir as a “great” prime minister, adding: “We’ve been talking about this deal for six years, and he’s done what they haven’t been able to do.”
He added: “We’re very longtime partners and allies and friends and we’ve become friends in a short period of time.
“He’s slightly more liberal than me to put it mildly… but we get along.”
Sir Keir added that “we make it work”.
As the pair exited a mountain lodge in the Canadian Rockies where the summit is being held, Mr Trump held up a physical copy of the trade agreement to show reporters.
Several leaves of paper fell from the binding, and Sir Keir quickly stooped to pick them up, saying: “A very important document.”
Sir Keir Starmer picks up paper from the UK-US trade deal after Donald Trump dropped it at the G7 summit. Pic: Reuters
The US president also appeared to mistakenly refer to a “trade agreement with the European Union” at one point as he stood alongside the British prime minister.
Mr Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs on countries in April. At the time, he announced 10% “reciprocal” rates on all UK exports – as well as separately announced 25% levies on cars and steel.
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In a joint televised phone call in May, Sir Keir and Mr Trump announced the UK and US had agreed on a trade deal – but added the details were being finalised.
Ahead of the G7 summit, the prime minister said he would meet Mr Trump for “one-on-one” talks, and added the agreement “really matters for the vital sectors that are safeguarded under our deal, and we’ve got to implement that”.
Whitehall officials tried to convince Michael Gove to go to court to cover up the grooming scandal in 2011, Sky News can reveal.
Dominic Cummings, who was working for Lord Gove at the time, has told Sky News that officials in the Department for Education (DfE) wanted to help efforts by Rotherham Council to stop a national newspaper from exposing the scandal.
In an interview with Sky News, Mr Cummings said that officials wanted a “total cover-up”.
Politics latest: Grooming gangs findings unveiled
The revelation shines a light on the institutional reluctance of some key officials in central government to publicly highlight the grooming gang scandal.
In 2011, Rotherham Council approached the Department for Education asking for help following inquiries by The Times. The paper’s then chief reporter, the late Andrew Norfolk, was asking about sexual abuse and trafficking of children in Rotherham.
The council went to Lord Gove’s Department for Education for help. Officials considered the request and then recommended to Lord Gove’s office that the minister back a judicial review which might, if successful, stop The Times publishing the story.
Lord Gove rejected the request on the advice of Mr Cummings. Sources have independently confirmed Mr Cummings’ account.
Education Secretary Michael Gove in 2011. Pic: PA
Mr Cummings told Sky News: “Officials came to me in the Department of Education and said: ‘There’s this Times journalist who wants to write the story about these gangs. The local authority wants to judicially review it and stop The Times publishing the story’.
“So I went to Michael Gove and said: ‘This council is trying to actually stop this and they’re going to use judicial review. You should tell the council that far from siding with the council to stop The Times you will write to the judge and hand over a whole bunch of documents and actually blow up the council’s JR (judicial review).’
“Some officials wanted a total cover-up and were on the side of the council…
“They wanted to help the local council do the cover-up and stop The Times’ reporting, but other officials, including in the DfE private office, said this is completely outrageous and we should blow it up. Gove did, the judicial review got blown up, Norfolk stories ran.”
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Grooming gangs victim speaks out
The judicial review wanted by officials would have asked a judge to decide about the lawfulness of The Times’ publication plans and the consequences that would flow from this information entering the public domain.
A second source told Sky News that the advice from officials was to side with Rotherham Council and its attempts to stop publication of details it did not want in the public domain.
One of the motivations cited for stopping publication would be to prevent the identities of abused children entering the public domain.
There was also a fear that publication could set back the existing attempts to halt the scandal, although incidents of abuse continued for many years after these cases.
Sources suggested that there is also a natural risk aversion amongst officials to publicity of this sort.
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Mr Cummings, who ran the Vote Leave Brexit campaign and was Boris Johnson’s right-hand man in Downing Street, has long pushed for a national inquiry into grooming gangs to expose failures at the heart of government.
He said the inquiry, announced today, “will be a total s**tshow for Whitehall because it will reveal how much Whitehall worked to try and cover up the whole thing.”
He also described Mr Johnson, with whom he has a long-standing animus, as a “moron’ for saying that money spent on inquiries into historic child sexual abuse had been “spaffed up the wall”.
Asked by Sky News political correspondent Liz Bates why he had not pushed for a public inquiry himself when he worked in Number 10 in 2019-20, Mr Cummings said Brexit and then COVID had taken precedence.
“There are a million things that I wanted to do but in 2019 we were dealing with the constitutional crisis,” he said.
The Department for Education and Rotherham Council have been approached for comment.
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