Essex lorry deaths: How people smugglers slipped through the net

The people-smuggling gang behind the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants repeatedly slipped through the net in Britain and abroad before they were finally caught by the authorities.

The gang who transported the group from Zeebrugge in Belgium to Purfleet, Essex, used ‘burner’ pay-as-you-go phones and evaded automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras as they attempted to stay under the radar.

Despite their activities repeatedly coming to the attention of authorities, police did not catch the ring until after the Vietnamese men, women and children, aged between 15 and 44, were found dead in the back of a trailer in Essex on October 23 last year.

Following a 10-week trial, Romanian ringleader Gheorghe Nica, 43, from Basildon, and lorry driver Eamonn Harrison, 24, from County Down, were found guilty today of 39 counts of manslaughter.

They were also convicted of their part in the people-smuggling operation with lorry driver Christopher Kennedy, 24, from County Armagh, and Valentin Calota, 38, from Birmingham.      

As early as May 9 2018, Harrison was issued with a civil penalty notice after he was caught with 18 Vietnamese migrants sitting on waffle boxes inside his trailer.

French border force officers at the Channel Tunnel entrance had become suspicious after finding the seal on his trailer had been broken and glued back together. 

Just days before the tragedy, the gang successfully smuggled two loads of migrants on October 11 and 18. 

Both times, they were observed by suspicious residents in the Essex village of Orsett as the human cargo was unloaded and people ran into waiting vehicles for onward transfer to Dulwich in south-east London.    

Marie Andrews called police three times about the incident on October 11, jurors were told.

Then, on October 14, another driver, Christopher Kennedy, was caught with 20 Vietnamese nationals in his trailer on the French side of the Channel Tunnel.

The migrants were taken away by French border forces but Kennedy was sent on his way to Kent.

Official documents relating to the stop were found among the personal effects of two victims on October 23.

The successful run on October 18 also raised suspicions at a storage depot in Kent.

Warehouse manager Barbara Richmond-Clarke rejected Kennedy’s delivery of crushed and dirty macaroons, suspecting illegal human activity.

That night, Harrison became so intoxicated on a night out in Bruges that he fell over and was stopped by Belgian police.

The next morning, officers spoke to him again, after they found his lorry had been parked illegally since the day before.

Hours before the migrants embarked on their tragic journey, Estelle Duyke called Gendarmes in Bierne, northern France, about nine migrants jumping in the back of a lorry, later identified as Harrison’s.

But the trail went cold after French police checked the shed where the migrants had been hiding and found no-one there, jurors heard.

Detective Chief Superintendent Stuart Hooper said Essex Police had acted ‘proportionately and in good faith’ .

Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten added that Ms Andrews’ reports on October 11 had been followed up.

He said: ‘One of the witnesses believed the number plate was covered. It’s for the jury to decide that. What we do know is that Kennedy’s lorry did not activate ANPR. (From) when it exited the port, the first time it activated was when he went through the Dartford crossing.

‘I asked for a great deal of work to be done around this lorry not activating ANPR. This 30-tonne lorry does not activate it. We have no images of it. It’s a bit of a mystery.

‘Personally, I think the number plate was either covered or it did not activate for whatever reason.’

He said a number of devices can be found on the internet that can help drivers evade ANPR detection.

DCI Stoten said: ‘Going forward, we actually changed not only the procedures of Essex Police but we have been a forerunner in changing the way the country responds to organised immigration crime.

‘So now when people are stopped and found to be in the back of lorries or vans etc we are looking at that. Most often the driver is arrested and that didn’t happen before.’  

Today chilling photos released by the police showed how some of the 39 Vietnamese migrants who suffocated in the back of a lorry while being smuggled into Britain tried to create air holes with a metal pole. 

Photographs from inside the lorry’s trailer showed gouge marks in the roof where some of the migrants had attempted to use a metal pole to create air holes so they could escape the sweltering heat and suffocating conditions.

Meanwhile, an illustration created by police revealed the scale of the cramped conditions and how the bodies were piled up inside the trailer when the horrific discovery was made.

The migrants had suffocated in sweltering temperatures as the airtight container was shipped from Zeebrugge to Purfleet.

The ‘unscrupulous’ gang behind the illegal shipment were motivated by greed as they pursued profits of more than £1 million that month alone. 

The latest convictions come as:

• Home Secretary Priti Patel has said conviction has  strengthened her resolve to tackle people smuggling rings
• Lead police investigator says thousands worked on investigation – one of the largest ever manslaughter cases
• In total, eight men have now been convicted in the UK in connection with deaths of the Vietnamese migrants 
• Timeline shows how complex the people smuggling ring operated over years and ‘traded in human misery’ 

The verdicts bring the total number of people convicted in Britain to eight, including haulier boss Ronan Hughes, 41, of Armagh, and 26-year-old lorry driver Maurice Robinson, of Craigavon, who admitted manslaughter.

Prosecutors are considering charges against a further three people.

The maximum sentence for people-smuggling is 14 years in prison with manslaughter carrying a possible life sentence.

Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten, of Essex Police, said the gang were ‘greedy’ but ‘complacent’.

He said: ‘You would not transport animals in that way but they were quite happy to do that and put them at significant risk.’

Since the tragedy, Essex Police had been at the forefront of cracking down on organised immigration crime, Mr Stoten said.

Kelly Matthews, from the Crown Prosecution Service, said: ‘Thirty-nine vulnerable people desperate for a new life put their trust in an unscrupulous network of people smugglers.

‘Nothing can bring back the lives lost on that day or the loss caused by the horrible, unlawful and dangerous actions of these defendants.

‘But we hope these convictions bring some measure of solace to the families in the knowledge that justice has been done.’

The Director of Threat Leadership for the National Crime Agency (NCA), Rob Jones, said: ‘The organised criminal groups involved in immigration crime are callous and treat migrants as a commodity to be profited from. 

‘Their only motivation is money, they don’t care about the safety or consequences of their actions.

‘Tragically in this case the consequences were fatal. I am pleased that those responsible will now be held accountable for their actions.

‘I hope this outcome brings some comfort to the families of those who died.’

The NPCC lead for Organised Immigration crime, Shaun Sawyer, said: ‘The inhumanity demonstrated by these men towards the 39 men, women and children who ultimately lost their lives is truly distressing.

‘This year the Home Office has provided extra funding to policing to assist the UK law enforcement effort to disrupt and prosecute these gangs.

‘With this support and the experience learned from this investigation we will continue our endeavour to seek to prevent tragedies such as this from happening again.’

The Old Bailey heard how the gang offered a ‘VIP’ service to Vietnamese migrants, who gathered in Belgium and France.

They charged about £13,000 a head to transport migrants in a trailer via the Channel Tunnel or by boat to Essex.

The network, led by Nica and and Hughes, had been operating for at least 18 months, despite repeatedly coming to the attention of authorities.

In May 2018, Harrison, the ‘man on the Continent’, was fined after being caught at the Channel Tunnel in France with 18 Vietnamese migrants in his trailer.

On October 11 last year, 15 people were shipped in a container dropped at Zeebrugge by Harrison and collected by Kennedy at Purfleet.

They then boarded a fleet of vehicles at Orsett for transfer to Dulwich where they were held by a Vietnamese man named Phong, whose job was to take payment, jurors heard

Orsett resident Marie Andrews had witnessed the drop and rang police to report her concerns three times that day.

Three days later, Kennedy was stopped by French border agents at the Channel Tunnel.

He was sent on his way after 20 migrants were removed from his trailer, two of whom were among the dead on October 23.

On October 17 last year, Harrison took 15 migrants and a load of macaroons and Bakewell tarts to Zeebrugge.

On arrival, Kennedy dropped the human cargo off at Orsett then helped Hughes try to disguise the fact that the biscuits were trampled and crushed.

That night, Nica was caught on CCTV with Hughes at a hotel in Essex carrying a bag containing £50,000, which he had allegedly collected from Phong.

On the morning of October 22, Harrison picked up 39 migrants from Bierne in France.

His trailer was loaded on to the Clementine ship which departed from Zeebrugge at about 4pm, docking at Purfleet shortly after midnight.

Robinson, who collected the trailer at 1.08am, was instructed by Hughes via Snapchat to ‘give them air quickly don’t let them out’.

When he opened the doors, a plume of vapour escaped and Robinson stood for 90 seconds.

In the 23 minutes before he dialled 999, Robinson exchanged panicked calls with his boss Hughes and Nica, who had been waiting for him in Orsett with his drivers. 

The court was played an emergency call Robinson made in which he said: ‘They are all lying on the ground.’

The operator asked: ‘Are they breathing?’

Robinson: ‘No, I don’t think so. I heard a noise in the back, so I opened the door.’

Operator: ‘How many patients?’

Robinson: ‘About 25.’

Operator: ‘And they’re not breathing?’

Robinson: ‘No.’

The first police officer on the scene described finding half-naked bodies ‘closely packed’ together lying in the trailer, some ‘frothing at the mouth’.

The court heard all 39 victims were declared at the scene in the back of the lorry’s trailer. 

Mobile phones recovered from the victims showed how they had tried to raise the alarm and left goodbye messages for loved ones as they ran out of air. 

Others had used a metal pole to try to punch a hole through the roof or attract attention, the court heard.

Kennedy, Harrison and Calota, who picked up migrants at Orsett on October 18, variously claimed they had thought they were transporting cigarettes, alcohol and stolen lorry parts.

Nica admitted being roped in by convicted cigarette smuggler Hughes for earlier runs, but said he thought Robinson had a load of cigarettes when he showed him where he could unload in Orsett the night before the tragedy. 

But prosecutor Bill Emlyn Jones told jurors the operation required ‘meticulous’ planning and each defendant had to be ‘in the know’. 

Home Secretary, Priti Patel, said: ‘This was a truly tragic incident.

‘While I’m pleased justice has been served, I know it will come as little comfort to the families of those who died. My thoughts remain with those affected by this tragedy.

‘Today’s convictions only strengthen my resolve to do all I can to go after the people smugglers who prey on the vulnerable and trade in human misery.

‘I’m determined to bring callous people smugglers to justice and keep our communities safe from the actions of horrendous organised crime groups.

‘I want to thank all the agencies involved in this investigation, specifically Essex Police, the NCA, the Crown Prosecution Service and operational teams in the Home Office for their exemplary professionalism in pursuing convictions.

‘We are fortunate to be served by such outstanding, committed officers, who help keep us safe and support those most in need.’

Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten, who led the investigation, said: ‘This story started almost eight thousand miles away

‘Every man, woman and child, some as young as 15, who died in the lorry trailer was from Vietnam.

‘They may have started their journeys at different times but, ultimately, they were all following the false promise of a new life.

‘They put their trust in people they hoped would deliver them safely to our shores. But sadly, that’s not how their journey ended.

‘Family members and friends, many of whom are still thousands of miles away have suffered an unimaginable loss.

‘I know this because my team at Essex Police have heard their stories, and carefully recorded their testimony first-hand.

‘Since our investigation started, nearly 14 months ago more than 1,300 people have worked on this case.

‘And for the detectives, staff and volunteers at Essex Police, and other forces across the country as well as national and international law enforcement, governments and embassies, this will be a case we will never forget.

‘I’d like to say to the families that we are one step closer to getting you the justice you deserve.

‘It won’t bring your loved ones back, but I hope it will offer some solace. Our thoughts are with you, today and always.’

Russell Tyner, of the CPS Organised Crime Division, said: ‘This is an unimaginably tragic case. 39 vulnerable people desperate for a new life were driven to put their trust in a network of unscrupulous people smugglers and they suffered horrific consequences – not through their own fault but due to the sheer greed of others.

‘They died through lack of oxygen, desperately trying to escape from the container.

‘Some were able to express their last words to their families on their mobile phones when they knew their situation was hopeless.’

The Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner for Essex, Roger Hirst, said: ‘This was an international tragedy that happened here in our county.

‘I said we needed to come together as a community to help the police bring whoever was responsible to justice and we did just that and our force has done an outstanding job.

‘I would like to say thank you to every police officer, firefighter, paramedic, staff member and volunteer who was involved in this case beginning with the heart-breaking discovery of the crime, right through to catching those involved and bringing them before the courts.

‘Nothing will ever bring those 39 people back, but I hope their families will be able to take some comfort from the fact that our emergency services treated them and their loved ones with the respect and compassion they deserved as well as working to get justice in their memories.’

During the trial, the court had heard a couple comforted each other as their dream of a life in Britain slipped away in the back of a dark, hot trailer.

Tran Hai Loc and Nguyen Thi Van, both 35, were still huddled together when they were discovered among the 39 dead on October 23 last year.

Their bodies were carefully removed from the trailer, still holding hands, and taken to hospital together.

The couple had travelled by plane to work in Hungary as fruit pickers for one-and-a-half months, having organised the placement through a labour company in Hanoi at a cost of 7,000 US dollars (£6,000) each.

Their families last heard from them on October 18 last year when they phoned to say their plans had changed.

Four days later, they and the other men, women and children had made their way to a pick-up point en route to Zeebrugge in Belgium, with one group coming from Paris and another from Brussels.

Jurors at the Old Bailey heard that there could have been a 40th migrant on the trip, but for the fact that he was late for his rendezvous with Eamonn Harrison’s lorry in Bierne, northern France.

During the cross-Channel trip on board the Clementine, the group had desperately tried to raise the alarm, even calling the Vietnamese emergency number, as they ran out of air.

When they found there was no mobile phone signal in the trailer, some recorded goodbye messages to their families.

Nguyen Tho Tuan, 25, told his family: ‘I am sorry. I cannot take care of you. I am sorry. I am sorry. I cannot breathe.

‘I want to come back to my family. Have a good life.’

A metal pole had been used to try to punch through the roof of the refrigerated container, but only managed to dent the interior.

Prosecutor Bill Emlyn Jones had said: ‘There was no way out, and no-one to hear them, no-one to help them.’

When police were alerted to the deaths by Maurice Robinson, they found the migrants, aged 15 to 44, were half-naked and frothing at the mouth.

They had been dead long enough for rigor mortis to have set in.

Former Detective Chief Inspector Martin Pasmore, who dealt with their identification, said: ‘It was shocking to say the least.’

He said it was important to treat the bodies with ‘dignity and respect’.

‘Dying in such a horrendous way… You could not help but have a great sense there was no panic there.

‘They seem to have died with dignity and respect for each other, just the way the bodies were laid.

‘There is one couple holding hands. They stayed together throughout the transportation to hospital and they stayed together throughout the post-mortems.’ 

Mr Pasmore said that seeing the tragedy had affected officers, and the risk of post-traumatic stress disorder was uppermost in his mind.

It also had a ‘significant impact’ on the families in Vietnam, many of whom had borrowed thousands of pounds to fund the journey.

Officers handled 391 calls from concerned relatives wanting to identify loved ones.

During the trial, jurors were provided with a snapshot of the victims and their dreams of a better life.

They included a bricklayer, a restaurant worker, a nail bar technician, a budding beautician, and a university graduate, who had worked in IT to save up and fund his own passage.

Their journeys across the world, via travel agencies in Vietnam, had included various stops in Russia, China, Germany, Poland, Hungary and Romania. 

They would fly to one country, work there so they could build up cash reserves and send some money home, before then attempting the perilous journey to Britain.

Many of their families borrowed thousands of pounds to fund their passage, relying on their potential future earnings once they got in Britain.

Some of the migrants had made repeated failed attempts to be smuggled into the country, with one being turned back five times.

Witness X, a Vietnamese migrant who was smuggled by the gang on October 11 last year, provided an insight into why so many people were prepared to risk everything.

He was attracted to Britain partly because of the language.

Firstly, he had moved from Poland to France after getting a Schengen visa as a business student.

He then arranged his ‘VIP’ trip across the Channel through a Vietnamese connection on Facebook, who put him in contact with someone in Dulwich, south-east London, called Phong.

He got a taxi to a pick up point where he was ushered onto a trailer by the driver, who told them to go ‘quickly’ but ‘keep quiet’.

Before arriving at Zeebrugge, the driver – said to be Eamonn Harrison – stopped once to provide them with water and further instructions, the court heard.

The migrants were provided bags to urinate in and told to huddle together in the centre of the trailer when they heard a signal.

After he arrived in Britain safely, witness X was made to stay at Phong’s flat in Dulwich until his parents in Vietnam had transferred the £13,000 payment.

Asked what his plan was, the migrant told jurors: ‘I’m going to go to the Home Office to apply for my papers.’

For every person successfully smuggled into Britain, the lorry drivers potentially pocketed £1,500, police said.

Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten, of Essex Police, said: ‘So you see this unacceptable disgusting trade was quite financially rewarding for these crime gangs.’

He said the ‘scale and complexity’ of the threat posed by the gangs and the ‘callous nature of their business model’ should never be under-estimated.

Chief Constable of Essex Police, Ben Julian Harrington, said: ‘The men who were found guilty today made their money from misery.

They knew what they were doing was wrong, but they didn’t care.

They tried to hide what they were doing. They attempted to evade detection. They thought they could cover up their crimes. Today, they have been proved wrong on every count.

‘While I am immensely proud of the Essex Police and our partners, for this diligent investigation, none of us will stop thinking of the victims and their families.

‘Those family members are, in most cases, halfway across the world, and their lives will never be the same again.

‘We will never forget those 39 victims men, women, and children – who were sold the lie of safe passage to our country.

‘We made their loved ones a promise in the Book of Condolence shortly after the incident: that we would do everything in our power to bring those responsible for that horrific journey to justice.

‘Essex Police has worked hard to deliver on our promise, and I hope that is of some small comfort.’

The risks taken by the crime group responsible for the deaths of 39 migrants found in a lorry container in Essex were ‘sadly not unusual’, a senior Immigration Enforcement official has said.

Steve Dann, director of crime and financial investigations within the Immigration Enforcement unit at the Home Office, said people being trafficked were seen as a commodity, no different to drugs or tobacco.

‘In relation to the risk, sadly the organised crime groups have complete disregard for the people, the commodity as they see it,’ he said.

‘Whether it’s drugs or tobacco, this is just another commodity and they take no interest at all in the health and wellbeing of the migrants.

‘I’ve seen some horrendous conditions, people being brought in.

‘People have been brought in unresponsive because they’re in a coffin-like hide within a vehicle or within a vessel, so sadly no this is not unusual.

‘The numbers were high for a single incident but the crime groups, their methodology, they have complete disregard.’

The criminal gang brought the container into the UK through Purfleet port in Essex.

‘I can’t say whether they saw this (entry point) as a soft touch,’ Mr Dann added.

He said that since the incident in October 2019, his agency has worked with colleagues in Zeebrugge in Belgium, where the container began its journey to the UK.

‘We’ve increased our deployments of resources over in Zeebrugge. The same way in the UK we’ve increased our response,’ he said.

‘We’ve developed a multi-agency hub to develop intelligence, to share intelligence quicker, there’s a number of different initiatives that have taken place with this.’

He said that the ‘link hadn’t been drawn’ when French authorities foiled an attempt to smuggle migrants across the Channel on October 14, nine days before the 39 migrants were found dead on October 23.

On October 14, a vehicle driven by haulier Christopher Kennedy was stopped at Coquelles, near Calais in France, and 20 Vietnamese migrants were found in the back, the trial at the Old Bailey was told was told. They were frisked and taken away.

Kennedy, 24, of County Armagh had denied being part of the people-smuggling ring linked to the deaths of 39 migrants.

‘At that point the link hadn’t been drawn,’ said Mr Dann.

‘He (Kennedy) was in, I think, it was a Transit van coming in through Coquelles.’

He went on: ‘We have a joint intelligence cell with the French, so we do share intelligence daily and lots of intelligence as well.

‘In relation to linking this, what we have to do with these incidents is start to develop the intelligence into an operation that allows us to identify the crime group behind it.

‘Sometimes, depending on what we’re faced with, it can be done immediately and we do an immediate response, other times it’s about bringing different pieces of the jigsaw together to identify the crime group.’

He said his agency is ‘making every effort to disrupt’ crime groups and that Immigration Enforcement has disrupted 430 organised crime groups so far this year through arrests and preventative action.

‘We see the threats move, it’s quite an agile threat, crime groups are very agile,’ he said.

‘What we have to do is try to stay ahead of the game and be as agile as them.’