LONDON (Reuters) – Four men were sentenced to long prison terms on Friday for the manslaughter of 39 Vietnamese, women and children who died of suffocation in an airtight and suffocating container in October 2019 while being smuggled into Britain.
The discovery of so many dead – two just 15 years old – in the back of the truck in an industrial area east of London shocked Britain and Vietnam. He also highlighted the global illicit trade that sends the poor from Asia, Africa and the Middle East on dangerous journeys to the West.
As oxygen levels dropped, some tried desperately to escape, but to no avail. Others used cell phones to say goodbye to devastated relatives on the other side of the world.
Judge Nigel Sweeney said they suffered a “slow and excruciating death” when they arrested seven men involved in the people smuggling gang for a total of 92 years at the Old Bailey criminal court in London.
He said it was a sophisticated, long-lasting and profitable scheme that would have earned the gang hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The four who admitted or were found guilty of manslaughter and immigration crimes, were 41-year-old Northern Ireland transporter Ronan Hughes, the plot leader who was imprisoned for 20 years, and Romanian Gheorghe Nica, 44, another important figure, who was sentenced to 27 years behind bars.
Maurice Robinson, 26, the Northern Ireland driver of the truck in which the bodies were found, was arrested for 13 years, while Eamonn Harrison, 24, also from the British province, who drove the container to the Belgian port of Zeebrugge from where the victims were taken to Britain, was sentenced to an 18-year sentence.
Most of those who died were from the provinces of Nghe An and Ha Tinh, in north-central Vietnam, where poor employment prospects, environmental disasters and the promise of financial reward abroad drive migration.
British police paid tribute to the relatives of the dead, including the parents of 15-year-old soccer fan Nguyen Huy Hung.
“He always dreamed of going to the UK and tried hard to study at school, as well as learning English for that purpose,” they said.
Reporting by Michael Holden; edition by James Davey and Angus MacSwan