A Somali refugee who smuggled his sister and son into Ireland after obtaining a family reunification visa for his wife, whom he claims is dead, has been sentenced to one year in prison.
The man, who was granted refugee status in Ireland in 2022 after claiming he had been injured by Al Shabaab, spent three years obtaining the reunification visa, using a number of false documents, Judge Sinéad Ní Chúlacháin heard.
He pleaded guilty to one count of facilitating entry into the state of persons contrary to Section 6.1 of the Criminal Justice (Smuggling of Persons) Act 2021. He also pleaded guilty to using a false passport contrary to Section 8 of the same act.
Aided by Detective Garda Karen Barker of the Garda National Immigration Bureau (GNIB), prosecuting counsel Grainne O’Neill told the court that the man arrived at Dublin Airport on a flight from Cairo on the 22nd of July last year.
He came off the plane with a woman and a six-year-old boy. He travelled on legitimate Irish travel documents that contained the family reunification visa stipulating that the child be accompanied by the woman he claimed was his wife.
The woman and child had Somali documents, Ms O’Neill said.
When an immigration officer became suspicious that the woman didn’t look like the photo in her passport, she was asked whether the photo was of her and repeatedly claimed it was.
When the woman was interviewed apart from the other two, she claimed she was the sister of his ex-wife and that she was his current wife.
She claimed that she had married the accused in 2018 and that the child was the son of her sister, who had died. Ms O’Neil said that when the woman was asked to write down the date of birth written on the passport, she was unable to do so. Immigration officials became concerned for the welfare of the boy, and he was removed from the custody of the two adults.
When the accused was interviewed, he gave an account consistent with the woman’s claims, but after repeatedly claiming that her passport was genuine, he eventually conceded that it was not.
He then claimed that the woman was his sister and that he had brought her to Ireland to claim asylum. The court heard that the woman was refused permission to land and is now in the asylum system and has been granted subsidiary protection.
The man claimed that he had left Ireland 20 days prior and had met the woman and child, who was confirmed to be his son after DNA testing was carried out, in Kenya, where they remained for just under three weeks after his arrival.
He claimed that his sister was in “imminent danger” despite it taking him three years to smuggle her into Ireland, the court heard.
Detective Garda Barker said that the accused claimed that he was homeless and that he wanted his family to live in Ireland and get accommodation.
The court heard that the accused spent six months in custody on this matter before he was granted High Court bail.
Defending counsel Mark Lynam SC argued that his client had brought a character reference from an “Islamic prayer group”, but conceded that this document didn’t hold much weight after Detective Baker said that it had not been written specifically for the court proceedings.
Detective Baker said that the reference contained “stuff” that “wouldn’t be” to her “moral compass”, adding that college references that the accused had submitted were “false”.
Judge Ní Chúlacháin remarked that “given the context”, it was “not surprising” that the Gardaí “want to check out his bona fides”, such was the number of false documents he had submitted thus far.
Mr Lynam said that what was beyond doubt is that his client and the other two individuals are from Somalia, which he described as being “close to a lawless state”.
When Mr Lynam said that his client has “full refugee status” as he was “injured in some kind of incident” where “Al Shabaab” had attacked him, Judge Ní Chúlacháin replied, “I know he has injuries: I don’t know what side he was on.”
Detective Baker said that the accused’s refugee status is now “under review”.
When Mr Lynam asked the Detective Garda if his client could be returned to Somalia, she said, “Not unless circumstances change.”
Lynam argued that the use of false documents was “not unusual” for persons seeking asylum, saying some come with “genuine” documents, some come “without” documents, some use “false” documents, and some “come over the border” having claimed asylum elsewhere.
Detective Baker agreed that various means are used, and that some individuals “give look-alike documents”, while others get documents from professional facilitators.
She said that the Gardaí are not aware of where the accused sourced the various false documents he has used, saying, “There’s all different ways and means people will use.”
She added that she wasn’t satisfied that his sister’s name was genuine, saying, “Due to the amount of false documentation that was already given to us, I don’t know what documents the refugee authorities got.”
Mr Lynam said, “He is himself a refugee from a war-torn country his story was deemed credible and he was given refugee status.”
“He was concerned about them[his sister and son]” he said, before Judge Ní Chúlacháin exclaimed, “They were in Kenya!”
“I don’t know that, do I? I understand he’s from Somalia: I have no evidence where they’re from at all.”
“I don’t know how they got to Kenya or how long they were there,” the court added.
“Can we stick to things that we know?” she said.
Mr Lynam insisted that the trio are “from a country that is lawless”, before Judge Ní Chúlacháin exclaimed again, “Where is the mother of this child?!”
To this, Mr Lynam said he had “no instructions”.
He continued his evidence, saying that it was “Nothing out of the ordinary for people to travel on false documents,” adding that his client “has taken responsibility” for his actions.
Mr Lynam added that his client has “never been in trouble before” and that he has worked since he came to Ireland.
“He just wants to be with his family and be a law-abiding member of society,” he said. When Mr Lynam asked if the court had any further questions,
Judge Ní Chúlacháin replied, “Probably none you can answer.”
Having heard the facts, Judge Ní Chúlacháin said that she would set a headline sentence “to reflect the gravity” of the offence, which she said “does appear to be a one-off”.
She said that the scheme “had been a long time in gestation, but that it wasn’t done to generate “profit”.
The court said that the “integrity of the immigration system” and the “international protection system” had been compromised, and that the woman, referred to as the injured party in the proceedings, had benefited from being smuggled into Ireland.
She said that she accepted that “motivation was to assist family members” and that Somalia “is a war-torn country.”
A headline sentence of three years was set before this was reduced to a term of two years, with the final year suspended for one year on condition of good behaviour for one year.
She said that the accused was a person of “good character, notwithstanding the number of false documents” he had used.
The accused is to be given credit for the six months he spent in prison on remand, meaning the balance of the sentence he must serve is six months.