The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled in favour of an Albanian criminal who sneaked back into the UK after being deported.
32-year-old Ardit Binaj, who has convictions for burglary, was removed from the UK as part of a prisoner exchange program after serving six months of his two year sentence.
Binaj entered the UK illegally in a lorry in 2014 before going on to rack up a number of convictions related to robbery.
In 2017, five months after he was deported back to Albania, he illegally returned to the UK where he married his Lithuanian girlfriend, the mother of his son, who received leave to remain in the country.
He waited until after the birth of his son to make another application for leave to remain “as he believed that would increase his chances of remaining in the UK”, a judge said.
When the Home Office moved to deport him again, Binaj claimed that the action would breach Article 8 of the ECHR, his right to a family life.
This claim was rejected by UK authorities resulting in the case being taken to the ECHR which ruled that it would be “unduly harsh” on Binaj’s wife Diana Bolgova, for the pair to be separated.
A spokesperson for the Home Office said, “Foreign nationals who commit crimes should be in no doubt that the law will be enforced and, where appropriate, we will pursue their deportation and ensure the rules are respected and enforced.
“We have already begun delivering a major surge in immigration enforcement and returns activity to remove people with no right to be in the UK, with 3,000 people already being returned since the new Government came into power.”
Reacting to the ruling, Conservative MP Robert Janick said, “A deported foreign criminal who snuck back into Britain is now allowed to stay because of his ECHR rights,” he added that “Reform is a fantasy” and that the UK “must leave” the ECHR.
Speaking to the Telegraph he said, “The convention has been stretched so far beyond recognition that it’s become a charter for criminals,” he said. “It has repeatedly offered loopholes to dangerous foreign criminals who threaten the British public so they can avoid deportation.
“Reform of Article 8 is a fantasy. The only way we can put an end to farcical cases like this is if we leave the convention altogether, and guarantee our own rights.”