Migrant boat pilot loses bid to appeal sentence
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Ibrahima Bah was sentenced to nine years and six month at Canterbury Crown Court
An asylum seeker, Ibrahima Bah, who piloted a boat in the English Channel during an attempted crossing in which four passengers drowned, has lost his bid to appeal his convictions and sentence. Bah was sentenced to nine and a half years in detention after being found guilty of manslaughter and facilitating a breach of UK immigration law. The incident occurred on December 14, 2022, when Bah steered a low-quality inflatable dinghy, overcrowded with passengers, in an attempt to cross the Channel.
Bah’s defense during his retrial at Canterbury Crown Court was that he had been forced to pilot the boat under threat of death from smugglers. However, the prosecution rejected his claims, arguing that he was not truthful. The Court of Appeal, led by Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr, ruled that Bah’s appeal against his convictions and sentence was not “arguable” and therefore dismissed it.
The Case and the Court Ruling
At his original trial, jurors were told that the inflatable dinghy, which was home-made and of poor quality, was designed to carry no more than 20 people but was overloaded with approximately 45 passengers on the night of the crossing. In the appeal, Bah’s lawyer, Richard Thomas KC, argued that the attempted crossing was a “joint endeavor” in which the passengers knowingly took risks by boarding the boat. He suggested that the deaths could not solely be blamed on Bah because the passengers were complicit in the journey.
However, Baroness Carr dismissed this argument, emphasizing that the trial judge had correctly concluded that the passengers’ voluntary decision to board the boat did not break the chain of causation leading to the deaths. She noted that it was irrelevant to causation whether the deceased passengers had willingly boarded the boat. According to the judge’s reasoning, the crucial issue was not the passengers’ consent, but the dangerous actions of Bah in piloting the overloaded dinghy.
The judge also agreed that the trial judge had provided the correct instructions to the jury. Baroness Carr stated that inviting the jury to consider whether the deceased’s voluntary boarding of the boat could break the chain of causation would have amounted to a misdirection.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which opposed the appeal, argued that the passengers were acting in concert with Bah, and it was his facilitation of the illegal crossing that led directly to the deaths. Duncan Atkinson KC, for the CPS, emphasized that the deaths were a result of the ongoing facilitation at the time of the incident, not the passengers’ background or initial decision to travel.
The Tragic Incident
The tragic crossing on December 14, 2022, ended with four deaths, including three unidentified males and one named individual, 31-year-old Hajratullah Ahmadi from Afghanistan. Following the sinking of the dinghy, a UK fishing vessel found 39 survivors and brought them to the Port of Dover. The survivors were assisted by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), air ambulances, and UK Border Force personnel.
Bah, a Senegalese national, was sentenced based on an estimated age of around 20 years old. The tragic deaths drew attention to the dangers faced by people attempting to cross the English Channel in overcrowded, poorly constructed boats. The case highlighted the issue of people smuggling across the Channel and raised questions about the responsibility of those involved in organizing or facilitating such crossings.
The case has become a significant point of discussion in debates about immigration and asylum-seeking in the UK, especially regarding the role of individuals like Bah, who act as pilots for these dangerous crossings. However, the Court of Appeal’s decision to uphold Bah’s conviction and sentence reinforces the message that facilitating such dangerous journeys, even if done under duress, carries severe consequences.
The tragic loss of life in this case serves as a stark reminder of the perils that migrants face when attempting to cross the Channel in dangerous conditions. Despite Bah’s claims of being coerced, the legal system has maintained that the responsibility for the deaths rests with those who facilitate these perilous crossings, regardless of the circumstances surrounding their involvement.
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