Epping migrant sex offender claims he tried to hand himself in but cops ‘ignored’ him | Politics | News

An immigrant sex offender who was wrongly released from prison has claimed he tried to surrender to police while on the run.

Ethiopian Hadush Kebatu claimed someone bought him an £18 train ticket after waiting three hours for immigration officers outside HMP Chelmsford.

A Channel migrant was given a £500 “tap” for deportation on Tuesday night in another “embarrassing farce” for the Home Office.

Before leaving Wormwood Scrubs and at Heathrow Airport, Kebatu threatened to seek asylum and take advantage of Britain’s human rights laws to get off his flight on Tuesday night; This sparked fears of huge costs to taxpayers and delays in his deportation.

Critics slammed the £500 payout, saying the “vile foreign sex offender” should be fired without a penny more from taxpayers.

It comes after the sex offender was mistakenly released from HMP Chelmsford in Essex when he should have been taken to an immigration removal centre.

Speaking for the first time, the Channel migrant sex offender claimed he tried to hand himself in to police but was ignored.

He said: “I [told] Police, look here, police are wanted, my friend, I have been arrested, I will give you my hand, please help me, where is the police station? He ignored me, drove away [off]”

“I am not an unknown person. Police station, where is the place? But I am also going to the police, I will give you my hand, please help me, where is the police station, take me, I am wanted.

“You know me or you recognize my image, my name is Hadush Kebatu, Ethiopian national. Please, I was released from Chelmsford prison by mistake. Please help me.”

After his release, he claimed he waited outside the prison for more than three hours for the person he described as someone “responsible” for him.

He said: “I was waiting for more than three hours at that time… [is] Is he responsible for me? Where is the Home Office, where is it [immigration]?

“I was told there was a bus. Plus all the experts ignored me.”

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said: “Keir Starmer would not rule out increasing taxes on hardworking people, even though his government previously gave £500 of your money to a vile foreign sex predator.

“Haduş Kebatu should have been deported immediately, not released, and sent home with pocket money.

“The Conservatives have a serious plan to leave the ECHR and deport all foreign criminals, ensuring this kind of outrageous waste of taxpayers’ money never happens again.”

He added: “This is all shameful nonsense and shows that Keir Starmer does not have the backbone to tackle our illegal immigration problem.”

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said: “The government should not have had to pay this illegal immigrant to go after he sexually assaulted a young girl.

“Kebatu should have been deported immediately and forcibly, without payment. This money is nothing but a new insult to British taxpayers.

“What the government needs to do is adopt the Conservative plan so we can get out of the ECHR and deport all illegal immigrants within a week of arrival and all foreign criminals.

“This man is both. But the Labor government is too weak to put in place a tough plan that will work.”

The asylum seeker, housed at The Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex, was arrested for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and another woman just days after arriving in the UK on a small boat.

At his trial, it was told that the immigrant told two young people that he wanted to “have a baby with each of them” and tried to kiss them, then put his hand on the hip of one of the girls and caressed her hair.

It was also revealed that he sexually assaulted a woman by trying to kiss her, placing his hand on her leg and telling her she was beautiful.

The Ethiopian was sentenced to 12 months in prison, but because of the time he spent in detention before his trial, he was eligible for immediate deportation under new early deportation rules for foreign criminals.

Negotiations regarding Kebatu’s deportation to Ethiopia then lasted four weeks.

A manhunt has been launched after the Channel migrant was mistakenly released from HMP Chelmsford rather than being transferred to an immigration removal centre.

Kebatu tried to return to prison five times but was told to go to the train station.

He was spotted in Chelmsford, Stratford and Dalston before being captured in Finsbury Park, north London.

Footage of Kebatu’s arrest shows the sex offender being apprehended by police officers next to a bench, four meters away from a children’s playground.

After three days on the run, he was detained again and told he would be deported within a few days.

And the Ethiopian nympho booked a 20:15 Ethiopian Airlines flight from Heathrow Airport on Tuesday night.

Kebatu, whose lawyer said at his hearing that the “sports teacher” wanted to be deported, threatened to change his mind hours before his flight.

He warned that he would seek asylum both before leaving for the airport and while at Heathrow Airport, and agreed to leave after being offered £500.

The Channel migrant was said to be “compliant” as he boarded the flight to Addis Ababa.

Funds are typically loaded onto a payment card after an offender is deported, which can then be used to withdraw cash upon arrival in his home country.

On Wednesday Downing Street revealed Kebatu had made a last-ditch bid to get an even bigger grant from the Government.

The Prime Minister’s spokesman said: “We turned down his application for the facilitated return scheme, under which successive governments have offered resettlement grants of up to £1,500.

“However, given Kubatu’s threat to disrupt the flight, an operational decision was taken to pay £500 to facilitate his return.

“The alternative was a slower and more expensive process for the taxpayer, which would have involved detention, a further escape and potentially fighting subsequent legal claims. And the cost of canceling the flight alone would have run into thousands of pounds.”

Zia Yusuf, Head of Policy at Reform UK, said: “This is an insult of the highest order. We have a government that is failing to keep its people safe, failing to put criminals in prison and wasting endless amounts of taxpayers’ money doing so.”

“The policy of reform is clear: no nonsense, no delays; detain, deport and keep Britain’s streets safe.”

Robert Bates, Director of Investigation at the Immigration Control Centre, said: “This farcical incident had a most deplorable outcome.

“A government that has completely lost control of our borders has been forced to beg and bribe a convicted sex offender to return to his country of origin.

“No amount of distortion can justify the decision to effectively reward with a large bung an illegal immigrant who caused nothing but fear and misery during the few short months he lived here.”

Senior Tory Neil O’Brien: “Instead of imposing £500 fines on foreign sex offenders, we should leave the ECHR and ban all illegals from claiming asylum. Starmer would rather raise your tax than change the rules so we no longer fine foreign criminals like Hadush Kabatu.”

Home Affairs Minister Shabana Mahmood said: “Last week’s mistake should never have happened and I share the public’s anger about it. I would like to thank the police for quickly detaining Mr Kebatu and the public for their sensitivity.”

“I have used every means to deport Mr Kebatu and remove him from British territory. I am pleased to confirm that this despicable child sex offender has been deported. Our streets are safer because of it.”

“If you come to this country and commit a crime, we will remove you.”

Kebatu was the fourth person extradited to Ethiopia this year.

The number of people accidentally released from prison more than doubled last year; A total of 262 cases were recorded in the year to March 2025.

Justice Secretary David Lammy announced that former National Crime Agency Director Dame Lynne Owens would launch an investigation into Kebatu’s wrongful release.

Initial findings will be reported to Lammy by the end of this week.

The Minister of Justice said: “Kebatu was extradited to Ethiopia, where he belongs. I am grateful to Home Office colleagues who acted quickly to ensure his deportation.”

“I have made clear from the outset that this type of error is unacceptable and we need to get to the bottom of what has happened. I have established an independent investigation, chaired by Dame Lynne Owens, into what happened last Friday to give the public the answers they deserve and we have put in place the strictest controls ever seen in our prison system to stop similar unacceptable errors in the future.”