Fury as foreign criminals guilty of murder and abuse allowed in UK | Politics | News
Hundreds of foreign criminals guilty of murder and rape have been allowed to infiltrate the UK. His convictions for horrific crimes abroad came to light after he was accused of crimes in this country, leading to checks by British police.
On Saturday the Home Office vowed to stop “dangerous individuals” from coming to Britain. But an investigation by the Sunday Express found hundreds of convicted murderers, sex offenders and pedophiles arrived in the three years between 2022 and 2024. They were identified following checks on foreign nationals arrested in the UK by the ACRO Criminal Records Office, a national police unit.
In this report, 359 were found guilty of murder or manslaughter, 239 of rape and 313 of sexual crimes against children.
This means that 911 people in total were identified. Some may have been counted more than once if they had been arrested more than once in Britain.
Most criminals came from Eastern European countries; 409 of these were from Romania alone.
Alp Mehmet, President of Migration Watch UK, said: “What is most disturbing is that these repeat crimes are often committed by EU citizens and only come to light after those involved have committed new crimes here.
“For me, this points to dangerously lax control at the border, where EU citizens can enter the country with a quick scan of their passport. It is also worrying that the criminals identified may be a representative group and possibly the tip of a much larger iceberg.”
A Home Office spokesman said: “This data is largely based on the previous government’s work. This Government protects our borders to ensure dangerous individuals cannot enter the UK.”
“All people arriving in the UK, regardless of their method of entry, are subject to stringent checks on ministerial systems and immigration databases. They may be refused entry if they have a criminal conviction, a history of serious or persistent criminal offences, or have not declared a conviction.
“Our police also carry out routine checks on arrested foreign nationals’ criminal convictions abroad, and those with serious convictions are referred to the Immigration Service for deportation.”
But Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said: “Murderers, rapists, child molesters. These are people who should never be allowed near our country and should be deported immediately. Every illegal immigrant should be deported within a week of arrival and every foreign criminal should be deported immediately. Simple as that. Simple as that.”
“England is thought to have one of the most sophisticated criminal record exchange systems in Europe, but under Labor it is more filtering than shielding.
“The British people are angry and right. Our border plan is ready. Leave the ECHR, remove all illegal immigrants within a week of arrival, end the appeals merry-go-round. But Keir Starmer doesn’t have the backbone to do this. This is weakness from top to bottom and the country is fed up with it.”
Lee Anderson of Reform UK said: “Britain, under the Conservatives and continued by the Labor Party, has become notorious for being soft. Hardened criminals are emboldened to come here in droves because they know the UK Government does not have the backbone to prioritize the safety of Britons and deport them.”
“Reform UK will not hesitate to deport every one of the approximately 11,000 foreign-born criminals currently detained in the UK. This will not only free up prison capacity but also send a clear signal that Britain is closed to criminals.”
The figures revealed by the Express include only those guilty of the most serious crimes, and their convictions were only revealed after they were brought to the attention of British police; This suggests that the total number of foreign criminals entering the UK could be in the thousands.
In 2017, Polish convicted murderer Michael Podlaszczyk was sentenced to life imprisonment for raping and robbing a woman whom he attacked in a Leicester park. It later emerged that the 33-year-old had arrived in the UK just weeks after being released on parole in his homeland after serving 12 years behind bars for murdering a man in a drunken rage.
Another notable case was 59-year-old Vytautas Jokubauskas, who killed his partner before dismembering her and stuffing her body into a suitcase. Jokubauskas, who lives in Peterborough, strangled his girlfriend, 42-year-old Ramute Butkiene, with a robe rope and then dismembered her body.
At the end of the trial in which he was convicted of the woman’s murder, it was revealed that he was imprisoned in Lithuania for a brawl in which he killed a man in 1992.
The problem became more pronounced in 2015, when 26-year-old Lithuanian Raimondas Jakstas was imprisoned for attacking his neighbor Lincs in Boston. Jakstas came to the UK after being released from a Lithuanian prison where he had served five years of a nine-year sentence for beating someone to death.
Sentencing him, Judge Michael Heath said: “This case highlights an issue of legitimate public concern.
“If a person is sentenced to life imprisonment for murder in this country, and the only sentence that can be given for murder in this country is life imprisonment, that person will be licensed and monitored for life after his release.
“This does not seem to be the case with those who were convicted of murder in the country you came from. You were able to come to this country without any obstacles, you were able to live here without being monitored.”
The ACRO Criminal Records Office is the national police body responsible for exchanging criminal record information between the UK and countries around the world, and authorities have carried out 315,228 cross-border computerized criminal record checks in the last three years.
The number and nationalities of serious foreign criminals in the UK have been released following a Freedom of Information Act request.
A spokesperson for ACRO said: “The UK has well-established mechanisms for exchanging information about criminal records with European partners. This helps UK police pursue criminal investigations and protect communities.”
