This is the moment a man suspected of being involved in an organised crime group which smuggled people to the UK in small boats was arrested in a raid by UK crime fighters.
National Crime Agency officers detained the 22-year-old Iranian national after swooping on an address in Acocks Green in Birmingham on Thursday morning, arresting him on suspicion of conspiring to facilitate illegal immigration.
The arrest follows a controversial BBC investigation into the activities of a people smuggling group operating in northern France and the West Midlands. The man is now in custody where he will be questioned this weekend by NCA officers.
In their probe the BBC handed over £1,200 of taxpayer’s cash to the gang as part of their undercover investigation
BBC reporters paid over the huge sum as part of their investigation into a people-smuggling gang.
Undercover reporters secretly filmed members of the gang as well as its encampment hide out in a French forest near Dunkirk. A reporter arranged for a colleague to pay hundreds of pounds for a place on a boat to cross the Channel to a gang member at Birmingham New Street.
The gang member can be seen receiving £900 in cash from the undercover colleague at the station. A further payment of £348 was handed over to another gang member in France.
The investigation aired on Tuesday and NCA officers swooped 48 hours later.
NCA Regional Head of Investigations Jacque Beer said: “This arrest is part of an ongoing investigation into organised immigration crime.
“People smugglers operate for profit without concern for the safety of those they transport, which is why dismantling and disrupting the networks is a priority for the NCA.
“Our investigation continues with the evidence we have gathered today.”
The Birmingham raid came at the same time as 22-year-old Albanian was arrested into a separate investigation into organised immigration crime.
The man was produced to NCA officers from in immigration detention centre near Gatwick Airport and was interviewed on suspicion of assisting unlawful immigration.
He is suspected of being involved in the facilitation of migrants from Albania to the UK via small boats and in the back of lorries.
NCA Branch Commander Sara-Jayne Moore said: “This arrest has been made as part of an ongoing investigation into highly dangerous people smuggling journeys using small boats and HGVs across the Channel.
“The NCA will leave no stone unturned – at every step of the people smuggling route – in our work to tackle the perpetrators of organised immigration crime.”
The NCA, dubbed Britain’s FBI, currently has 91 ongoing investigations into networks or individuals in the top tier of organised immigration crime or human trafficking, those inflicting the highest harm, and who are the most difficult to reach. Some of these sit right at the top of the NCA’s priority list.
The organisation says it is aiming to target and disrupt organised crime groups at every step of the route, in source countries, in transit countries, near the UK border and across Europe as well as those operating in the UK itself.