The Home Office made an “alarming catalogue of failures” handling an asylum seeker’s case before he murdered a pensioner in a terrorist attack, the shadow home secretary has said.
Ahmed Alid, 45, stabbed Terence Carney, 70, to death in the Hartlepool town centre in “revenge” for Israel declaring war on Hamas on October 8.
Conservative MP for Hartlepool, Jill Mortimer, said he was a “failed asylum seeker” who “should never have been” in the town.
After his sentencing Yvette Cooper, the Labour MP for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford, called for “a major overhaul of the UK’s asylum and immigration system” that “shockingly” took three years to process Alid’s claim.
She said: “These were the most appalling terror attacks and all our thoughts are with the victims, their families and the local community.
“Ahmed Alid is responsible for these terrible crimes, but we cannot ignore the alarming catalogue of failures in the way the Home Office dealt with his case.”
Ms Cooper criticised that Alid was not challenged by Border Force staff when he entered the UK unlawfully in 2020, and that his case was not fast-tracked.
“No attempt was ever made to return him to his home country” despite his history of failed asylum applications in other European countries, she added.
She said: “This deeply troubling case shows we need a major overhaul of the UK’s asylum and immigration system, with a new Border Security Command to tighten security checks, an end the shameful delays in the asylum process by making speedy decisions where people have already had claims refused elsewhere, and a new Returns and Enforcement Unit with additional staff to swiftly remove people with no right to be here.”
At Teesside Crown Court Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb said Alid was seeking “revenge” on Israel in by murdering Mr Carney.
She told Alid he “hoped to frighten the people of Britain and to undermine the freedoms they enjoy” and to “intimidate and influence the British government”.
Minutes before attacking Mr Carney he attempted to murder his housemate Javed Nouri, which Mrs Cheema-Grubb said was an “an attempt to punish him for converting to Christianity”.
Ms Mortimer said after Alid was sentenced: “The murder of Terrance Carney is a tragic case, and my thoughts remain with the victim and the victim’s family.
“I hope that today’s sentencing has brought them some closure.
“Mr Carney was a victim of a failed asylum seeker who should never have been here in Hartlepool in the first place.
“Murderer Ahmed Alid had been turned down asylum in Germany and had been in the asylum system for years travelling around Europe.
“He will now spend the rest of his life inside our prison system.
“I continue to pressure the Government to enforce the removal of people whose asylum claims have been turned down and to speed up the vetting process, so that these people who travel across Europe making multiple asylum claims in multiple countries are under no circumstances granted stay in the UK.
“In the last year 26,000 people were returned to their home countries and the Government continues to increase the overall capacity for removals in detention centres and the number of caseworkers to process these removals.
“The Rwanda scheme has been extended to include failed asylum seekers.
“These important actions will come into place with urgency, to ensure that no community needs to suffer like ours has again.”
Enjoy the convenience of having The Sunday Post delivered as a digital ePaper straight to your smartphone, tablet or computer.
Subscribe for only £5.49 a month and enjoy all the benefits of the printed paper as a digital replica.
Subscribe