London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Sunday, Aug 10, 2025

Britain to Deport People for Non-Violent Drug Offences to Jamaica

Britain to Deport People for Non-Violent Drug Offences to Jamaica

The UK government has been criticised for chartering a flight to deport up to 50 people including a vulnerable drug user and a man who arrived in the country as a baby.
Campaigners have condemned the UK Home Office for its decision to deport Jamaican nationals who have lived in the UK for over 20 years for drug offences.

On Wednesday a charter flight is scheduled to remove up to 50 people, some of whom are linked to the Windrush generation, after criminal convictions triggered deportation orders.

Karen Doyle, of Movement for Justice, an immigrant rights campaign organisation, told VICE World News that almost half of the 20 people she has spoken to who are being put on the flight are being deported for non-violent drug offences.

One of the men due to be deported – despite a pledge made by the UK government in November that it would stop deporting Jamaican nationals who came to Britain as minors – arrived in the UK when he was two years old.

Now 23, the man has a baby son, a partner and an elderly mother living in London. As a child he had a tough upbringing and was in trouble with the police multiple times as a young teenager. When he was 18 he received a four-year sentence for supplying Class A drugs, which include heroin and cocaine, a conviction that led to him being moved on Wednesday straight to London’s Colnbrook immigration centre instead of being released.

“It feels unfair to send me back to a country I don’t know. I did nursery, reception, primary school, and secondary school in England. I haven’t been in an aeroplane or left here since I was two,” he told the Guardian earlier this week.

Another of those due to be flown out next week is a highly vulnerable, addicted drug user with long term mental health problems, who has been living in the UK for 20 years and has three British children.

Now 48, his health deteriorated after losing his young son aged nine. Since being diagnosed with schizophrenia and becoming addicted to crack cocaine, he has been in and out of drug treatment and has been prescribed psychiatric medicine for over a decade.

In 2010, according to court documents, he was caught selling small amounts of Class A drugs to police officers pretending to be drug users and sentenced to three years in 2010. Since being released in 2012 after serving half his sentence, and despite his ongoing addiction and mental health problems, he has not committed any offence. Yet in July he was taken from his home and locked up in Colnbrook, where he was left without medication for four days.

Doyle said the man has suffered “nightmarish withdrawal symptoms, crying and screaming for his medication.” He has a history of serious suicide attempts and is at high risk of suicide while detained because he said he “would rather die than be sent back to Jamaica”.

“The government likes to stress that these charter flights are all about deporting dangerous criminals, rapists and murderers,” Doyle told VICE World News. “But in our experience the majority at risk of being on the flight are there for drug offences that most people would not consider dangerous enough to warrant being ripped from your home and family to somewhere you have little connection with.

“It is well documented that black people face disproportionate sentencing for drug offences and are more likely to be picked up in stop and searches. These deportations are particularly unjust.”

This week it was revealed that five people have been killed in Jamaica in the past year after being deported from the UK by the Home Office.

Responding to its plans to deport the group next week, a Home Office spokesperson said Thursday: “People who come to this country and commit crimes should be expected to be removed. That is why we regularly operate charter flights to different countries – to remove foreign offenders, and those who have no right to be in the country but refused or failed to leave voluntarily.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Street justice isn’t pretty but how else do you deal with this kind of insanity? Sometimes someone needs to standup and say something
Armenia and Azerbaijan sign U.S.-brokered accord at White House outlining transit link via southern Armenia
Barcelona Resolves Captaincy Issue with Marc-André ter Stegen
US Justice Department Seeks Release of Epstein and Maxwell Grand Jury Exhibits Amid Legal and Victim Challenges
Trump Urges Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan to Resign Over Alleged Chinese Business Ties
Scotland’s First Minister Meets Trump Amid Visit Highlighting Whisky Tariffs, Gaza Crisis and Heritage Links
Trump Administration Increases Reward for Arrest of Venezuelan President Maduro to Fifty Million Dollars
Armenia and Azerbaijan to Sign US-Brokered Framework Agreement for Nakhchivan Corridor
British Labour Government Utilizes Counter-Terrorism Tools for Social Media Monitoring Against Legitimate Critics
OpenAI Launches GPT‑5, Its Most Advanced AI Model Yet
Embarrassment in Britain: Homelessness Minister Evicted Tenants and Forced to Resign
President Trump nominated Stephen Miran, his top economic adviser and a critic of the Federal Reserve, to temporarily fill an open Fed seat
The AI-Powered Education Revolution: Market Potential and Transformative Impact
Chikungunya Virus Outbreak in Southern China: Over 7,000 Hospitalized
French wine makers have seen catastrophic damage to vines that were almost ready to be harvested after the worst fires in more than 70 years burned through the south of the country
US Lawmaker Probes Intel CEO’s China Ties Amid National Security Concerns
Brazilian President Lula says he’ll contact the leaders of BRICS states to propose a unified response to U.S. tariffs
Trump Open to Meeting Putin as Soon as Next Week, with Possible Trilateral Summit Including Zelenskiy
Katy Perry and Justin Trudeau spark dating rumors, joining high stakes world of celeb-politician romances
US envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Moscow to seek a breakthrough in the Ukraine war ahead of President Trump’s peace deadline
WhatsApp Deletes 6.8 Million Scam Accounts Amid Rising Global Fraud
Nine people have been hospitalized and dozens of salmonella cases have been reported after an outbreak of infections linked to certain brands of pistachios and pistachio-containing products, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada
Karol Nawrocki Inaugurated as Poland’s President, Setting Stage for Clash with Tusk Government
Trump Signals JD Vance as ‘Most Likely’ MAGA Successor for 2028
US Charges Two Chinese Nationals for Illegal Nvidia AI Chip Exports
Texas Residents Face Water Restrictions While AI Data Centers Consume Millions of Gallons
U.S. Tariff Policy Triggers Market Volatility Amid Growing Global Trade Tensions
Tariffs, AI, and the Shifting U.S. Macro Landscape: Navigating a New Economic Regime
Representative Greene Urges H-1B Visa Cuts Amid U.S.-India Trade Tensions
U.S. House Committee Subpoenas Clintons and Senior Officials in Epstein Investigation
Sydney Sweeney Registered as Republican as Controversial American Eagle Ad Sparks Debate
Trump Accuses Major Banks of Politically Motivated Account Denials and Prepares Executive Order
TikTok Removes Huda Kattan Video Over Anti-Israel Conspiracy Claims
Trump Threatens Tariffs on India Over Russian Oil Imports
German Finance Minister Criticizes Trump’s Attacks on Institutions
U.S. Proposes Visa Bond of Up to $15,000 for Some Applicants
U.S. Farmers Increase Lobbying Amid Immigration Crackdown
Elon Musk Receives $23.7 Billion Tesla Stock Award
Texas House Paralyzed After Democrats Walk Out Over Redistricting
Mexican Cartels Complicate Sheinbaum’s U.S. Security Talks
Mark Zuckerberg Declares War on the iPhone
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
China Tightens Mineral Controls, Curtailing Critical Inputs for Western Defence Contractors
OpenAI’s Bold Bet: Teaching AI to Think, Not Just Chat
Tesla Seeks Shareholder Approval for $29 Billion Compensation Package for Elon Musk
Nvidia is cutting prices on its RTX 50-series graphics cards after sales slowed and inventories piled up
Ghislaine Maxwell Transferred to Minimum-Security Prison Amid Ongoing DOJ Discussions
U.S. Tariffs Surge to Highest Levels in Nearly a Century Under Second Trump Term
×