the times | Wednesday June 8 2022 2GM 11
News
MAX WILLCOCK/BNPSTwo men were caught smuggling 31
migrants into Britain, including seven
children and a pregnant woman, after
filling a van with paprika to try to
confuse sniffer dogs.
Akan Brayan, from Nottingham, and
Dylan Shwani, from Lincoln, both 37,
were each jailed for seven years at
Nottingham crown court after a five-
year inquiry by the Home Office’s crim-
inal and financial investigations unit.
The pair were found guilty of paying
drivers to smuggle in Iraqi migrants.
The majority were men, but children as
young as one and a pregnant woman
were also found.
On six occasions between 2016 and
2018 people were crammed into
vehicles among stacks of tyres, second-
hand furniture and household goods.
Investigators found that paprika was
placed on the floor of one of the vans in
an attempt to prevent sniffer dogs from
detecting the migrants’ scents. Photos
showed a woman cradling a small child
with other children sitting around her
in a tightly enclosed space in a van.
Tom Pursglove, minister for tackling
Smugglers used paprika in
bid to mask human cargo
illegal immigration, said: “These brazen
attempts to smuggle illegal migrants,
including very young children, into the
UK in tiny, airtight spaces with room to
barely move, is despicable.”
Ben Thomas, deputy director of the
criminal and financial investigations
unit, said: “These two evil men endan-
gered the lives of people, including
children, to line their pockets without a
care in the world for their safety. I hope
these sentencings send a powerful
message that breaking the law and
putting individuals’ lives at risk will not
go unpunished.”
Yesterday children clutching teddy
bears were carried ashore in Dover as
the number of migrants who have
crossed the Channel this year was
expected to have reached 10,000. The
Ministry of Defence is expected to pub-
lish the latest official figures today.
Downing Street has said that “signifi-
cant numbers” of Channel crossings
were being prevented because of joint
working with the French authorities.
“We are working closely with French
partners on stopping crossings,” the
prime minister’s official spokesman
said.Matt Dathan Home Affairs Editor
A sixth-form pupil who felt forced to
leave her school after challenging a
visiting speaker’s views on transgender
issues has claimed that the incident
drove her to self-harm.
The 19-year-old A-level pupil has
alleged that teachers and pupils
hounded her out after she questioned a
politician’s assertions during a discus-
sion about gender. In an interview with
the news website UnHerd, the pupil,
who has studied from home since the
incident in December, claimed that the
school, a private institution in the home
counties, had fallen under the influence
of Stonewall, the LGBT charity.
JK Rowling, the author, condemned
the “utterly shameful” treatment of the
girl following a report in The Times.
The pupil described in the interview
how she had challenged the visiting
female member of the House of Lords
about what she considered to be her
“righteous denunciation of her peers as
irredeemably transphobic”.
The pupil, who used the name Kate
in the interview, said that she told the
politician, “I respectfully disagree,”
which caused one of her schoolmates to
run out of the room crying. Afterwards
she heard several pupils talking about
“transphobia” and was accused of caus-
ing trans pupils to consider suicide.
When Kate went to collect her bag
from the locker room, she said 60 pupils
circled her, called her names including
“Nazi”, “fascist”, “transphobe”, “homo-
phobe” and “racist”, and spat in her face.
The next day, her desk was covered in
printouts of trans flags with text saying:
“Trans rights are human rights.”
Two investigations were begun into
Kate’s supposed bullying, including her
“provocative history”. Meanwhile,
teachers allegedly apologised to pupils
for Kate’s “terrible, hateful behaviour”.
She said she became so distressed
that she self-harmed on school premis-
Pupil ‘self-harmed
after attacks over
her trans views’
es and was asked to stay at home for
several weeks “because I was seen as a
danger to myself and to other students”.
When she eventually returned, she
said she was made to sit in the library,
separate from other pupils. She decided
to leave the school and is continuing
her studies online. “Why would they
turn on me so viciously?” Kate told Un-
Herd. She said that these days “there is
no forgiveness for those branded with
the damning suffix of ‘-phobic’ ”.
She previously told The Times: “It
made me think I was mad. Otherwise
how could people turn on me so bitterly?
“The language she [the politician]
was using was implying critical theory
took precedence over biological reality
in defining women. When I questioned
that, she said it wasn’t an issue of se-
mantics. She said trans people don’t
have basic human rights in this country.
Afterwards I spoke to her and said, ‘I’m
sorry if I came across as rude.’ ” The pair
parted amicably, the girl said.
The politician who visited the school
told The Mail on Sunday: “I spoke about
a wide range of human rights issues.
One young woman challenged some of
my views and was treated with the same
courtesy as everyone else.”
It is understood that the school
disputes the version of events outlined
in the media.Ben Ellery
Sole survivor The boots of Fanny Williams, who played for Swindon Ladies in 1921, in a women’s football exhibition in Brighton6 A transgender cyclist has said she was
inundated with threats after comments
by Boris Johnson. Emily Bridges, 21, was
blocked from competing in the female
category of the National Omnium
Championships in April against a field
including Dame Laura Kenny, the five-
time Olympic champion. Johnson said
a few days later: “I don’t think biological
males should be competing in female
sporting events.” Bridges told ITV News
that she received hate-filled messages
including “threats of physical violence
made against me by complete strangers
online” and was now “scared a lot of the
time” about being out in public.