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action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home/agdmvorg/public_html/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6114The migrants died “excruciatingly painful” deaths, having suffocated in the container en route from Belgium to Purfleet in , a judge said.<\/p>\n
Ronan Hughes, 41, and Gheorghe Nica, 43, played “leading roles” in the smuggling conspiracy and were jailed for 20 and 27 years respectively.<\/p>\n
Eamonn Harrison, 24, who towed the trailer to the Belgian port of Zeebrugge before their journey to the UK, was sentenced to 18 years.<\/p>\n
Maurice Robinson, 26, was given 13 years and four months, having collected the trailer and opened it in an industrial estate to find the migrants dead.<\/p>\n
Sentencing, Mr Justice Sweeney said: “I have no doubt that the conspiracy was a sophisticated, long-running and profitable one to smuggle mainly Vietnamese people across the channel.”<\/p>\n
He said on the fatal trip the temperature had been rising along with the carbon dioxide levels throughout, hitting 40C (104F) while the container was at sea on .<\/p>\n
“There were desperate attempts to contact the outside world by phone and to break through the roof of the container,” the judge said.<\/p>\n
“All were to no avail and, before the ship reached Purfleet, [the victims] all died in what must have been an excruciatingly painful death.”<\/p>\n
The victims had used a metal pole to try to punch through the roof but only managed to dent the interior.<\/p>\n
The court heard some of their final desperate phone messages, including one where a man spoke with ragged breaths as he apologised to his family.<\/p>\n
Justice Sweeney added: “The willingness of the victims to try and enter the country illegally provides no excuse for what happened to them.”<\/p>\n
During the trial, jurors were given a snapshot of the victims – who included a bricklayer, a university graduate and a nail bar technician – and their dreams of a better life.<\/p>\n
Many of their families borrowed heavily to fund their passage, relying on their potential future earnings once they got into the UK.<\/p>\n
The father of Nguyen Huy Tung, one of two 15-year-olds in the container, later learned of his son’s death via social media.<\/p>\n