Ms R

Ms R was arrested after she presented a false UK passport to an immigration officer at Gatwick Airport as she tried to catch a flight to Canada in May 2008.

After receiving legal advice, Ms R admitted in interview to being a Sudanese national and to using a false travel document to try to board a flight to Canada.

The same month at Lewes Crown Court, she pleaded guilty to an offence under section 25(1)(a) of the Identity Cards Act 2006 and was sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment.

Following her arrest in 2008, during the interview under caution in which she admitted the offence, Ms R also revealed that she had left Sudan for Ethiopia in 2006; was offered employment in Italy but when she travelled there, under arrangements made by the “employers”, she was made to work as a sex worker.

She became pregnant and wanted to leave but was beaten. With help, she eventually managed to escape from her “employers” and she was arrested whilst attempting to flee to Canada via the UK.

After the Home Office initially refused asylum to Ms R and her child (born in July 2008), she was eventually recognised by the First Tier Tribunal of the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal and the Home Office as a victim of trafficking and, in December 2015, she and her child were granted asylum and leave to remain in the UK until 2021.

Ms R sought to appeal against her false passport conviction in 2012, but her appeal was dismissed. In November 2017 Ms R applied to the CCRC for a review of her conviction.

Having considered the case in detail, the CCRC decided to refer Ms R’s conviction to the Court of Appeal because it believed there was a real possibility that the Court would quash the conviction.

The referral was based on new evidence and on new legal argument that:

• A change of law in the treatment of victims of trafficking was set out in the case R v GS [2018] EWCA crim 182.
• In light of that change of law, the Crown Prosecution Service, in accordance with their guidance, and in light of the fresh evidence in Ms R’s case, would conclude that it was not in the public interest to prosecute her.
• Ms R would suffer a substantial injustice if her conviction was upheld.

The CCRC referred the conviction in February 2019.

The Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in January 2020.