Former banker Kweku Adoboli in last ditch bid to halt deportation

Kweku Adoboli. Picture: Lewis Whyld/PA Wire

Lawyers for Mr Adoboli - who was jailed for seven years in 2012 for two counts of fraud that resulted in £1.4 billion in losses - have lodged a judicial review and injunction against deportation amid fears that his removal is hours away.

It is being argued on the grounds of public interest.

His lawyers say Mr Adoboli, 38, has been teaching at several universities and working with an initiative promoting responsible leadership since his release from prison in June 2015, and also that he left Ghana aged four, has lived in the UK since the age of 12 and it is where his family is based.

Immigration minister Caroline Nokes said in a letter that all foreign nationals sentenced to more than four years are subject to automatic deportation unless there are compelling reasons for them to remain.

It is believed that Mr Adoboli, who was released after serving half his sentence, is due to be deported tomorrow evening.

A group of 132 MPs and MSPs have written to Home Secretary Sajid Javid urging him to intervene.

The decision to deport Mr Adoboli has been upheld at several stages by the courts but his lawyers say they will make an application to review on an oral basis on Tuesday if the judicial review or the injunction are refused.

His legal team said in a statement: “The new judicial review and the injunction to halt Kweku’s deportation were lodged shortly after 2pm today.

“Both focus on the key issue of ‘public interest’, in that Kweku Adoboli has done much to contribute to UK society since leaving custody in June 2015, and it is very much in the public’s interest that he continue with his work, be it inspiring students, or working to effect systemic change in the financial services industry.

“Given that his white collar offence was demonstrably non-violent, he is unable to reoffend without a banking licence and obviously represents no threat to the public of any kind.

“The logical conclusion is that it cannot be in the public interest to deport him.

“Even if Kweku is a foreign national on paper, sending a 38-year-old man to a country where he has not lived since the age of four is absurd, given that he has lived in Britain since the age of 12 and the UK is where his friends and partner live and where his family life is based.

“It is unquestionably his home. Kweku Adoboli may have been born elsewhere, but he was forged in Britain.”

A Home Office spokesman said: “All foreign nationals who are given a custodial sentence will be considered for removal.

“Foreign nationals who abuse our hospitality by committing crimes in the UK should be in no doubt of our determination to deport them and we have removed more than 44,500 foreign offenders since 2010.”

Mr Adoboli was detained during a fortnightly check-in at Livingston Police Station, West Lothian, on September 3 and taken to Dungavel Immigration Removal Centre in South Lanarkshire.

In her letter Ms Nokes wrote: “Financial crime, like all crime, has an impact on the society that we live in and the public expects robust action to be taken against foreign nationals who abuse our hospitality by committing crime.”