Pakistani asylum seeker wins £100,000 after being ‘treated like criminal’ for overstaying visa

London: A Pakistani asylum seeker was awarded almost £100,000 after complaining that she was “treated like a criminal” when she overstayed in Britain.

Nadra Almas, who initially came to Britain on a student visa, fought a 16-year legal battle to remain, arguing that as a Christian, she would face persecution if she was forced to return home.

In 2018, she was handcuffed and detained by Home Office officials, who told her she would be deported but released her two weeks later, the High Court was told.

The Government then took almost three years to grant her refugee status, during which time she was not permitted to travel and was unable to work or claim benefits.

She won compensation after claiming it breached her human rights.

She claimed that having to rely on friends and family “undermined her self-esteem and caused her embarrassment”.

Details of Ms Almas’s case emerged at the High Court in Birmingham after the Government appealed a lower court judge’s original decision to award her £98,757.04 in damages for her “outrageous” treatment.

However, the appeal was dismissed by a judge, who upheld both the findings and the level of compensation.

The court heard that she was born in Pakistan and came to the UK on a student visa in 2004. “This expired after five months but she stayed,” a judge was told.

“In February 2008, she was served with a notice of removal. Between 2005 and 2014, she made six applications, which I have not seen, for permission to remain.

“[The Home Office] issued a notice of temporary admission at one stage.

“She was informed that she could not work or run a business, had to live at a specified address and had to report.”

The court heard that in March 2015, Ms Almas’s asylum claim was refused as “clearly unfounded” but that she applied again two months later.

In 2018, her son, who was 26 at the time, was granted refugee status on the same grounds on which she had applied.

However, several months later in April, when she reported to officials, “she was handcuffed and detained, imprisoned in a room with two men she did not know and was told she was going to be flown back to Pakistan”.

The court found “numerous breaches” in the process by which Ms Almas had been detained at the Yarl’s Wood centre including a failure to carry out the necessary consideration of alternatives to locking her up.

After she lodged a fresh claim to stay in Britain, she was released, but under restrictions while her case was considered, the court heard.

However, it took two years and nine months for the Home Office to finally approve her refugee status.

This delay breached her rights to a family life under the Human Rights Act, the original judge, Recorder McNeill, ruled.

“She could not travel, she could not move freely, she could not develop her private and family life because her status was uncertain, and she could not work or claim public funds and had to rely on the little support from the asylum system,” the judge said.

“She was wholly unable to work and her home life was affected by the anxiety she felt following her period of detention, feeling like a criminal and not a good person with her friends and family because she had been detained.”

Recorder McNeill described the flaws made by officials in Ms Almas’s detention as “outrageous” and showed “a reckless disregard for her rights”.

She said: “The rights at stake were the most basic rights of liberty of the individual. [Ms Almas] feared to return to Pakistan for reasons of her religion and personal safety, which she clearly expressed to [the Home office] on being detained, and was, indeed, in due course granted refugee status, thus vindicating the genuineness of her fears.”

The Home Office appealed both Recorder McNeill’s original findings and the level of compensation awarded.

However, Mr Justice Ritchie rejected the Government’s case.

“In my judgment, the Recorder’s rulings on unlawful detention due to breaches of policy were logical, supported by the evidence and her unchallenged findings of fact,” he said. “These breaches were not trivial or minor.”

The damages awarded were appropriate, he said.