Egyptian who ran $15.5m people smuggling operation from London home jailed for 25 years

The National

20-05-2025

An Egyptian fisherman who helped run a £12 million ($15.5 million) people smuggling operation, and one told an assciate to kill and throw into the sea any migrants caught with phones, has been jailed for 25 years. Ahmed Ebid, 42, worked out of a house in London provided for him and his family by the British authorities, just three weeks after he arrived by small boat. Ebid, who is believed to be the first person convicted of organising boat crossings across the Mediterranean from the UK, was working with networks in north Africa to organise boats, bringing over hundreds of migrants at a time on extremely dangerous vessels. According to the UK's National Crime Agency, he was involved in at least seven separate crossings in 2022 and 2023 which carried almost 3,800 people into Italian waters. He was initially linked to the smuggling operation after he made phone calls to satellite phones used by henchmen on board migrant boats. These were then used to call the Italian coastguard to relay their position so they could be towed to safety and those on board taken ashore. His number was traced to London and the Italians tipped off the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA), who then began bugging his home. In one conversation he told an associate that migrants were not allowed to carry phones with them on his boats as he sought to avoid law enforcement. 'Tell them guys anyone caught with a phone will be killed, threw in the sea,' he said. Ebid was arrested and charged in June 2023 and pleaded guilty to assisting unlawful immigration but disputed aspects of the prosecution's case against him. At a special court sitting known as Newton Hearing, he claimed that he made only €15,000 ($16,400) from the operation and that his involvement was limited to sharing navigational and seafaring advice, which he had learned from his time as a fisherman in the Mediterranean. He maintained his primary motivation was to get his family to the UK. But prosecutors said he was involved in the sourcing and provision of boats and crews for crossings from Libya to Europe. He was involved in the movement of migrants before the crossings, organised their housing and dealt with any paperwork. Two notebooks were also seized, one of which contained maritime co-ordinates for the area between Libya and Italy. Ebid's claim to be a low level player was rejected by judge Adam Hiddlestson, who described Ebid as having a 'significant managerial role within an organised crime group'. Speaking after Ebid was sentenced, Tim Burton, a Specialist Prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, said the Egyptian "played a leading role in a sophisticated operation" which "endangered lives, for his own and others' financial gain". 'Vulnerable people were transported on long sea journeys in ill-equipped fishing vessels completely unsuitable for carrying the large number of passengers who were on board," he said. "His repeated involvement in helping to facilitate these dangerous crossings showed a complete disregard for the safety of thousands of people, whose lives were put at serious risk." The NCA's Regional Head of Investigation, Jacque Beer, explained that many of those Ebid moved across the Mediterranean would have eventually ended up coming to the UK in small boats. "Ebid was part of a crime network who preyed upon the desperation of migrants to ship them across the Mediterranean in death trap boats," she said. 'The cruel nature of his business was demonstrated by the callous way he spoke of throwing migrants into the sea if they didn't follow his rules. To him they were just a source of profit." The court was told the calculation for the amount of money he made came from interviews with the migrants carried out by the Italian authorities. They passed that information to the NCA as part of its investigation into Ebid. The average paid by the 3,781 migrants whose passage he organised was £3,272, meaning he made £12,375,212. During a search of his home, two Italian mobile phones were seized along with other devices, on which were found images of boats, conversations about the possible purchase of vessels, videos of migrants making the journey, and screenshots detailing money transfers. There were also photographs, showing a large amount of cash on a bed. One crossing in October 2022 saw more than 640 migrants rescued by the Italian authorities after they attempted to cross in a wooden boat from Libya. It was taken into port in Sicily and two bodies were recovered. In another, 265 migrants were rescued by the Italian coastguard from a 20-metre fishing boat found adrift in the Mediterranean after leaving Benghazi in early December 2022. Then in April 2023 two further search and rescue operations were mounted following distress calls to the coastguard – in each case more than 600 migrants were on board each boat. Ebid has a previous conviction for attempting to smuggle a tonne of cannabis into Italy, for which he was given a six-year jail sentence. Police recently arrested suspected people smugglers they say made €30 million ($33.1 million) from taking migrants across the Mediterranean. According to Europol, Egyptians have increasingly been involved in smuggling on routes into and throughout the EU, including the Mediterranean and the western Balkan routes.