2 days ago
Migrant machete attacker allowed to stay in Britain
A machete attacker jailed for four years has avoided deportation because of European Union rules.
Daniel Koopmann, 24, a German citizen, claimed to have arrived in the UK in 2014 and was granted indefinite leave to remain in 2020 before Brexit.
However, in July 2020 he slashed his victim across the forearms in a machete attack. Then, after his arrest, he intimidated his victim over Snapchat and Facebook in an attempt to get the case dropped.
The Home Office sought to deport him once he was jailed but he successfully appealed to an upper tribunal which ruled his case should be re-heard because a lower court had failed to take sufficient account of immigration rules for EU citizens.
Another, lower court will now have to reconsider his case.
The case, disclosed in court papers, is the latest example uncovered by The Telegraph in which illegal migrants or convicted foreign criminals have been able to remain in the UK or halt their deportations.
Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, has announced plans to curb judges' powers to block deportations with new legally-enforced 'common sense' rules to clarify how judges interpret human rights laws and strengthen the public interest test.
Koopmann was 19 at the time of the attack when he and another unidentified attacker ambushed their victim as he walked outside a primary school in Northampton at night.
While the other attacker held the victim from behind, Koopman swung a machete at him once and cut him across both forearms.
In the days that followed, Koopman began a campaign of threatening social media posts in a bid to scare his victim into keeping quiet.
They included videos of driving past his address with the caption 'talk get stitches'. Another read: 'Cool your snitching I'm back out now – you better drop the case you silly boy.'
In sentencing, His Honour Judge Rupert Mayo told Koopman: 'These threats posted on social media get around instantly. These threats are even more sinister when they are shared and seen by hundreds of your contacts. A custodial sentence is inevitable.'
'Genuine, present' threat
Koopmann initially appealed his deportation to a lower immigration tribunal which rejected his claim, saying his conduct represented 'a genuine, present and sufficiently serious threat affecting one of the fundamental interests of society.'
The judge had stated: 'He has shown a disregard for the law and he still fails to acknowledge his own criminality.'
However, an upper tribunal has found the judge erred in law and ordered a fresh hearing.
It was claimed the previous judge had failed to conduct an assessment of the proportionality of his expulsion as required by European citizen immigration regulations.
Gang member not deported over EU rules
It follows a similar case where a migrant gang member convicted of manslaughter after the murder of an 18-year-old could not be deported because of EU rules.
William George, 28, a semi-professional footballer, was a member of a gang of 10 men convicted of killing Abdul Hafidah, 18, in front of rush hour commuters in Manchester in May 2016.
George, a Belgian who moved to Britain with his parents at the age of eight, was jailed for 12 years for manslaughter for his part in the assault. In 2018 he was served with deportation papers, which said he had a 'real risk' of reoffending.
Home Office officials lost a six-year legal battle to remove George from the UK, despite him being associated with Manchester's notorious AO gang.
Under Brussels directives, which applied until Brexit, EU nationals who lived in Britain for an extended time could only be deported 'on imperative grounds of public security'.
