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Vietnamese teenager to be extradited from UK to Belgium over Essex migrant truck deaths
- Ngo Sy Tai is wanted in Belgium over allegations he ran a so-called ‘safe house’ for his fellow Vietnamese nationals in Brussels
- Thirty-nine migrants from Vietnam were found suffocated to death in the back of a refrigerated truck near London in 2019
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A Vietnamese teenager accused of being a key “organiser” in the fatal people-smuggling operation which saw 39 migrants suffocate in the back of a container on its way to Essex has lost his appeal against extradition.
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Ngo Sy Tai, also known as Hung Sy Truong, is wanted in Belgium over allegations he ran a so-called “safe house” for his fellow Vietnamese nationals in Anderlecht, Brussels.
Joel Smith, representing Ngo, appealed against extradition and cited a lack of detail in the charges against his client, meaning he was unable to sufficiently advise him.
But District Judge Mark Jabbitt, in his written ruling handed down at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London on Thursday, said Ngo should be extradited.
He faces up to 20 years in prison if he is convicted over the operation, an extradition hearing at the same court heard last month.
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Ngo, who is said to be 18, fled to Berlin and then to Birmingham following the grim discovery of the 39 dead men, women and children in an airtight trailer the morning after it left the Belgian port of Zeebrugge, bound for Britain, on October 22, 2019.
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