Prison for Manor Park refugee who joined mob during London Riots

By Court Reporter
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
5:08 PM

An Afghan refugee who ‘repaid the government’s hospitality’ by taking part in last summer’s riots was locked up for 10 months.

Amar Khan, 20, from Manor Park, came to the UK illegally in 2008 without a passport or identity documents, but was granted temporary permission to stay.

On August 8 last year he was on his way back from visiting a friend when he joined a mob storming into the Vicarage Field shopping centre on Ripple Road in Barking, Essex.

‘The jewellers Warren James was broken into following a breach of the outer doors of the shopping centre,’ prosecutor Michael Logsdon told Wood Green Crown Court.

Mr Logsdon added the jewellers had initially been broken into by someone throwing a bicycle through its front window.

A bystander filmed Khan placing his hand through the smashed window trying to grab items and later uploaded it to YouTube.

He was also seen on footage from the shopping centre’s CCTV cameras, leaving the store empty handed.

Passing sentence, Judge Peter Ader said: ‘It is not a very good way to behave when he comes to this country as refugee, without a passport or any legal documents. He then repays the hospitality of this country in allowing him to stay at all for a period of time by breaking into a shop with intent to steal,’

The court heard Khan’s refugee status had expired in 2009. Addressing Khan, Judge Ader said: ‘Not only were you illegally in this country when these matters took place, but you repaid the hospitality of the government or the Border Agency, or whoever it is, by committing and joining in the commission of very serious disorder.’

Kerry Moore, defending, said that his client was ashamed of his action.

Khan, of Harcourt Avenue, Manor Park, admitted one count of burglary and was sentenced to 10 months in a young offenders’ institute.

Judge Ader also made a recommendation that he be deported to his native of Afghanistan upon his release.