4th January, 2016
Photo: MailOnline
A killer has complained from his jail cell after being told that he will be deported to Nigeria when his sentence ends even though he’s never been to Africa.
Junior Bayode was jailed for 11 years after being found guilty of the manslaughter of 15-year-old schoolboy Sofyen Belamouadden, who was knifed to death in a brutal attack on March 25, 2010.
The teen was chased by a gang of around 20 youths from a rival school and stabbed nine times in just 12 seconds in front of shocked commuters in Victoria Underground Station in central London just after 5:00 pm.
He was rushed to hospital, but was pronounced dead by 6.15pm – suffering 20 separate wounds to his body, including slashes to his lung, heart, head and spine.
Five trials took place at the Old Bailey with 17 convictions resulting.
Three of the attackers – Obi Nwokeh, Christopher Omoregrie and Samson Odegbune – who were aged between 19 and 20 at the time of their sentencing in April 2013 – were jailed for life after being found guilty of murder.
Bayode, of Streatham, south London – who was just 16 when the attack took place – was found guilty of manslaughter and was caged for 11 years in July 2013.
But in a letter from his cell at HMP Moorland in South Yorks, Bayode, now 22, has complained to prison chiefs after being told he will be deported to Nigeria when he had completed his sentence, in around 2019.
He wrote to lags’ mag Inside Time complaining about the Home Office winning a ‘deport first, appeal later’ policy in October last year.
The policy effectively removes the right of foreign prisoners to appeal against deportation from within the UK unless they can show there is a ‘real risk of serious irreversible harm’ if deported.
Killer Bayode, however, says he only knows ‘the British way of life’ and has never even been to Nigeria, where his mother was born.
He wrote: ‘I was born in Germany on the 29th of January 1993 and came to the UK with my mother as an infant when I was 9 months old.
“I have neither travelled nor been to any other country since I arrived in the UK over 20 years ago.
“My past, my present and my future is firmly rooted in British soil, hence why I am struggling to understand why I have been served with a deportation order to a country I have never been to – Nigeria.
“I concede that this is where my mother is from but she has lived in the UK since 1993.
“The Home Office have disregarded everything about me; from my childhood to the relationship I have with my partner of 4 years, to the bonds between myself, my mother and siblings, and all for what?
“To achieve a target? I understand that the Home Office must consider many factors when they make such decisions, but it appears they only, misconstrue and even invent factors that work in favour of their pursuit, to reduce net migration at any cost, regardless of the devastation they cause and the human rights they breach.
“I was distraught when I read on the order that I can only appeal after my deportation.
“I may not have been born here but all I know is the British way of life.”
During his trial in 2013, Judge Christopher Moss QC told Bayode – who was armed with a knife during the attack – that he ‘set upon’ his victim as he lay “helpless and defenceless”.
The judge told him: “You joined the group of killers, you set upon Sofyen as he lay helpless and defenceless on the floor of the ticket hall.
“The killing of Sofyen Belamouadden took place in dreadful circumstances in a public place. You played your part in the death and you stand convicted of his manslaughter.”
Investigating officer DCI John McFarlane said at the time that the youngsters turned to extreme violence after becoming hooked on computer games.
The murder detective said: “People are playing games on computers in which people are getting stabbed and shot.
“Where is the real world? For them there is a blurring between the real world and those in the computer world. There was a blurring of the reality.”