Essex Police's Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Stoten delivers a statement to members of the media outside the Old Bailey in the City of London on aturdat (Jan 23, 2021). Four men were given prison terms ranging from 13 years to 27 years on Friday for their involvement in a people-smuggling plot that led to the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants. - AFP
LONDON, Jan 23 (Reuters): Four men were given long jail sentences late on Friday (Jan 22) for the manslaughter of 39 Vietnamese men, women and children who suffocated to death in a stifling, airtight shipping container in October 2019 as they were being smuggled into Britain.
The discovery of so many dead people - two as young as 15 - in the back of the truck on an industrial estate to the east of London shocked Britain and Vietnam. It also shone a spotlight on the illicit global trade that sends the poor of Asia, Africa and the Middle East on perilous journeys to the West.
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