No, not again: Jimmy Mubenga deportation death

After what Black Britain saw as the unlawful death of Jamaican woman, Joy Gardner, in 1993, at the hands of immigration officers who bound and gagged her in their bid to deport her, we thought we would never be here again.

And yet the as news leaks out from eye witness reports, we are again horrified to learn of the circumstances leading up to the death of Angolan asylum seeker Jimmy Mubenga, who died on a plane after being restrained by three private immigration officers.

One eye-witness has claimed he pleaded for help, and that he couldn't breath, as the three officers, all big men sat forcefully on him.

It seems that if it wasn't for people coming forward the official account would be rather different.

We must now demand a full inquiry and if necessary a moratorium on private companies being used to deport foreign nationals, to get to the bottom of this case and their procedural methods.

By Simon Woolley