An unprecedented trial in this department, which illustrates the increase in illegal departures from the Bay of Somme.
Three men were sentenced Wednesday in Amiens to sentences of up to 18 months in prison for facilitating the departure of migrants to England.
These three men of French nationality were arrested on Sunday in Cayeux-sur-Mer, in the Bay of Somme, “almost in flagrante delicto because they were in vans where the gendarmes found nautical equipment and life jackets”, a added the prosecutor.
The three suspected smugglers “explained in police custody that they had been recruited to participate in this operation for money,” said the prosecutor, denouncing “the criminal agility of the networks, which are looking for new means to cross the Channel” .
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“This is the first time that we have enough elements to take legal action after the arrest of smugglers in the Somme”, welcomed Jean-Philippe Vicentini, Amiens prosecutor, during a conference of press Wednesday, ahead of the hearing in immediate appearance.
On Sunday, “around forty (migrants) managed to reach the English coast, and we arrested 23 before they boarded, Iranians and Vietnamese,” said Colonel Marc Jankowski, commander of the gendarmerie group. departmental of the Somme.
“I succumbed to the lure of gain”
Before the Amiens criminal court, the three defendants expressed regret but remained evasive about the sponsor(s) of this attempted crossing.
“I no longer worked, I succumbed to the lure of profit,” explained one of the defendants.
Picked up in Calais, the migrants were brought to Cayeux aboard a truck.
Two of these men were sentenced respectively to 15 and 18 months' imprisonment with continued detention, the third to nine months' suspended imprisonment.
Starting from the Bay of Somme, smugglers attempt to thwart surveillance of the Calais coastline.
But a departure for England from the Bay of Somme "increases" the risks compared to an attempted crossing from Calais, "because the currents there are unfavorable and the crossing is longer", underlined Colonel Jankowski.
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Channel crossing: seven-year-old girl dies in boat sinking
According to him, 860 people in an irregular situation were arrested in the department in 2023, “or 80% more compared to the previous two years”.
Faced with the increase in departures from the Picardy coast, “numerous measures have been put in place since 2021”, including the installation of “two dams” on the Authie river, indicates the Somme prefecture.
Since the start of the year, seven migrants have died trying to cross the Channel, all off the coast of Nord or Pas-de-Calais, and two others have been missing since an attempted crossing on February 28.
Among the dead, a seven-year-old girl who was on a canal 30 km from the coast, aboard an overloaded boat sailing towards the sea.