Gangmaster jailed for cocklers' deaths
Gangmaster jailed for cocklers' deaths
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Tuesday, 28, Mar 2006 05:36
A Chinese gangmaster has been jailed for 14 years for the manslaughter of 21 immigrant cocklepickers at Morecambe Bay two years ago.
Lin Liang Ren from Liverpool was handed the sentence at Preston crown court this morning, while two other Chinese nationals were also jailed for their contribution to the drownings in February 2004.
Lin Liang Ren, 29, was last week found guilty of 21 counts of manslaughter, - one count for each of the 21 bodies recovered of 23 immigrants who disappeared that night - conspiring to pervert the course of justice and immigration offences.
His girlfriend Zhao Xiao Qing, 21, also from Liverpool, was jailed for two years and nine months for conspiring to pervert the course of justice by trying to conceal who had sent the cocklers out to drown and immigration offences.
Lin Liang Ren's cousin Lin Mu Yong, 31, also from Liverpool, was jailed for four years and nine months for immigration offences.
In sentencing, Mr Justice Henriques told Lin Liang Ren that he had "cynically and callously exploited his fellow countrymen" and was "motivated by greed".
The judge also told Zhao Xiao Qing that she was "thoroughly manipulative" before recommending that all three were deported at the end of their sentences.
During the six-month trial, the court heard a harrowing phone call from one of the immigrants who died on the stormy winter night. During it he repeatedly told a police operator that there was "sinking water" before the phone went dead.
Of the 18 men and three women known to have died, 20 were from the Fujian province in south-east China and one is from Liaoning province in north-east China.
Speaking after last week's unanimous verdicts from the jury, Detective Superintendent Mick Gradwell of Lancashire police, who investigated the tragedy, said that the cocklers died a "horrendous" death on a "particularly horrible and tragic night".