Jamaican ex-banker wins right to remain in UK after ‘unlawful’ Home Office detention

A Jamaican ex-banker who was “unlawfully detained” by the Home Office has won his right to remain in the UK, The Independent can reveal.

James Matthews, 34, was awaiting the outcome of his application for leave to remain before being detained in Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre in May 2022 and labelled an “overstayer”.

The former Jamaica National Bank employee had applied for leave to remain on the basis of his relationship with a British citizen in July 2020, but the Home Office said this application was refused on 2 February this year. However, Mr Matthews says he wasn’t notified about this.

Consequently, the ex-banker and legal representatives at MTC Solicitors launched legal action arguing he was still lawfully resident in the UK.

On Thursday, it emerged that the government was defeated in its attempt to remove Mr Matthews from the country and no Home Office representatives showed up to the court hearing to argue its case.

“This past year and a half has probably been the most difficult time for me and my family, especially my fiancée, her parents and my dad who worried about this situation but tried not to voice it. However, I could see it,” Mr Matthews said.

“I’m sorry for the stress that I’ve caused them but I thank God that it’s over now. Before life became a misery in May 2022, I was a happy and carefree man. But, after having immigration officers barge into the place where I sleep, I know that I will never look at them the same.

“Nowadays, I don’t like seeing planes flying overhead and I know it’s because of how I used to see them going past while being detained at Harmondsworth Detention Centre.”

Mr Matthews’s fiancée, an NHS doctor who asked not to be named, told The Independent the couple look forward to closing this painful chapter in their lives.

“It feels like a weight has been lifted,” she said. “This unnecessary situation imposed upon us by the Home Office is finally over, although it will never be forgotten.

“I’m British and felt as though I was being punished for falling in love with a non-Brit. Where we come from should not matter, but that has not been the case in the UK.

“He is not a criminal and yet he was detained like one. When visiting him, I and his loved ones were patted down as if visiting a criminal.

“Even on release, the fact that the case was ongoing meant that it has been in the back of my mind even when at work, trying to serve as a doctor.”

The couple expressed gratitude to MTC Solicitors, advocacy group Here to Stay UK and local MP Wes Streeting for their support.

Mr Matthews came to the UK in October 2019 on a visitor’s visa and was unable to return to Jamaica at the time after his visa expired in April 2020, as travel to and from Jamaica was suspended because of the Covid pandemic.

The Home Office extended his stay to 31 July 2020 because of the extenuating circumstances, and he was advised of his right to apply for leave to remain in the UK from within this country – referred to as “in-house” – again, because of the pandemic. His application was lodged on 28 July 2020 but a response was not received from the government.

Mr Matthews would have been deported last year, if MTC Solicitors had not intervened and lodged a last-minute judicial review injunction, having only received instructions some hours before a flight he was to be put on.

Public law solicitor Naga Kandiah of MTC Solicitors told The Independent: “There is currently a hostile environment marketed by the Home Office, which has also sadly targeted immigration solicitors due to the disappointing actions of a few bad lawyers.

“But what is being forgotten is the necessity of lodging last-minute applications to halt great injustices from happening to the individual person when the state clearly makes unreasonable or wrong decisions.

“Such actions and procedures are there for a reason, and must be used only after a solicitor has exercised the utmost diligence in analysing and preparing a case.”

Mr Kandiah said that Mr Matthews had “done everything in his power to comply with the rules” and accused the Home Office of “failing to justify their inhumane and cruel decision to detain him and put him on the charter flight”.

Though Mr Matthews is now able to legally remain in the UK, the matter of legal accountability for his detention by the Home Office remains ongoing.

The Home Office has been approached for comment.