Northern Ireland man pleads guilty to the manslaughter of migrants in lorry

Ronan Hughes, 40, of Co Armagh in Northern Ireland, pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey today.

He was one of several men accused of being part of a people-smuggling ring linked to the deaths of the 39 migrants last October.

The bodies of the Vietnamese nationals were discovered on an industrial estate in Grays, Essex, shortly after the container arrived in Purfleet on a ferry in the early hours of October 23 last year.

Among the men, women and children were 10 teenagers, two of them 15-year-old boys.

An inquest heard that their medical cause of death was asphyxia and hyperthermia – a lack of oxygen and overheating – in an enclosed space.

On April 8, lorry driver Maurice Robinson, 25, of Craigavon in Northern Ireland, who discovered the bodies after transporting the container from Purfleet to an alleged pick-up point in Grays, Essex, pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey to 39 counts of manslaughter.

He also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration of non-European Union citizens between May 1 2018 and October 24 2019 and acquiring criminal property, but denied a further charge of transferring criminal property.