Manhunt for people smuggler ‘Scorpion’
A CHANNEL people-smuggling boss who calls himself Scorpion was being hunted last night.
Barzan Kamal Majeed made a fortune trafficking hundreds of migrants in small boats but went on the run before he was given 10 years in jail and fined nearly £1million last month.
Police forces across Europe were alerted and National Crime Agency officers fear that Majeed, 36, may be hiding in the UK, possibly in the Midlands. He uses the WhatsApp handle Scorpion.
He moved to Nottingham in 2013 but was deported to Kurdistan in his native northern Iraq two years later.
His trial in Bruges, Belgium, followed an investigation involving the NCA plus Belgian, Dutch and French law enforcement.
The case centred on 31 attempts to smuggle migrants into the UK from July 2018 to November 2019 using small boats, lorries and shipping containers.
Many of the migrants had stored Majeed’s number in their phones under the name “Scorpion”.
The probe led to the conviction of fellow people smuggler Nzar Jabar Mohamad. The 35-year-old was jailed for 10 years at Hull Crown Court in October last year. He had admitted attempting to bring in 21 immigrants in small boats and lorries but bragged that he had smuggled in hundreds of young women. Mohamad was one of 17 defendants in the Belgian case and was given two more years in prison and fined £250,000.
NCA branch commander Martin Clarke commented: “These convictions represent the destruction of the UK and international arms of this organised crime group, which preyed on the desperation of migrants seeking to cross the Channel.
“Justice will only be achieved when [Majeed] is back on Belgian soil to serve his jail term.”
Anyone with details of his whereabouts can ring the NCA control centre on 0370 496 7622.