Romanian was released from jail, came to UK and raped woman 11 days later
‘Get back control of our borders’
A ROMANIAN man raped a woman just 11 days after arriving in the UK following his release from prison in his home country. Florin Moraru, 25, was freed on licence for a violent robbery but was able to walk unchecked into the UK under EU freedom of movement rules.
He brutally attacked the woman in the early hours of New Year’s Day as she walked home through a churchyard, leaving her with serious facial injuries after she was punched to the ground.
A court heard Moraru shouted ‘shut up you f****** b****’ at his screaming victim before raping her in the darkness. He had earlier been pestering the woman for sex after approaching her in a nightclub where she was celebrating New Year’s Eve and followed her out after she said no.
Moraru, from Kettering, Northamptonshire, was matched to a DNA sample and arrested five days later at the car wash where he worked in Corby.
He is the latest in a series of foreign criminals to have moved unhindered to the UK to commit further horrendous acts.
Moraru was jailed for ten years and eight months at Northampton Crown Court on Tuesday after he admitted rape and causing actual bodily harm.
His sentencing comes a week after a convicted Polish killer received a life term for raping a woman in Leicester after being freed in his homeland on parole.
Jailing Moraru, Judge Rupert Mayo said the Romanian had used his fists to ‘smash his victim’s face in’ as he punched her up to eight times during the attack in Kettering. She is now afraid to go out alone after dark.
Following the conviction Philip Hollobone, Kettering’s Conservative MP, said foreigners with a criminal record should not be allowed to enter the country.
He said: ‘This was a vicious, horrendous and vile crime, which has tainted our town. My heart goes out to the victim. Foreign nationals with criminal records should be barred from ever coming to Britain.
‘Foreign nationals who commit crimes in the UK should serve their prison sentences in full back in their country of origin and never be allowed to re- enter the UK. I am afraid that whilst we remain in the EU, EU nationals with criminal records are free to travel from one EU country to another, but once we leave we can get back control of our borders and we could put a stop to free movement for criminals.’
Last week Michal Cezary Podlaszczyk, 33, was jailed for life at Leicester Crown Court after raping a 55-year-old woman who was walking through a park in the city. He had been freed in Poland after serving 12 and a half years of a 15year term for manslaughter, 15 months before moving to the UK.
Afghan-born Jamshid Piruz, a convicted murderer who moved to Holland as a child refugee, travelled unchecked to Britain and went on to attack two police officers with a claw hammer.
Piruz, 34, received a life term in January for the attack a year earlier which occurred within a month of him arriving in the UK. The Dutch citizen had been freed from prison in his adopted country in 2014 after serving seven years of a 12-year term for decapitating a woman.
Latvian builder Arnis Zalkalns was allowed into the UK despite serving seven years in jail in his home country for killing his wife.
He moved to the UK in 2007 but police did not know about this con- viction when he was later questioned about a sexual assault on a girl. He was not prosecuted and went on to murder 14-year-old Alice Gross in London in August 2014.
A Home Office spokesman said: ‘Foreign nationals who abuse our hospitality by committing crimes in the UK should be in no doubt of our determination to deport them and we seek to remove anyone who is handed a custodial sentence.
‘All passengers are checked against police, security and immigration watch lists on arrival and where we are aware of individuals who pose a risk, Border Force officers can – and do – refuse them entry.’