Britain’s immigration system is under fire after officials confirmed an Ethiopian asylum seeker sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl and another woman was accidentally released from prison on Friday, sparking a manhunt for the fugitive sex offender.
Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, 38, was sentenced to 12 months behind bars in September, Reuters reported.
A “shocked” British Prime Minister Keir Starmer denounced Kebatu’s release, calling it “totally unacceptable,” according to The Associated Press.
His arrest in July sparked weeks of protests outside the Bell Hotel in Epping, a migrant housing site about 20 miles north of London, according to the report.
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At its peak in 2023, the Home Secretary said more than 400 hotels were used to house asylum seekers, costing almost £9 million GBP per day, or around $11.3 million.
Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was convicted of two charges of sexual assault, one charge of attempted sexual assault, one charge of inciting a girl to engage in sexual activity and one charge of intimidation without violence. (Essex Police)
“We share the views of communities across the country that these hotels should close – including the Bell Hotel in Epping,” British Foreign Secretary and Labor MP Yvette Cooper wrote in an earlier statement. “We will do this as quickly as possible through a structured and sustainable plan, rather than through one-off court decisions that create more problems for other local areas or municipalities.
“Such piecemeal decisions risk a repeat of the chaos that led to the widespread use of hotels in the first place.”
Officials said Kebatu was supposed to be transferred to an immigration detention center for deportation, but was accidentally released, according to the report.
People protest outside Epping Forest District Council after the British government won a court ruling that prevented asylum seekers from being evicted from the Bell Hotel in Epping, Britain. (Reuters/Jack Taylor)
British Justice Secretary David Lammy wrote in an X-post that he was “shocked at the wrongful release by HMP Chelmsford.”
“We are working urgently with the police to locate him and I have ordered an urgent investigation,” Lammy wrote. “Kebatu should be deported for his crimes, not on our streets.”
Kemi Badenoch, a Conservative MP for North West Essex, also took up a fiery post, saying “the whole system is collapsing under Labour.”
“The fake asylum seeker who sexually abused a child in Epping has been ‘wrongly released’,” Badenoch wrote. “Why is that? Because the whole system is collapsing under Labour. The government is accidentally releasing people instead of deporting them. Those they deported are coming back. Nothing substantial has been done to tackle the threat to women and girls living in these communities.”
Protesters react alongside police during a protest near Epping Forest District Council after the British government won a court ruling that prevented asylum seekers from being evicted from the Bell Hotel in Epping, Britain, in August. (Reuters/Jack Taylor)
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Badenoch said Conservatives voted against Labour’s release program because it “put predators back on the streets”, but she pointed out that Kebatu had just been convicted.
“A level of incompetence that defies belief,” she wrote. “Only Conservatives have a plan for stronger borders and law and order.”
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Nigel Farage, MP for Clacton and leader of Reform UK, added to X: “The Epping hotel migrant sex attacker has been accidentally released instead of deported. He now walks the streets of Essex. Britain is broken.”
