Critics claim deportees are still treated 'brutally'

THE GARDNER CASE: Police officers are acquitted of manslaughter, but critics call for controls on Immigration Service

After Joy Gardner's death senior Metropolitan Police officers seemed genuinely as appalled as the public at the disclosure that she had been handcuffed to a body belt and gagged with adhesive tape. Yet the activities of the Alien Deportation Group (ADG) had never been a secret within the force.

When the leather belt with a buckle at the back and handcuffs on the front was designed in 1981 by Constable William Johnson, a long-serving ADG officer, he was commended and given a cheque for pounds 50 by the force. It was manufactured by the police's saddlery department.

The use of surgical tape by the ADG to gag deportees who shouted aboard aircraft or tried to bite their escorts was never hidden either. It was ordered from Metropolitan Police supplies.

In 1983, the force's solicitors department was asked by an officer for guidance on the use of gags on aircraft. Michael Wil-mot, a police lawyer, wrote back saying: "It would be difficult, if not impossible, to justify gagging before the aircraft was in flight."

But nobody asked whether gags should be used before deportees were put on aircraft, no one issued guidelines and the ADG still invented restraint techniques as it went along.

From its foundation in 1965 the ADG, which later became part of the Metropolitan Police's SO1(3) section, was a small, closely knit unit with an unpleasant job. It consisted of one inspector, one sergeant and seven constables

Their main problem was that many deportees put up a fierce struggle, kicking, lashing out and biting their escorts. Some would strip naked or try to injure themselves in attempts to avoid being thrown out of Britain.

The police were worried about contracting Aids or hepatitis B. Airline captains, who have a legal right to decide who flies with them, were unwilling to accept deportees who were struggling and screaming because they might upset passengers or endanger the aircraft.

The ADG started to devise its own solutions and PC Johnson, now retired, invented the restraint belt. This has a disturbing similarity to slave manacles, which are historically sensitive for Jamaicans.

The ADG began to use two-inch wide strips of surgical tape twisted to form a narrow rope-like gag, but there was no training on how to apply them even though doctors consider that gags can be dangerous. At first they were used on aircraft, then on the way to the airport and finally in the case of Mrs Gardner one was applied in someone's home for the first time.

Only after her death was the use of gags banned. The following year, a joint review by the Home Office and the Metropolitan Police announced new guidelines controlling the use of physical restraints in deportation cases. The review concluded that handcuffs should be available where necessary and that additional arm and leg restraints were justified where a detainee could not be otherwise adequately controlled.

The fact that deportations were a joint exercise by the Home Office's Immigration Service and the police has been largely obscured by the trial of the latter's officers for the man-slaughter of Mrs Gardner. This has led to a feeling that the civil servants have got off lightly.

One officer said: "The fact is that the Immigration Service ran the system and we merely carried out the deportation of those they had selected. There was an immigration officer present during the incident in Joy Gardner's flat and yet all the attention has focused on the police."

Claude Moraes, director of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, said: "The police are rightly angry that they have been made scapegoats in this case and the Immigration Service has got off scot-free."

What concerns Mr Moraes and civil liberties groups is that the heart of the problem has still not been addressed. Deportations continue unabated and there is no disciplinary code for the Immigration Service, which increasingly uses private security firms for enforcement.

A damning report alleging that Britain has continued to use cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment during forcible deportation was published by Amnesty International last year. It called for for an independent inquiry into the issue.

Amnesty alleged that a gag was used last year in the case of a Nigerian asylum-seeker, nine months after their ban. The Immigration Service has denied this but concerns that deportees are still being treated brutally remain.

Critics of the service say that it should be regulated by an independent statutory authority to ensure that Britain does not breach international human rights conventions. Without proper controls, they fear that Joy Gardner may not be the last deportee to die.