Mentally unwell asylum seeker 'needlessly' detained on her birthday by Home Office

Woman was locked up and forced to spend 48 hours behind bars without medication

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The Home Office has been accused of putting a mentally unwell asylum seeker through a “horrendous ordeal for no reason” after she was detained for 48 hours on her birthday.

Mariam*, who lives in Gloucester, was reporting at her local immigration centre on Monday when officials locked her up and said she must attend an interview with diplomats from her home country.

She was reportedly told the meeting was to renew her passport in order to facilitate her deportation – a practice known as a “redocumentation interview”, which was recently branded “corrupt” by campaigners.

The 44-year-old was placed in a police cell in Quedgeley for 26 hours without access to her anti-depressants.

Speaking to The Independent, she said: “I was really shocked. I wasn’t expecting it at all. I showed them the document to prove that I had a judicial review pending, but they said well the interview had already been arranged.

“They took me to the police station and I was locked up. There was nothing in my cell apart from the toilet I was just staring at the walls for 26 hours. I couldn’t sleep. Those cells aren’t meant to hold people for a long time.

“The Home Office was supposed to collect me and take me to the detention centre, but they didn’t arrange things properly.

“I had my anti-depressants with me but I couldn’t take them because they were sealed up with all my other belongings. I was having nightmares. I felt like I was hallucinating."

Mariam was eventually driven to Colnbrook detention centre near Heathrow airport. No home country officials arrived, and after spending a second night behind bars, she was released on Wednesday evening.

Bethan Bowett-Jones, a friend of Mariam, who received a panicked email from her on Tuesday, said: “She was in a really bad way. They didn’t give her her medication. She was in total shock – she hadn’t eaten anything all day.

“It’s awful to think that Mariam was put through this horrendous ordeal for no reason. Had they asked her to come to an appointment she would have done it, in the 10 years she has been in the asylum system she has complied with everything they’ve asked of her.

“She’s been once before to speak to the embassy and nothing came of it. They made her suffer like this totally needlessly. Even depriving her of her medication. It’s appalling.”

Mariam went to school in France, during which time she lived with her aunt, and went to university in the US, before returning to her home country where she was told by her parent she must have a forced marriage.

The 44-year-old described the situation in her home country as a "terrible clash of culture" and said she was "petrified" at the prospect of returning.

She has previously has her asylum claim rejected but appealed the decision, only to be left waiting for long periods of time for any Home Office response.

Ms Bowett-Jones added: “Mariam keeps putting in an appeal and it gets rejected eventually. But then nothing happens – she’s just left in limbo.

“She relies on medication for her mental health. Where she lives now she’s got quite a lot of support. It’s crazy to think that all of that would be taken away if she were to be removed.”

The number of people granted asylum in the UK has plummeted by 26 per cent last year, with more than half of applicants now turned away by the government when they appeal for refuge.

Government figures show more than a third of asylum applications that receive a negative initial decision are overturned on appeal, prompting concerns that the Home Office is “consistently getting it wrong” on such cases.

Asylum seekers are meanwhile facing record delays in the application process, with 14,528 people waiting for longer than the government’s six-month target as of June 2018 – 76 per cent more than two years ago, when the figure stood at 8,254.

Campaigners attribute the decline in grants of asylum in part to an “unrealistically high” standard of proof for asylum seekers, saying applicants are expected to obtain “impossible” proof such as evidence documenting torture and sexual violence.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “The UK has a proud history of granting asylum to those who need our protection.

“Immigration detention is an important part of the wider immigration system, and we are committed to using detention sparingly and only when necessary.”

*Not her real name.