Case No: CO/4003/2000
Neutral Citation Number: [2001] EWHC Admin 627
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN’S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT

Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL

Tuesday 7th August 2001

B e f o r e :

THE HONOURABLE MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN

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	THE QUEEN
On the application of JAMES YANKEY
	
Applicant	
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	THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT	
Respondent	

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(Transcript of the Handed Down Judgment of
Smith Bernal Reporting Limited, 190 Fleet Street
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Mr Oluwole Ogunbiyi (instructed by Tayo Arowojulu Solicitors, Helen House, 214-218 High Road, South Tottenham, London N15 4NP for the Applicant)
Miss Jennifer Richards (instructed by the Treasury Solicitor, Queen Anne’s Chambers, 28 Broadway, London SW1H 9JS for the Respondent)

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Judgment
As Approved by the Court

Crown Copyright ©

Mr Justice Lightman: 
1.	I have before me an application made pursuant to leave granted on the 12th March 2001 by Mantell LJ for an order quashing a decision made by the Secretary of State on the 24th October 2000 to refuse leave to the applicant Mr James Yankey to enter this country pursuant to paragraphs 320(3) and (19) of the Immigration Rules.  These paragraphs read as follows:
	“320	In addition to the grounds of refusal of entry clearance or leave to enter set out in Parts 2-8 of these Rules ... the following grounds for the refusal of entry clearance or leave to enter apply:
	Grounds on which entry clearance of leave to enter the United Kingdom is to  be refused.
	...
	(3)	failure by the person seeking entry to the United Kingdom to produce to the immigration officer a valid national passport or other document satisfactorily establishing his identity and nationality; ...
	(19)	where, from information available to the immigration officer it seems right to refuse leave to enter on the ground that exclusion from the United Kingdom is conducive to the public good...”
2.	The Secretary of State refused leave on two grounds: (1) the passport at all material times held and used by the applicant was to the knowledge of the applicant a forgery, and on this ground it was conducive to the public good to refuse the applicant leave to enter; and (2) the applicant when seeking leave to enter the United Kingdom on the 24th October 2000 had failed to produce to the immigration officer a valid national passport or other document satisfactorily establishing his identity and nationality.  The applicant challenges the decision on both grounds on the basis that the decisions were unreasonable and wrong in law.
3.	The applicant claims that he first arrived in this country on the 19th May 1994 when he was given six months leave to enter.  (Remarkably in the only sworn statement made in support of this application his solicitor states that the applicant first arrived in 1996, a statement which has never been corrected and which still stands).  On the 22nd July 1994, he says that he was given a two year extension as a working holidaymaker.  On the 11th October 1995 he married a British citizen present and resident in the UK (from whom he is now separated) and on the 19th February 1996 he was granted a twelve month leave to remain as the spouse of a British citizen.  On the 8th May 2000 the applicant was granted indefinite leave to remain as the spouse of a British citizen.  On the 18th October 2000 the applicant travelled to Italy on a one week holiday.  On his return on the 24th October 2000 he was refused entry on arrival from Italy, but on the 26th October 2000 he was granted temporary admission with restrictions on residence and employment.
4.	The critical document in this case is the applicant’s Sierra Leone passport.  Its apparent date of issue was the 5th June 1992.  It contains stamps recording the grant of leave to enter this country.  On his entry into the United Kingdom on the 24th October 2000 the immigration officer after examining the passport formed the view that the whole document was a forgery.  The applicant challenged that it was a forgery, and accordingly Mr Edward Whalley, of the National Forgery Section of the Immigration Services, was instructed to examine the passport and make a report on it.  This is set out in his witness statement.  In a fully and careful analysis Mr Whalley expressed the view that, whilst the stamps recording the various grants of leave to enter in the passport are not counterfeit, the passport had been dismantled, reassembled and restitched and contained counterfeit end papers and laminate.  The end papers are the pages which affect and relate to the applicant.
5.	The statement of Mr Whalley is clear and convincing.  An examination of the passport is enough to disclose (as it disclosed to the immigration officer) the questionable features of the passport, and the expert testimony of Mr Whalley plainly establishes beyond question the forgery.
6.	The question raised by the applicant’s counsel is whether it is also established that the applicant at all times knew that the passport was a forgery.  In my view this likewise is fully established.  The inference of knowledge can sufficiently be drawn from the fact of possession and use of the passport by the applicant, the refusal by the applicant when interviewed by the immigration officer on the 16th October 2000 to answer any question as to where or how he obtained the passport and the decision of the applicant to proffer no evidence in this regard or at all on this application.  It is of course possible for a possessor of a forged passport to proffer an innocent explanation for his use and possession of it, but no effort has in this case been made to proffer any explanation.  It is not enough for counsel to state that the applicant can have had no motive for using a forged passport.  Whether or not he did have a motive and what that motive may have been are matters of speculation.  It is unnecessary and unhelpful to speculate where the applicant has deliberately maintained silence as to the relevant matters on which he could shine a light, but declines to do so.
7.	Accordingly in my view the Secretary of State was entitled to treat the various licences to enter and remain here by the applicant as obtained by use of a passport which he knew to be forged.  It is well established that where fraud has been exercised to obtain leave to enter that is a sufficient ground for exclusion of the fraudster from the United Kingdom on the grounds that such exclusion is conducive to the public good: see R v IAT ex p. Patel [1988] AC 910.  I therefore hold that the challenge to the decision of the Secretary of State to refuse entry to the applicant on this ground must fail.
8.	It is unnecessary to decide whether the alternative ground relating to the proof of identity and nationality of the applicant but nonetheless I shall briefly decide this question also.  Beyond the passport, for the purpose of proving identity the applicant relied on five documents besides the passport, namely (1) his marriage certificate; (2) his wife’s birth certificate; (34) his application for indefinite leave to remain on the basis of his married; (4) the letter granting such leave; and (5) a Sierra Leone identity card.  The first four of these documents merely show that the applicant used the same identity as on the forged passport; and the fifth raises more problem s than it solves in relation to the identity card issued in 1994 contains a photograph of a person considerably younger than that in the passport allegedly taken two years earlier in 1992.  I am satisfied that the Secretary of State was entitled to refuse entry on the ground that he was not satisfied as to the applicant’s identity or nationality and in particular not satisfied that the applicant was the person identified in the passport.  I would accordingly dismiss the application on this ground also.
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	MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN: For the reasons set out in the judgment which I have just handed down, I refuse this application.
	MR RICHARDS: My Lord, I notice in the time I have had to look at it two corrections. Would it be convenient to give them to your Lordship now?
	MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN: Just give them to me now.
	MR RICHARDS: On the last page, my Lord, the third line down, I think it should be “I therefore hold” rather than “held”. Halfway down paragraph 8 where your Lordship says “and the fifth raises more problems than it solves for the identity card” it should be “in relation to the identity card”.
	MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN: Thank you very much.
	MR RICHARDS: The Claimant is, as I understand it, in possession of a CLS Funding Certificate so there is no application for costs.
	MR OGUNBIYI: My Lord, may I just ask for CLS funding for the Claimant?
	MR JUSTICE LIGHTMAN: I will direct that. Thank you to both counsel for your help in this case.