warning: Graphic content, readers’ discretion advised. This story contains a recollection of crime and can be triggering to some readers discretion advised.
The phrase “How police pursued one of Britain’s biggest ever murder investigations…” refers to the BBC’s documentary series “Hunting the Essex Lorry Killers”. The investigation centered on the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants, who were found in a lorry in October 2019, and detailed how detectives uncovered a complex, international human smuggling ring with links to Northern Ireland
In 2019 , 39 people were found dead in the back of a lorry in Essex,sparking Britain’s biggest ever murder investigations.
A huge team of detectives ans specialists started working on the case.
The officer opened the back doors of the trailer,there was three or four seconds of just trying to process what you’re seeing,it was almost just like silence, no one was saying anything and no one really knew what to say.
The driver just stood there,didn’t say a word, he didn’t look stressed or flustered.
In custody , lorry driver , Maurice Robinson said he did not know anyone was inside the trailer he collected from Purfleet docks.
But police suspecte he is part of a criminal gang earning money from smuggling imigrants into the UK.
Luckily ,there were a large number of premises with CCTV that showed maurice pulling up in the trailer,getting out of the trailer and walking to the rear doors and you can see him clearly opening the doors and has a look in and then closes it.
Robinson drives away before returning to the same spot, by the time he calls the emergency services ,23 minutes have passed.
It’s an odd thing to do ,you’ve just found 39 dead people in the back of your lorry ,so your’e going to get back into it and go for a drive.
When Robinson came into police custody he had a samsung mobile phone but he had also a Nokia battery in his pocket.
People seem to think that when they take a SIM card out of a mobile phone, that ‘s it , you see on the movies they take the Sim cards out ,they break the phone, but you can still recover a lot of data.
Data from the phone number confirmed that in the 23 minutes before he called an ambulance,Robinson called his boss, Ronan Huges, and one other unknown person.
The CCTV image was just perfect, he walked under the camera,detectives were able to put a face to the person top of the phone.
The image is circulated to UK Intelligence teams and the man is identified as Gheorghe Nica.
Harrison appeared to have made a lengthy journey to a place called Bierne in france.
Using the GPS tracker from Harrison’s lorry, police identify an industrial estate where wthe lorry stopped.
the 29 men ,eight women and two teenage boys int the lorry died as they crossed the English channel.
The temperature n the lorry reached nearly 35 degrees and victims were left without enough oxygene to breath.
Through detailed police work and collaboration with the victim’s families and Vietnamese community leaders, police were able to identify all 39 victims.
Police discovered CCTV footage of all three key suspects in a hotel together.
Maurice Robinson and Ronan Huges were there already,having a drink it was about midnight or one in the morning
And then Nica turns up and he’s carrying a black bag.
He than is greeted by Huges and they go upstairs and they go to Huge’s room and they’re out of view for a quite a few minutes,about 14 minutes detectives think and then they come back out again, that bag looked a little more empty than it did when it went in …
Detectives suspected there was money inside that bag.
Robinson ,Harrison ,Huge and Nica are all convicted of manslaughter.
Maurice Robinson is sentenced to 13 years
Eammon Harrison gets 18 years.
and as ring leaders Ronan Huges receives 20 years.
And Gheorghe Nica 27 years.
Four more people were convicted for their part in the smuggling operation.
They were sentenced to a total of 14, 5 years.
Approximatelly 70,000 migrants are smuggled into the UK illegally each year , many by organized crime groups.the police are now working with the Haulage Industry to implement safety changes to prevent future death.