Home Secretary Theresa May has failed in an attempt to overturn a £36,000 damages award made to a failed asylum seeker for wrongful imprisonment.
Nemah Shehadeh, of Petershill Drive, Glasgow, considers herself to be a stateless Palestinian, although the Home Secretary regards her as a Jordanian national,
Shehadeh was granted visas to enter Britain in 2000, 2001 and 2002 as a visitor but subsequently overstayed. She was arrested at Heathrow Airport, London, in 2005 attempting to fly to Canada with a false passport.
She was sentenced to four months imprisonment for offences stemming from the incident and recommended for deportation.
Shehadeh was subsequently detained from December 2006 until August 2009 and has since made a fresh claim for asylum on the basis she has converted to Christianity.
Last year a judge held she was unlawfully detained for a year by immigration authorities from August 2008 until August 2009 when she was freed on bail.
Lord Tyre awarded her damages and the Secretary of State appealed against the ruling to three judges at the Court Of Session, Edinburgh.
But Lord Drummond Young, sitting with Lady Dorrian and Lord Philip, said Lord Tyre was "fully justified" in concluding that from August 2008 onwards the immigration authorities were in breach of legal principles that govern the lawfulness of detention in such circumstances.
The Home Secretary also claimed the amount of damages awarded was excessive, but the appeal judges also rejected that argument.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article