London, July 14: Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood set a law change in motion in the UK Parliament that will finally remove the legal hurdle blocking the deportation of a notorious grooming gang ringleader to Pakistan.
The case of Shabir Ahmed, jailed in 2012 on multiple charges of rape and sexual offences against young girls and recently released from prison, triggered an outcry when it emerged that the Pakistani man is protected under a 1971 law forbidding the removal of Commonwealth citizens who arrived in the UK over 50 years ago.
The convicted rapist was the ringleader of a group of nine men who groomed and sexually abused teenage girls. The men’s modus operandi was to gain the trust of their victims by offering takeaway food and cigarettes later plying them with alcohol before raping them. (PTI)
