Rogue trader convicted of fraud launches last-ditch attempt to avoid deportation

Supporters of a former UBS trader facing deportation to Ghana after being convicted of fraud are preparing an 11th hour legal challenge to try and keep him in the UK.

Kweku Adoboli, 38,  was jailed for seven years in 2012 for two counts of fraud that resulted in £1.4 billion losses.

Mr Adoboli – who left Ghana at the age of four – was released after serving half of his sentence and had been involved in teaching at several universities and working with an initiative promoting responsible leadership.

But he was detained during a fortnightly check-in at Livingston Police Station, West Lothian, on September 3 and taken to Dungavel Immigration Removal Centre in South Lanarkshire.

Despite almost 75,000 people signing a petition against his deportation, he has now been moved to Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre at West Drayton.

Mr Adoboli is due to be deported in the early hours of September 18 on a charter flight – having lived in the UK since the age of 12.

A group of 114 MPs and MSPs also wrote a letter to Home Secretary Sajid Javid urging him to intervene, but Mr Adoboli’s supporters were told an appeal before a tribunal would have no hope of success.

Immigration minister Caroline Nokes said in a letter that all foreign nationals sentenced to more than four years’ imprisonment are subject to automatic deportation unless there are compelling reasons for them to remain.

She wrote: “Financial crime, like all crime, has an impact on the society that we live in and the public expects robust action to be taken against foreign nationals who abuse our hospitality by committing crime.”

Now his legal team are applying for a judicial review and are seeking an injunction to prevent Mr Adoboli’s removal on Tuesday.

Mr Adoboli said: “By denying the application of discretion to my case, a precedent is being created that will allow the Home Office to deny human rights to many other deserving cases.”

He added: “This is the Hostile Environment at work and we should all use this opportunity to persuade the Government to deliver on the ‘fair and decent’ immigration policy it promised”

His lawyer Jackie McKenzie previously said: “[Mr Adoboli] is de facto British – all his main relationships and friendships are in the UK.

“Kweku doesn’t even speak his native languages in the way he would be required to to work in Ghana.”