British skipper gets 10 years in jail for people-smuggling

A British yacht captain was sentenced to 10 years in jail yesterday after a Greek court found him guilty of trying to smuggle 72 illegal immigrants into Greece.

Michael Wood, 45, from Morecambe, Lancashire, was alleged to have taken thousands of pounds from the immigrants and crammed them on to a boat from Turkey.

But in a court hearing at Piraeus, Wood claimed he had been duped by a Greek sailor into helping with the clandestine operation. He denounced the raucous court proceedings and claimed that he had been made a "scapegoat" by the Greek authorities.

His lawyer, Elisavet Pouliou, described the sentence, which included a fine of £285,000, as "very strict" but said Wood could pay £200 per month for 10 years instead of going to jail.

Wood was arrested on the island of Aegina near Athens on Sunday and charged with transporting the illegal cargo of Syrians and Iraqis, including nine children, on the 50ft sailing boat Elena IV. The immigrants claimed they paid up to $20,000 (£12,000) to make the 31-hour voyage from the Turkish coastal town of Izmir.

People-smuggling is a big problem in Greece. Tens of thousands of people from Asia, eastern Europe and the Middle East illegally enter the European Union country every year. They often head to Greek islands from the neighbouring Turkish coast on board sailing or fishing boats.

In court, Wood claimed he was tricked into the act by the boat's other skipper, identified as George Patsakis, for whom the Greek police are still searching. Wood told the court that he had been hired about one month ago as an assistant skipper and engineer to help sail the Elena IV to the resort island of Mykonos.

After sailing around Mykonos and other parts of Greece with three customers, the empty yacht returned to Athens for repairs. However, instead of returning to Mykonos, Wood claimed the boat sailed without his knowledge to a bay near Izmir on 19 July, where he discovered the Greek captain's true intentions.

"I said, 'I don't like this, I don't want to do it'," Wood told the court, adding that the Greek captain became aggressive and gave him no choice. Wood claimed he could not communicate with authorities to warn them.

Wood also complained that the trial was confusing, with poor translation. At least one of the immigrants questioned during the trial, a 36-year-old Iraqi Kurd, Sadiq Ibrahim Yousif, looked confused about the questions asked of him.

Wood said: "He said he was going to testify for me, he wasn't allowed to do so. They put a different translator that we had never seen before. So, in the end, he was my prime and only witness and because of that I lost." The Briton said he felt "like a scapegoat".

"I have been singled out like this, I don't know. A scapegoat, maybe to be an example. The main thing is I didn't do the deed. I was forced to do it, I was coerced, I was conned," he said, adding that he would probably appeal.