French court convicts Vietnamese lorry tragedy suspects
- 18 defendants were jailed for up to 10 years over their role in the death of 39 Vietnamese migrants who suffocated in a refrigerated container
- According to phone intercepts, the group referred to the migrants as ‘goods’ or ‘chickens’
The bodies of the migrants who suffocated to death – two of whom were just 15 years old – were discovered inside the sealed unit at a port near London in October 2019.
They had travelled in the lorry from northern France to Belgium before crossing the Channel to Britain.
Two ringleaders of the operation – one Romanian and one British – were convicted at a trial in 2021 in Britain and sentenced to 27 and 20 years in prison respectively. Other suspects, notably the drivers, received 12 to 20 years, while a Belgian court handed a 15-year term to a Vietnamese man for heading the local cell of the network.
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Of the 19 defendants in the French trial – who include Vietnamese, French, Chinese, Algerian and Moroccan nationals – 18 were found guilty.
Four of them, all Vietnamese, were found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to nine or 10 years in prison.