A FORMER director of Wycombe Race Equality Council used a fictitious college to fool the Home Office into granting asylum seekers illegal visa permits, a court heard.
Alfred Webley, who was a magistrate at the time but has since resigned, said the immigrants were students at the Wye Valley Institute a college based in his friend's three-bedroom council house in Cater Road, High Wycombe.
A jury at Oxford Crown Court heard this week that Webley, 56, and his accomplice, Isa Ibrahim, 47, sent bogus documents from the college in an attempt to sidestep UK immigration laws.
Webley, of Norwood, London, allegedly instructed Ibrahim who has already admitted conspiracy to defraud the Home Office to write to immigration officials telling them the claimants had enrolled on computer courses.
Barnaby Evans, prosecuting, called the fraud a "tissue of lies" and a "blatant attempt to defraud the Home Office."
Wilfred Forster-Jones, defending, claimed the Wye Valley Institute was a bona-fide educational establishment.
Webley denies the charge of conspiracy to defraud the Home Office.
The case continues and is expected to last for up to three weeks.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article