A Church of England vicar who staged more than 20 sham marriages in Greater Manchester has been jailed for two and a half years.
Rev. Patrick John Magumba, a 58-year-old Ugandan national, who presided over three churches within the Greater Manchester Diocese, pleaded guilty to immigration offences in December 2011 following UK Border Agency’s investigation into sham marriages.
Suspicions were raised about Rev. Magumba when officers investigating a sham marriage interviewed him in connection with one of his marriages.
Ignoring church guidance he conducted 28 sham marriages at two of his churches in St. Peter’s, Rochdale and St. Luke’s, Deeplish. These marriages took place in the period between April 2008 and February 2011.
Rev. Magumba was found to have misled the Church Parish Council, ignored the Marriage Act requirements on publishing Banns of marriage, removed registers and certificate books from the church, failed to account for payments for weddings and stolen from the church.
Immigration Minister Damian Green said Rev. Magumba’s sentence “sends a clear message to anyone considering breaking our immigration laws that Britain is no longer a soft touch. We now have specialist teams of immigration and police officers working to prosecute people who commit this form of organised criminality no matter who they are.”
He added that the UK Border Agency works closely with the church to identify sham marriages. “Last April we issued special guidance to help the clergy identify those who seek to abuse the institution of marriage,” he said.
Dave Magrath, head of the UK Border Agency criminal and financial immigration team in the North West warned that if they uncover marriages that are not genuine, they will challenge them and ensure those responsible are brought to justice. “Our main aim is to identify the organisers who profit from and fuel the demand for sham marriages. In this case the key organiser was a church minister who was prepared to abuse his position — and the trust placed in him by the Church and his community,” Mr. Magrath said.
