Since its launch in September 2014, 24 Hours in Police Custody has gripped the nation, showing in detail the investigations led by Bedfordshire Police officers as they work around the clock to solve harrowing crimes. Tonight’s episode on Channel 4 at 9pm follows a daring escape by eight Albanian detainees from Yarl’s Wood Immigration Detention Centre in Milton Ernest near Bedford in April last year, which resulted in a seven week manhunt.
The show will open with CCTV showing a group of 13 men fleeing the detention centre during a mass disorder, using gym equipment to climb over the site’s fence. Five of the escapees were caught later that night, but the other eight went on the run – evading police for weeks after they split into smaller groups.
Several of the prisoners handed themselves in, but officers were forced to track down the remaining absconders who had made off to different parts of the country, including Huddersfield, Watford, Leicestershire and London.
Bedfordshire Police were forced to track down eight Albanian men who fled Yarl’s Wood Detention Centre (pictured) in April last year while awaiting deportation
(Image: Leon Neal / Getty Images)
Detective Chief Superintendent Will Hodgkinson, who co-ordinated Bedfordshire Police’s nationwide manhunt, told the BBC : “I’ve never known [a search] on this scale against eight individuals… I don’t think anyone has encountered a challenge quite as large as this. While we do this on a daily basis, we tend not to do it on this scale and this intensity.”
The Beds Police investigator gave a special shout out to the Metropolitan Police, who helped with the manhunt despite it occurring during a major security operation for the King’s coronation. Rizah Koka, 29, and another man were arrested by Bedfordshire and Metropolitan Police officers while they were sat outside a coffee shop in the Colindale area of north London.
Officers found a set of keys on the pair and subsequently carried out searches at the address where they discovered cocaine worth up to £50,000, cannabis worth up to £63,000 as well as around £70,000 in cash. Mariglen Coha, 32, returned to an address in Huddersfield where he had previously been arrested and was found by officers fast asleep. Ervin Morati, 21, was arrested in a coffee shop in Watford town centre.
Officers tracked down Bilbil Bodini, 27, at an address in Hendon, north London, while Enea Shima, 28, was arrested by Metropolitan Police officers at an address in Bromley, south London. The last three men on the run – Thanas Bizhoti, 28, Luftim Hallaci, 21, and Arnold Lleshaj, 28 – handed themselves into police stations in Kempston in Bedfordshire, Romford, east London and Hinkley, Leicestershire, respectively.
All eight men pleaded guilty to escaping lawful custody. Lleshaj, the last man to be sentenced, pleaded guilty to violent disorder and criminal damage and was jailed for 22 months on February 8 last year. The other seven men were found not guilty of violent disorder in relation to the breakout. Six were found not guilty of criminal damage with one, Hallaci, pleading guilty to the offence.
Bodini, Hallaci and Morati were handed jail terms of eight months. Bizhoti and Coha were jailed for seven months and Shima for six months. In terms of the drugs seized in London, Koka and two others were convicted.
Detective Chief Inspector Matt Inwood from Bedfordshire Police CID, who led the investigation, said at the time of sentencing: “This was a dangerous and brazen escape attempt by men who were awaiting deportation. Thousands of hours has been spent by our Bedfordshire officers and staff as well as law enforcement colleagues across the country in order to apprehend those who escaped. This behaviour was completely unacceptable and a flagrant breach of the law.”
24 Hours in Police Custody airs on Channel 4 at 9pm on Monday, January 6.
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