Something borrowed? Bridal shawl exposes sham wedding scam with British women paid up to £1,000 to pose for fake pictures

Eastern European and British brides paid up to £1,000 to pose for wedding pictures
Some wedding photos taken in the same room and with the same traditional dress
Eva Holubova was paid to get married three times in four months

PUBLISHED: 16:01 EST, 18 October 2013 | UPDATED: 16:17 EST, 18 October 2013

View
comments

Apart from a few nervous-looking brides, nothing seemed to stand out in the wedding photos which landed on the desks of immigration officials in marriage visa applications.

But when they placed them side-by-side, a more sinister story began to emerge.

Home Office immigration officials’ suspicions were raised when they noticed several different couples were wearing exactly the same outfits to their weddings.

At least five brides were clad in the same distinctive red and yellow shawl, while a golden turban appears to have been passed between the grooms.

The officials had struck gold – exposing a major sham marriage scam.

Suspicious: Eva Holubova's wedding with Nikola Horvarthova (right). Immigration officials uncovered the scam from these photographs

A string of Eastern European and British brides were paid up to £1,000 to fly to Pakistan and pose for wedding pictures, with the aim of getting dozens of Pakistani men into Britain illegally.

With proof of their marriage, each man could apply to come to Britain to be with his wife, who was here legally as a result of EU open border rules.

More...

The scam organisers thought that by holding the wedding ceremonies in Pakistan they would evade the scrutiny of register offices in the UK, where officials are on the look-out for bogus couples.

But clearly they needed to pay more attention to the details.

Same clothes: The traditional dress was the same in Sabah Qureshi wore as she smiled with her new 'husband'

Not only were the garments the same, several of the weddings appear to have taken place in the same room, with the same broken clock on the wall.

Tinsel and other decorations also appeared in several pictures. Standing alongside Czech bride Eva Holubova, 20, in one of her weddings is 26-year-old Nikola Horvarthova, apparently acting as her maid of honour. She also joined in the scam, staging her own wedding wearing the same outfit – and in the same room.

A court heard that Holubova was paid to get married three times in four months.

Three other fake brides, Czechs Michaela Lengyelova, 30, Matylda Krejci, 29, and Briton Sabah Qureshi, 24, also wore the red and yellow diamond-pattern shawl for their photos.

All were handed jail sentences of up to a year for immigration fraud at Sheffield Crown Court. Jailing Holubova and Horvarthova, Judge Rosalind Coe said it was a ‘very well organised and professional operation’. She told the gang members: ‘Participation in sham marriages is an abuse of the marriage ceremony itself and an abuse of immigration control. Sham marriages strike at the heart of our immigration system.’

In total 16 brides were prosecuted by Home Office officials in several cases over the last year involving the highly organised sham marriage gang based in Rotherham, South Yorkshire.

Investigation: A court heard fake bride Nikola Horvarthova (pictured) was one of the women that took part. A string of Eastern European and British brides were paid up to £1,000 to fly to the Pakistani capital Islamabad and pose for wedding pictures

Ringleader Talib Hussain, 42, was jailed for six years in January. His house was described in court as the engine room of the conspiracy. His ex-wife Rahina Zaman, 33, who helped him, was jailed for two-and-a-half years.

Two of the other main organisers, Tariq Mehmood, 27, and Veronika Horvothova, 21, are still on the run.

Mark Bates, from the Home Office’s Immigration Enforcement Criminal and Financial Investigation team, said: ‘This has been a complex case, with our investigations stretching from the UK to Pakistan. The gang involved thought they had come up with an ingenious way of breaching UK immigration laws. They were wrong, and as a result are now behind bars.

‘The message to anyone involved in this sort of criminality is clear. The Home Office has dedicated teams with the resource and expertise to catch up with you and bring you to justice.’

Immigration Minister Mark Harper said: ‘The sentences handed out send a clear message to anyone tempted to break immigration rules. We have the resources, expertise and technology to catch you, and you will pay with your liberty.’