People smuggler is hailed by band as he gets 17-year sentence

This is the shocking video of an illegal immigration kingpin grinning shamelessly as he is hailed by a band as ‘a first-class smuggler’ and ‘the best agent’.

As 33-year-old Amanj Hasan Zada was today jailed for 17 years after being found guilty of people smuggling, the astonishing clip of him being feted was revealed in full for the first time.

The Iranian national - who arrived in Britain illegally, and was initially refused asylum before being granted refugee status – is seen throwing cash at the band and firing a handgun into the air 15 times.

From his terraced house in Lancashire, Zada served as a criminal ‘travel agent’, masterminding a multi-national network which helped fellow Kurds get across Europe before sneaking across the Channel on small boats.

Other clips show migrants hailing him as they crossed the Mediterranean and mainland Europe ahead of the perilous final leg of their journey to the UK.

Investigators from the National Crime Agency also traced adverts Zada placed on social media for his international criminal network, encouraging his countrymen to make the same journey.

The brutal ringleader was secretly recorded threatening to cut a man’s legs off after learning a family had been allowed to pay half-price, a court heard.

But despite his people smuggling empire earning six-figure sums, Zada himself lived in a modest terraced house in Preston, Lancashire, with much of the proceeds believed to have been sent abroad.

As Zada was convicted of three counts of assisting the illegal immigration of seven people into the United Kingdom, investigators warned that other people smuggling kingpins profiting from people’s misery would soon face justice as well.

Jurors at Preston Crown Court were played a YouTube video - believed to have been filmed in Iraq in 2021 – showing a band extolling Zada under his business alias, Amanj Zaman.

As Zada grins and waves his arms to the music, the singer declares: ‘He is the first class smuggler, proven the best agent,’.

‘All the smugglers have learned from him, Amanj is number one.

‘Amongst the smugglers Amanj you are very brave.’

The singer makes a ‘promise’ to start ‘packing’, adding that ‘if I go to Europe I will call you’.

Investigators were able to link him to three separate crossings made from France to the UK in November and December last year.

Each involved Kurdish migrants who had travelled through eastern Europe, into Germany, Belgium and then France.

Zada, who was known by those he smuggled as Amanj Zaman, advertised his services on social media, sometimes using videos of those he had successfully smuggled thanking him for his help.

One such video showed a group of men on a boat to Italy praising him.

Following his conviction, NCA Branch Commander Martin Clarke said: ‘Amanj Hasan Zada ran a sophisticated people smuggling enterprise, using social media to advertise his services.

‘While we have uncovered evidence directly linking him to three specific crossings, there is no doubt in my mind that he was likely to have been involved in many more.

‘For him it was all about profit, and he had no issues with putting people in life threatening situations as long as he got paid.

‘People smugglers like him risk lives, which is why we are determined to do all we can to stop them, wherever they operate.’

Showing the video to jurors at Preston Crown Court, Steven Ball, prosecuting, said the musicians were ‘feting him with a song in Kurdish and the song is about smugglers’.

‘The smuggler they are talking about is him and they call him Aman Zamanj; they refer to him as “the best smuggler”, a brave smuggler whose enemies fear him,’ he added.

‘Eventually some of the group shoot their handguns into the air in manly approval.

‘But this isn’t a fable or a folk song about tobacco, alcohol or gems.

‘It’s about an altogether different commodity - human beings, those who seek a life in the West - and who are the subject of the defendant’s widely advertised smuggling services.’

Mr Ball told jurors that Zada has lived in the UK for over eight years and was ‘well-versed’ in the process of claiming asylum.

Mr Ball said Hasan Zada had assisted a number of Kurdish-Iranian men to get to the UK in dinghies, most of them with no documentation to confirm their correct names or ages.

He described it as ‘a lucrative business’ with references in phone calls and on social media to payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

NCA officers began covert surveillance of Zada in December last year.

A probe was placed in his vehicle which captured discussions about yachts, immigration camps, payments for passengers and the fate of people who had been arrested.

Messages exposed how the migrants were taken on torturous journeys through Turkey, Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Germany, Belgium and France before making it to dinghies taking them across the English Channel.

Zada claimed there were ‘fake profiles’ of him on social media that had nothing to do with him.

He alleged that multiple mentions of smuggling captured on his mobile phones and on secret recordings were references to moving alcohol between Iran and Iraq.

But Mr Ball said: ‘The reality is that this defendant has been caught out by his own communications which the officers have been able to capture.’

At the start of the trial he warned the jury: ‘Unfortunately illegal immigration through organised trafficking is a big problem faced by this country and the subject may invoke strong emotions.

‘Some of you may feel some sense of revulsion at those illegally entering the country without documents or even feel sorry for those being trafficked and placed in danger; or you may be angry at those who enrich themselves by manipulating or exploiting people desperate for a new life in the West.

‘However, emotion must play no part in your consideration of the evidence.’

Zada was today found guilty of three counts of facilitating illegal immigration in relation to seven people.

He was sentenced to 17 years in prison.

The case comes as the NCA has around 70 ongoing investigations into networks or individuals in the top tier of organised immigration crime or human trafficking.

CHILLING LYRICS SUNG AS GANG BOSS FIRED INTO THE AIR

Lyrics to the YouTube song extolling Hasan Zada which were translated for the jury include:

‘Greeting to the leader of the smugglers Kaka Amanj Zaman’ (an alias of Zada)

‘He is the first class smuggler, proven the best agent.

‘All the smugglers have learned from him, Amanj is number one.

‘Amongst the smugglers Amanj you are very brave.

‘I promise I will be packing now, I will be ready to go, with Kaka Amanj, I will count on Amanj, if I go to Europe I will call you.

‘This is for Kak Amanj, I am greeting him and I am at his service.

‘He is the best smuggler and I rely on him’

‘It is for Amanj Zaman, proudly he is like my brother, I love him because he is smuggler and brave’