He says he swam all the way from France to Jersey — now he's high and dry in jail

David Law is due for deportation for illegal entry to the island, but no one knows where to deport him to

- Orlando Crowcroft

A few hours into his swim from the French mainland to the coast of Jersey, David Law says he began to wonder if he was going to make it.

He had set off at dawn, he says, wearing a short wetsuit and with a flotation device attached to his leg. He was carrying a wet bag containing a couple of fruit-and-nut bars and €260 in cash. He was cold and tired, and the island was little more than “a string” on the horizon.

Law says this was a homecoming. According to the 35-year-old, he was born in London and grew up in Myanmar, the son of Hong Kong Chinese aid workers. He claims he was brought to Europe in 2007 on a yacht owned by a friend of his father and has lived in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. In 2023, he decided he wanted to return to the UK.

But Law has no passport or birth certificate and no known relatives in the UK. He is now in jail, having been sentenced to 15 months in prison for entering Jersey illegally.

In September, Law will be eligible for release. He has been recommended for deportation by the island's court. But as Law is claiming to be British, and there is no evidence of either this or any other nationality, nobody knows where to deport him to.

Jersey, a British crown dependency but self-governing island, has strong links with France. On a clear day, the headland of Normandy is visible from the east coast. At night, the lights of towns such as Créances and Portbail twinkle in the distance, separated by just 20 miles (32km) of water.

Illegal arrivals on the island are rare, even if Jersey's proximity to the French coast makes it a seemingly obvious destination for migrants on small boats. While it is a relatively short distance, it is a treacherous one - Jersey's coastal waters are infamous for their riptides.