41 year old Mohammed Faisal a Pakistani druglord was ordered out of Britain, he is 'desperate' to leave but is being kept here because of a paperwork bungle costing taxpayers at least £100 a day.
Mohammed Faisal was due to be sent back to his native Pakistan under the government's Early Removal Scheme, designed to save taxpayer cash by deporting foreign criminals when they are nine months from freedom.
And last December he was taken from his cell at HMP Moorland to board a flight 3,700 miles back home - only for paperwork problems to leave him grounded at the airport.
Now the 41-year-old has lodged a complaint that he has not been booted out, and taxpayers have been saddled with a bill which has already topped £5,000 and could continue for the remaining six months of his sentence.
The Early Removal Scheme was launched to save public money by cutting the amount of time foreign national offenders spend in our jails.
According to the latest Home Office estimates, keeping a prisoner at an Immigration Removal Centre where Faisal is now costs just under £100 per night.
Jonathan Isaby, chief executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: 'What a complete mess where British taxpayers are having to shoulder the cost of imprisoning someone who is desperate to go home.
'This sort of incompetence is very difficult to stomach, particularly when hard-pressed families up and down the country are feeling the pinch and having to budget hard.
'The authorities need to pull up their socks and ensure the individual is returned home as soon as possible.'
Faisal was sentenced 16 years in 2009 after he was found guilty of setting up a £650,000 heroin smuggling deal and a money laundering plot.
He used a bogus college for overseas students called Yorkshire College - in Bradford, West Yorkshire, as a front for the scam, the city's crown court was told.
Immigration Removal Centre, where Faisal is being held in custody
Faisal, who fronted as the 'principal' of the fake college was busted shipping in 13kg of heroin from Pakistan in parcels of clothing. More than £1 million was thought to have been laundered by Faisal and two cronies.
When cops searched the 'college', they found that tens of thousands of students were on its books - despite the fact the bogus college had facilities at its Bradford 'campus' for little more than 12 students.
Faisal, of Bradford, West Yorkshire, was found guilty of conspiracy to import a class A drug and money laundering and was jailed for 16 years in 2009.
In a letter from his cell after the airport mix up in December last year, Faisal moaned: 'I am desperate to leave England, but after repeated promises the Home Office is letting me down.'
Faisal, who was married and living in Bradford, claims the delay over being sent home has given him anxiety and stomach pains - and he says his wife has left him.
He wrote to prison mag Inside Time in the most recent February edition: 'I am a foreign national so this year immigration approached me, they told me if I want to leave voluntarily I will become eligible for nine months early release.
'I agreed to the proposal, because I want to see the other half of my family before it is too late. They started the process and after much hindrance they were able to book ticket for me on 7th of December.
'I was moved to detention on December 11. But when I reached the airport with high hopes, I found out they have not actually prepared my travel documents. So I was sent back to the detention centre.
'I got only six months to serve, but there is no light on the horizon.'
He added: 'I don't know even after expiry of my sentence if I will be released from prison, because I am a foreign national.
'Is there any conscience left here in this country? I have gone through a lot of stress, I am suffering from acute anxiety.
'I get sharp pains in my chest - I want the Home Office to listen to my plea before it's too late.'
Before being moved to the centre, Faisal was serving the final part of his sentence at HMP Moorland, near Doncaster, South Yorkshire.
Some 1,791 foreign criminals were removed from he UK under the Early Removal Scheme in 2014/15.
A justice source said: 'It's a bizarre situation. You have a criminal who wants to leave - is not contesting deportation - and yet he's still here and the costs are stacking up.
'You'd think the opportunity to kick out a foreign drug dealer was something of an open goal. Now this is looking more like an own goal.'
A Home Office spokesperson said it did not comment on individual cases, but added: 'Foreign nationals who abuse our hospitality by committing crimes in the UK should be in no doubt of our determination to deport them - and we have removed more than 27,000 since April 2010.'
Last year, 1,791 foreign criminals were removed from he UK under the Early Removal Scheme (ERS) in 2014/15.
Justice Minister Andrew Selous said earlier this month: 'Foreign criminals who break our laws should be properly punished but not at the expense of the British taxpayer.
'We are committed to ensuring that all means possible are explored to make sure that criminals who have no right to stay in this country are removed at the earliest opportunity.'
'Last year we returned more than 5,000 prisoners to their home country with around 1,800 being removed under ERS.'
Source DailyMail
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