4 Travellers charged with slavery offences

SOME of the Travellers staying at the British caravan site at the centre of a slavery investigation are normally resident in Ireland and have claimed no knowledge of what was going on under their noses.

Four men, all believed to have Irish backgrounds and to work in the same gang in Britain, were charged by police last night following Sunday’s raid on the Greenacres Travellers Site in Bedfordshire, during which 24 men allegedly held as slaves were freed.

The four men — Tommy Connors, aged 30, Patrick Connors, aged 19, James (Big Jim) Connors, aged 34, and James (Jimmy) Connors, aged 23, all of Greenacres caravan site, in Great Billington, Leighton Buzzard — have been charged with slavery offences relating to four people found at the site.