Kerry humanitarian among 23 charged in Greek court with people smuggling

Mr Binder began volunteering for a search and rescue NGO in 2017, a lethal year for crossing the Mediterranean

Sean Binder stands outside a court in Mytilene port, on the island of Lesbos, Greece. File picture: AP Photo/Panagiotis Balaskas

The trial of a Kerry humanitarian and lawyer charged with people smuggling after trying to rescue refugees from drowning in the sea has begun what may be its final day in Lesvos, Greece.

Seán Binder, alongside 23 fellow defendants, is before the three judge Court of Appeal in Mytilene, Lesvos.

Although the trial, which began before Christmas, is not an appeal, the gravity of the charges has placed it in this higher court.

The three felony charges they face – people smuggling, belonging to a criminal organisation, and money laundering - are amongst the most serious in the State. If convicted, they could face 20 years in prison.

Defendants are expected to give evidence today and more than a dozen of them are in court. A doctor from the US, a banker from the Netherlands, and a police officer from the Netherlands are among the 24 people, who range in ages from 20s to late 70s, facing trial.

Mr Binder began volunteering for the search and rescue NGO ERCI on Lesvos in 2017, a lethal year for crossing the Mediterranean with more than 3,000 people reported dead or missing.

In 2018, the Greek authorities arrested Mr Binder, then age 24, and detained him for more than 100 days before releasing him on bail. Mr Binder has been trapped in limbo for the seven years since, with limitations on his career and having to save to potentially pay for an apartment in Greece so that his mother and partner could visit if he is jailed.

'Chilling' effect on humanitarian efforts

Miring humanitarians in seven years of probable lawfare has had a chilling effect on others keen to help vulnerable people arriving in Europe.

“The uncertainty has scared people away from doing search and rescue,” Mr Binder previously told the Irish Examiner.

The search and rescue organisation he volunteered for ceased to exist as everyone involved was arrested.

Sean Binder with his mother outside court in 2021. File picture: Manolis Lagoutaris/AFP via Getty Images)

Targeting humanitarians for helping refugees is not isolated to the 24 defendants in Lesvos. Mr Binder knows of 143 people in similar situations across the EU, including a Swiss pastor who was to be prosecuted for allowing asylum seekers sleep in his church.

"But people still have a right to seek asylum. That's still the law. There's still a right not to drown," Mr Binder said. 

"We still have the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which says we have an obligation to assist people in distress.

"The Maritime Convention specifically states we have an obligation to assist people regardless of what their passport, their visa says."

Mr Binder was born in Germany but moved to Castlegregory, Co Kerry, at the age of 5.

He studied in Trinity College Dublin and at the London School of Economics before training as a barrister.

When released from a Greek prison, he spent time with his mother in Togher, Cork. He is now practicing criminal law in London.

“It’s been horrifying to confront the hypocrisy of European border policy.

“On the one hand, we lecture the rest of the world about the European Convention on Human Rights and how strong Europe is in upholding fundamental rights.

“And yet, as soon as the responsibility comes to implement those in our own waters, they evaporate, meaningless. People are abandoned to drown."

Charges faced by the defendants 

The lawyer who is leading the defence, Zac Kesses, said that the charges the humanitarians face are “extremely serious”.

They are: forming and participating in a criminal organisation; migrant smuggling; and money laundering.

The last charge stems from the police assertion that ERCI was not a humanitarian organisation but criminal, so all funds it held were criminal.

In Greece, anyone convicted of membership of a criminal gang or people smuggling must be imprisoned until any appeal.

So if anything goes wrong, the defendants will end up in prison pending appeal, Mr Kesses said.

Migrant smuggling carries a 10-year sentence per person smuggled.

In Greece’s case against the humanitarians, more than 100 people were allegedly smuggled, potentially bringing jail terms of more than 100 years.

But practically in Greece the maximum sentence a person can serve is 20 years, Mr Kesses said.

He expects the humanitarians to be acquitted.

But the cases were brought with the goal of pushing humanitarians off Lesvos, he said.

“Back in 2018 there was a perception that the humanitarian agents were a pull factor in migrant smuggling,” Mr Kesses said.

Multiple criminal cases were brought against humanitarians to discourage volunteers from coming to provide humanitarian assistance, he said.