Pet cat, girlfriend help immigrant remain in Britain

London: An immigrant who was about to be deported from Britain has won a legal battle to remain in the country — partly because he and his girlfriend had bought a pet cat.

The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal ruled that sending the Bolivian back to his homeland would breach his human rights because he was entitled to a "private and family life", and joint ownership of a pet was evidence that he was fully settled in the country.

Lawyers for the Home Secretary were aghast at the decision by James Devittie, an immigration judge, to allow the immigrant to stay in Britain. They lodged an appeal, but their case was again rejected. The Bolivian's identity has not been disclosed and even the name of the cat was blanked out in official court papers to protect its privacy.

Delivering her decision on the case, Judith Gleeson, a senior immigration judge, joked in the official written ruling that the cat "need no longer fear having to adapt to Bolivian mice".

Barry O'Leary, the solicitor who represented the Bolivian, said that the court was told — in his initial appeal against deportation — that the man and his girlfriend had purchased the animal together and it was therefore "one detail among many" that they were in a committed relationship.

"As part of the application and as part of the appeal, the couple gave detailed statements of the life they had built together in the UK to show the genuine nature and duration of their relationship," he said. "One detail provided, among many, was that they had owned a cat together for some time.

"The Home Office asked for the decision to be reconsidered. They argued it should be reconsidered because the decision was wrong in law, and one error they cited was that too much consideration was given to the couple's cat."