An asylum seeker who filmed a woman being raped on Brighton beach was convicted of murder in Egypt, according to prosecutors.
Karin Al-Danasurt, 20, was found guilty of four counts of rape as a secondary party by encouraging and filming the brutal attack in October last year.
The Egyptian national was convicted after a trial at Hove Crown Court alongside Ibrahim Alshafe, 25, and Iranian Abdulla Ahmadi, 26, who were each found guilty of two counts of rape.
The trio all arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel by boat and had decisions pending on asylum claims.
Details of Al-Danasurt’s past crimes emerged at a plea hearing in November last year, ahead of the trial, but the judge withdrew the evidence from the case after his defence team contested the conviction.
At the time, prosecutors told the court Al-Danasurt had been convicted of murder in his absence in Egypt, adding that the basis of his asylum claim was that he fled the country to “evade a lengthy custodial sentence”.
But his defence barrister said it was in fact his brother who had the conviction for murder, not him.
They added that the UK Government’s assessment of Egypt is that a person who is openly critical of the government is likely to be at risk of serious harm.
As a result, the evidence was not heard by jurors during the trial because of the dispute.
On Thursday, prosecutor Hanna Llewellyn-Waters KC told the court there were “ongoing inquiries at a very senior level” about Al-Danasurt’s crimes abroad, adding he had also been given a caution in the UK for criminal damage in April last year but said she was “not in a position” to provide any more detail.
She also told Judge Christine Henson KC it was “not a foregone conclusion that these defendants will be deported”, adding “I am not the Home Office” when asked about reports to determine whether the rapists meet the threshold for extended sentences.
But in the wake of the verdicts, border security and asylum minister Alex Norris said: “Once sentencing has taken place, we will move to deport them off British soil.”
At the time of the attack, all three defendants knew each other and were living at Home Office-approved hotel accommodation for asylum seekers in Lower Beeding near Horsham, West Sussex.
The trial heard that Ahmadi and Alshafe met each other while crossing the Channel from France and arrived in the UK on June 19 2025.
Jurors were told Al-Danasurt arrived in the UK on September 21 2024 but were not told how he came to be in the country.
The trial heard that Alshafe’s asylum application had been refused on October 3, but he told the court he did not know about the update to his case before going to Brighton that night.
Giving evidence, he said he was from the port city of Alexandria in Egypt, where he lived with his parents and two sisters.
He left school without formal academic qualifications and worked as a carpenter, and also did military conscription for three years.
He said he wanted to make a better future for himself. Asked if his plan was to come to the UK to do that, he said: “Yes.”
Al-Danasurt was born in Egypt and went to school there until around the age of 11, and left Egypt to come to the UK in June 2022.
Ahmadi told jurors he left Iran because he was working for a Kurdish opposition party and was discovered by security police who went to look for him at his home and asked his mother where he was.
“If I hadn’t left, I would have been arrested and been killed,” he said through a Kurdish Sorani interpreter.
Ahmadi had not been to school and had received education only since he had been in prison, the court heard.
His father died when he was 13 and he worked as a labourer and farmer in Iran.
The UK has prison transfer agreements with more than 110 countries which allow for foreign prisoners to serve their sentences in their home countries, but Iran is not one of them.
But its agreement with Egypt is voluntary, where the prisoner being transferred must agree to the move, as well as both states.
An Early Removal Scheme (ERS) allows eligible foreign prisoners, who are serving determinate sentences, to be deported from the UK earlier than serving their full sentence.
Under current law most foreign nationals in jail can be considered for removal after serving 30% of their custodial sentence.
Once they are removed under ERS they are not imprisoned in their home country but are banned from returning to the UK. If they return they would have to serve the rest of their sentence from before they were deported.
Border security and asylum minister Alex Norris said: “My thoughts are first and foremost with the victim of this appalling crime, and with all those who have been affected by it.
“What she endured is deeply disturbing, and I commend her bravery in coming forward and reporting these vile individuals. I share the public’s outrage in their horrendous actions.
“The perpetrators have now been rightly convicted, and justice has been delivered by the courts. Once sentencing has taken place, we will move to deport them off British soil.”
Kemi Badenoch, leader of the Conservative Party, told reporters in Pembrokeshire that she was “disgusted” after hearing about the case.
She said: “There are people who are taking our country for a ride, are coming here trying to claim asylum, which is for genuine refugees, when really they come here to do harm to others.
“This is why it’s really important that we solve this small boats crisis, that’s why I’ve changed the Conservative Party policy.”
