UK taxpayers have paid out thousands of pounds to support a US asylum seeker for over a year even though he should have been deported.
In a bizarre case, the man flew here 14 months ago on a US passport from Las Vegas claiming he was being persecuted in the US because he is black, Jewish and a Mormon.
Instead of being turned away, he was incredibly put up in a series of migrant hotels while his claim was processed enjoying free accommodation, food and benefits in the meantime.
Even though his claim – which was peppered with contradictions – was eventually rejected last June, the university-educated American ‘refugee’ has still not left the UK.
He even apparently claimed and was awarded benefits from Islington Council just weeks after being asked to leave the country with no right of appeal on June 5, 2025, when he was told categorically:
‘You must now leave the United Kingdom. You do not have a right of appeal against this decision because your protection and human rights claims have been certified as clearly unfounded under section 94 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002.’
But, Mr Shoniregun, who was then evicted from the Holiday Inn in Wembley where he had lived for months when he was asked to leave, simply failed to heed the letter and applied for benefits instead.
And astonishingly when Border Force finally caught up with him before Christmas to try and enforce his departure, he also accepted £1,500 cash and a flight home to Las Vegas but did not fly home.
Olabode Shoniregun, 27, has been supported by the state since he flew to Gatwick Airport on October 23, 2024
Mr Shoniregun, who says he has recently been sleeping rough at a McDonald’s outlet in north London and the Barbican Centre in the City, has documented his ‘odyssey’ on social media
He is now sleeping rough in London and, in an interview with the Telegraph, claimed the Home Office ‘forgot’ to book his ticket home so he was ‘stranded’ here.
In what appears to be the first case of its kind, which makes a total mockery of our already beleaguered asylum system, showing how people from safe countries can come here and lodge claims and access benefits, Olabode Shoniregun, 27, has been supported by the state since he flew to Gatwick Airport on October 23, 2024.
Calling himself ‘a self-employed investor’, he claimed that American law enforcement agencies, the police and employers had prevented him from getting a job because he was black.
He claimed to be Grenadian, suggesting he was also being persecuted on the Caribbean island. Although he later said he was born in the UK, this claim did not feature in his asylum application or the rejection letter.
Mr Shoniregun, who says he has recently been sleeping rough at a McDonald’s outlet in north London and the Barbican Centre in the City, has documented his ‘odyssey’ on social media.
He fondly references ‘Mum and Dad’ in the first social media videos he filmed after landing in Britain even though he claimed that he was being persecuted by his family because he was Jewish and a Mormon – a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
He has now thanked UK taxpayers for their support and suggested he should get even more money, claiming he is entitled to it because he was born in the UK and considers himself ‘a law abiding citizen who does actively work here’ who would make ‘a great contribution to the UK’.
He said: ‘The taxpayers are paying for me to be here and I want to say thank you. I’m grateful for that.’
Mr Shoniregun, who was then evicted from the Holiday Inn in Wembley where he had lived for months when he was asked to leave, simply failed to heed the letter and applied for benefits instead
Mr Shoniregun said that together with support from a local charity for accommodation and subsistence, he received £400 a month until recently.
‘I was born in the UK so I think that it’s crazy for me not to receive some kind of benefit so I’m not too surprised. And I don’t think that £400 is a lot of cash. I deserve that and more.
‘I chose the United Kingdom specifically because I was born in the United Kingdom. I came from the borough of Islington and I was born in the Whittington Hospital. I thought I would come to the United Kingdom because I was born here and I could start life, get some housing, get a job that pays me cash.
‘When I decided to claim asylum, I had a feeling that I would just get through the airport border very easily because I had my United Kingdom birth certificate. I didn’t really think that I would claim asylum [but] I thought I just have to tell them I’m coming back here seeking protection.’
He claimed he had fled to the UK after being sexually assaulted by US law enforcement officials and that he was ‘under constant threat’ from them and it was ‘dangerous’ for him to go back. But, in another apparent contradiction, he also admitted that he would be happy to return to the US ‘to visit’ at his own behest but he just did not want to be ‘deported’ back.
‘I have chosen to come back to the United Kingdom because I want humanitarian protection from violent homosexuality. I love living in the United States. I just feel as if there are some people who don’t like living in the United States.
‘And those people are making my life very difficult. I have been attacked and abused. I’ve been sexually assaulted by several police officials, and people have just chosen not to believe me.
‘I’m constantly under threat by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, the North Las Vegas Police Department, the Boston Police Department, even Florida State Police, the Reno Police Force.’
Mr Shoniregun said that together with support from a local charity for accommodation and subsistence, he received £400 a month until recently
Mr Shoniregun, who has a Grenadian mother and a Nigerian father, added: I’ve also applied for my British passport and His Majesty’s Passport Office has not given me a proper answer.’
However, immigration rules state that people born in Britain after 1983 are only automatically citizens if at least one parent was also a British citizen or had settled status.
Mr Shoniregun, who has a psychology degree from a university in Boston, travelled from Britain to the US with his mother at the age of five.
Although he claimed to have a ‘well-founded fear of persecution’ in the US because of his race and ethnicity, he exercised his democratic freedoms by attending a rally in support of the Democrats’ then presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, just before he left the US.
In its 22-page rejection letter, UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) pointed out that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protected Mr Shoniregun from employment discrimination based on his race, and that his religious freedom was ‘protected under the First Amendment’.
UKVI said that he had insisted he didn’t suffer from any mental or physical health conditions and if he did, they could be treated in America, where ‘the US government funds two kinds of health plans through: Medicare and Medicaid’.
It concluded none of his human rights had been breached and if he didn’t leave voluntarily, he would be ‘removed’.
Calling himself ‘a self-employed investor’, he claimed that American law enforcement agencies, the police and employers had prevented him from getting a job because he was black
But it was just weeks later after being evicted from the Holiday Inn as an illegal immigrant, that he was offered social housing and benefits by Islington council and when the Home Office caught up with, he received the expensive air fare under the voluntary returns scheme.
Footage of a meeting with Border Force at Heathrow Airport shows Mr Shoniregun being told he is eligible for £1,500 and a return ticket to Las Vegas, where his mother lives in a $500,000 property in a gated community.
He filmed himself signing the voluntary returns deal and agreeing to the Home Office keeping his passport so he cannot leave without their approval. But when he arrived at Heathrow Airport a week later to fly home, he claimed the Border Force had failed to purchase his ticket, leaving him stranded in the UK.
A Home Office spokesman told the Telegraph: ‘The airline deemed Mr Shoniregun unfit to fly. We are working to remove him as soon as possible.’