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The family of an asylum seeker who died on the Bibby Stockholm barge say they do not understand why a man “whose mental state was clearly not right” was moved there.
An inquest into the death of Leonard Farruku, an Albanian asylum seeker whose body was found in a shower room on the barge in Portland Port on 12 December 2023 opened in Bournemouth on Monday.
Farruku’s older sister, Marsida Keci, said in a statement read out to the court that she and her sister Jola, who both live in Italy, had many unanswered questions about the circumstances around their brother’s death.
Farruku was accommodated in a hotel in Paignton, Devon, by the Home Office, before being transferred to the Bibby Stockholm on 3 November just over a month before he died.
The inquest heard that according to a pathology report, it is probable Farruku had been dead for some time before his body was discovered. The cause of death was compression to the neck and suspension by ligature.
“We have so many questions that we need to know the answer to. We would like to know what help there was for people who are mentally unwell and why Nardi [the family’s nickname for Farruku] was moved to the barge when it seems his mental state was clearly not right. We need to understand how all Nardi’s dreams and ambitions ended up with his death there.”
Farruku was described by his sisters as “a good man, kind, talented, ambitious”. From an early age he showed considerable musical talent playing piano, accordion and organ and secured a scholarship to attend a music school in the Albanian capital Tirana.
They said that the death of first his mother when he was 17 and then his father when he was 22, affected him deeply. “He suffered a lot and became withdrawn”. His sisters urged him to seek help but said he did not engage with the psychologist he saw.
Farruku arrived in the UK on 7 August 2022 and initially stayed with relatives. At first he maintained contact with family but then he stopped communicating and did not respond to calls or emails. His sisters said that their last contact with him was August 2023.
“He told me he was having issues with the staff in the hotel. I had no idea he was later moved to the Bibby Stockholm barge,” said Keci in her statement.
“We have only found out what happened to Nardi during that time since we started the inquest process. We were completely speechless when we heard this information. Nardi had never behaved like this in his whole life.”
Farruku had received permission from the Home Office to work but he never got to know about this as the information was not communicated to him on the barge.
“When we found out he had died we couldn’t believe it. Everything was a blur and it felt like a nightmare,” said Keci.
The Bibby Stockholm barge was scrapped by the current government after it came to power last July and the final asylum seekers left the vessel at the end of last year before it was towed away from Portland in January.
While it was in operation it was evacuated owing to the presence of legionella bacteria in water pipes and claims of bed bugs and rotten food were made by asylum seekers and some members of staff. It is understood that the government is once again considering barges as asylum accommodation, along with disused holiday camps, former student accommodation and military bases.
The inquest continues.
