Deported autistic boy will suffer 'voodoo child' slurs

Along with his twin sister, Melissa, and mother, Olivia, he was flown London, en route to Lagos, last night after the family's last minute legal challenge to halt their expulsion failed.

The High Court turned down their application for an injunction to defer their removal from the State.

Judge Garrett Sheehan refused to stop Justice Minister Brian Lenihan carrying out the deportation and said he did not have sufficient evidence to overturn the original order.

The Agbonlahors got news of their deportation two hours after they turned up with their luggage to sign on at the Garda National Immigration Bureau on Burgh Quay.

Devastated

Olivia Agbonlahor said she was devastated as she has no family in Nigeria and nowhere to live with her twins, who were born in Italy.

Her husband still lives in Italy and may, ironically, be entitled to EU citizenship in the next two years.

She decided she would not renew her Italian residency and move to Ireland when he was subjected to death threats because he had written about a gang of Nigerian drug dealers.

Ms Agbonlahor and her children had lived in Clonakilty before moving to Killarney last year.

The Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service has arranged for one night's accommodation when she arrives in Lagos but she has to make her own arrangements after that.

"I really face a difficult situation," she said. "I have nowhere to go.

"There is no education for Great. The children don't know what is in store for them as they haven't been to that country before.

"When you don't have a mother or father, how will you cope?

"I don't want to go back to Italy because I know I'm not safe there."

Speaking after the decision, the family's visibly shaken solicitor, Kevin Brophy, said it was "absolutely horrific".

"Minister Lenihan wants the Agbonlahors out of the country so they don't cause him any further embarrassment," he said.

"I feel ashamed and embarrassed for this Government that in this day and age, on humanitarian grounds, an autistic child can't stay in Ireland.

"Olivia has walked through the doors of the Immigration Bureau on two or three occasions not knowing whether she would come out again. It is absolutely unforgivable."

Town councillors in Clonakilty have openly backed their cause and passed a unanimous motion calling on the Justice Minister not to deport the family.

Campaigners for the family argue that Great, who has been receiving one-to-one treatment for his condition in Kerry, will be treated like he is "possessed by the devil" and is in danger of being harmed in Nigeria.

The family sought an injunction restraining their imminent deportation on the grounds that the Minister had erred in law.

Conor Power, who appeared with Kevin Brophy for the family, argued that the judge had failed to grant them the benefit of EU regulations governing the handling of applications for refugee status.