CA-2024-002683-B - [2025] EWCA Civ 1107

This is an application made by Ms Annmarie Smalling-Small pursuant to CPR 3.3(5) to set aside a limited civil restraint order made on 29 July 2025. An oral hearing was held by video link on 13 August 2025 to give Ms Smalling-Small the opportunity to explain in person why that order should not have been made, in accordance with the decision of this Court in Gopee v Crown Court at Southwark [2023] EWCA Civ 881 at para. 47.

Ms Smalling-Small made oral submissions at the hearing on 13 August 2025 setting out in a careful and, if I may say so, dignified way what it is that concerns her and why she wishes the limited civil restraint order to be set aside. In summary, Ms Smalling-Small explained that she should have focussed in her earlier applications on the human rights issues and not gone back and forth over earlier applications she had made. Her fundamental wish is to be able to defend the charges made against her in 2004 that she had entered the United Kingdom illegally or had overstayed. She was adamant that she had not entered the United Kingdom illegally or overstayed and explained her version of events. As I understood it, on a journey back to the United Kingdom, Ms Smalling-Small says that her passport was not stamped with a landing stamp but that was not her fault. She described the way in which an interview with an immigration officer was conducted, how she was detained in 3 jails or camps until released on 8 June 2004, and how she could not afford to pay for immigration advice after that time. She explained that there was an order prohibiting her removal without an appeal hearing but she was removed without a hearing. She explained how there were three attempts to remove her in 2004, describing each one. She explained how she was finally removed to Jamaica in handcuffs. Ms Smalling-Small explained about her family situation, the effect of what had happened on her and her family and on her education and employment. Before addressing those submissions, it is necessary to set out the background and to state again that this application is an application to set aside the limited civil restraint order made on 29 July 2025.