Interpreter denies fraud over citizenship

Mehmet Ince, from London, said he had carried out legitimate work as an interpreter from an office in Tottenham and that he booked citizenship tests at City Wide Learning because migrants said the Sheffield centre provided good training.

Ince is one of six people charged with conspiring to defraud the UK Border Agency by dishonestly arranging for false Life In The UK test certificates to be bought by migrants from all over the country.

A series of witnesses have told Sheffield Crown Court that Ince acted as a middle man and charged hundreds of pounds to acquire false certificates without them taking the test.

Yesterday, Ince told the court he filled in City Wide application forms for Turkish migrants in London because they had already decided they wanted to go to Sheffield to take the test.

One of City Wide's directors, Liban Mohammed Yousif, previously told the court the company had been the unwitting victim of migrants using people to take the test of their behalf.

Ince said that once he had booked the course he assumed migrants had travelled to Sheffield to take the test.

He denied knowing anyone at City Wide and denied producing false test certificates. He also said that 132,000 in cash payments into his bank account were the result of payments from his building business, from rental properties and his work as an unofficial interpreter.

Three City Wide directors, Liban Mohammed Yousif, Abdi Rashid Yusuf and Mustafa Yassin, the company's administrator, Mubarak Yusuf, and alleged middle men Ince and Halil Dari, all deny conspiring to defraud the UK Border Agency between October 2005 and February 2007.

Two other middle men, Mohamad Jafari and Shpetim Ymeri, have pleaded guilty to the offence.

The trial continues.