A LITHUANIAN woman who tried to smuggle her husband back into the UK through the port of Fishguard was jailed for 18 months on Friday.

Svetlana Beliuga, aged 29, admitted assisting him to re-enter the UK knowing that he had been deported.

Jim Davis, prosecuting told Swansea crown court how her husband Vitalij had an extensive criminal record for offences involving drugs, fraud and violence and had continued offending after his arrival in Britain.

He was jailed for 22 months in September 2016 and issued with deportation papers.

Vitalij Beliuga took advantage of an early release scheme by opting to be deported as soon as possible. He was put on a plane on January 25, 2017, but on the same day his wife booked a journey to Dublin via Scotland and Belfast.

Vitalij Beluiga got off in Copenhagen and flew to Dublin and met up with his wife.

Mr Davis said Svetlana Beliuga had arranged for a friend to drive to Dublin to collect them. As they arrived in Fishguard on the way back after a ferry journey from Rosslare a Border Officer became suspicious and questioned the couple in the back of a car, who turned out to be the Beliugas.

Vitalij Beliuga was again deported but on March 6 police officers noticed him close to his wife's home in Grays, Essex, and he was arrested and later deported yet again.

Judge Keith Thomas said Svetlana Beliuga had been arranging to get her husband back into the country almost as soon as he had been deported.

"Any breach of the immigration regulations is serious because it undermines the security of the country as a whole," he said.

"This took some planning between you and your husband. You recruited another man to help you and paid his expenses."

The court heard that steps were being taken to deport Svetlana Beliuga.