Alvin Brissett, pictured, claimed that he was gay moments before he due to be deported to Jamaica

A violent father-of-two escaped deportation moments before being put on a plane to Jamaica – by suddenly declaring he was homosexual.

Alvin Brissett, 55, was ordered to be sent back to his Jamaican homeland after building up a long criminal record including thefts, drug possession, and assaults.

Yet at the last moment, while he was in handcuffs in a van at Gatwick airport, he announced that he was gay and claimed he could not be sent to Jamaica because he could face discrimination there.

This claim halted his deportation in its tracks.

And even though a hearing subsequently ruled it would have been lawful to send him home, as Home Secretary Theresa May wished, he has now won the right to remain.

Two immigration judges have ruled that his human right to a family life is more important than the Government’s wish to protect the public from him. Conservative MP Philip Davies said: ‘This case perfectly shows how the law is an ass. We must be a complete laughing stock.’

Asked about claims that he was not really gay, Brissett told The Sun: ‘I had a right.’

Mrs May spent thousands of pounds of public money to remove Brissett from Britain.

Brissett, of Stratford, East London, was 13 when he came to Britain. He has 18 convictions for theft, three for possession of drugs, and four for assault.

In 1993 he was jailed for seven years for robbery, and ten years ago he received a 12-month sentence for theft and threatening behaviour.

Then, in 2009, after he was jailed for a street attack, the Home Office ordered that he should be sent to Jamaica. Brissett immediately began using human rights laws – and his right to a family life – to contest the deportation, but all his appeals failed. In March 2011, Mrs May signed his deportation order.

It was shortly afterwards, as he was on his way to the plane, that he made his gay claim. Police immediately turned round and returned to a police station. A series of further hearings followed, and judges have now ruled he is free to remain.

There has been growing concern about the way criminals and failed asylum seekers defeat deportation orders by using the clause of the Human Rights Act guaranteeing a right to a family life. Claims that the deportee will face discrimination or violence in their homeland are also often accepted by courts, despite scepticism by others.