A marriage scam centred in Bradford was unravelled when police swooped on the day of a bogus wedding.

Officers moved in as people arrived for the ceremony at St Philip and St James in Scholes, Cleckheaton, in July.

Five men and two women were yesterday sentenced at Leeds Crown Court after admitting their parts in the scam which involved sham weddings between Nigerian men and European women to gain UK residency for the bridegrooms.

Ring leader Adeola Orobiyi, 27, of Manchester, was jailed for three and a half years.

He had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration, possession of a false identity document with intent.

Czech national Dennis Baiger, of St Leonard’s Road, Girlington, Bradford, pleaded guilty to the conspiracy and to an unrelated charge of supplying heroin. He was jailed for a total of four and a half years.

Peter Abbey, 27, of Dartford, Kent; Adesola Adewole, 29, and Richard Okunade, 35, both of Manchester, were each jailed for 12 months.

The two women – Slovakian Lucia Koncekova, 25, of Dalcross Grove, West Bowling, Bradford, and Czech national Veronika Horvathova, 21, of Regency Court, Girlington – received 12-month prison sentences suspended for two years.

Prosecutor Thomas Klouda said the scam was busted after Anglican church staff raised concerns to West Yorkshire Police about a spate of marriage inquiries from brides and grooms of similar backgrounds.

Subsequent investigation led by the UK Border Agency’s Immigration Crime Team led to the suspects being filmed at church wedding interviews.

The court heard how “customers” were exploiting a loophole in the UK’s immigration rules, whereby they would marry Eastern European economic migrants and remain in the country under common marriage licences.

Sentencing the gang, the Recorder of Leeds, Peter Collier QC, said: “These were not marriages of convenience but were completely bogus marriages in which the European nationals pretended to be people other than who they really were.

“Fortunately the Anglican church which you attempted to deceive was alive to the possibility of such frauds and so they alerted the police who covertly recorded the wedding interviews that a number of you had.

“You are basically decent people who came to this country at different times and for different reasons. While here you have worked hard, looked after your families and tried to better yourselves but unfortunately a number of you had no right to be here or remain here so when you heard of this scheme you were prepared to pay about £2,000 or more to obtain status to stay here.”

He said aggravating features were the period of time each defendant was involved in the scam, motivation of financial gain and the extent of planning.

After the case Detective Chief Inspector Dave Powell, regional head of the UK Border Agency’s Immigration Crime Team, said: “Once again we would send out the message to those who seek to engage in immigration related crime, this team poses a major threat to crime groups and will continue to target them and bring them to justice.”