An Eritrean criminal who sexually assaulted a woman before a passer-by intervened is to be deported back to his home country.
Asylum seeker Behailu Naedw, 41, was free to roam a seaside resort looking for victims despite having multiple previous convictions including burglary and vehicle crime, a court heard today.
A woman in Prestatyn, North Wales 'challenged' the 'intoxicated' stranger after seeing him trying her neighbour's front door, only for him to 'grab' her.
Moving towards her, Naedw said: 'You know you want it, you know you like me, you want to kiss me.'
Jailing him for four months after he admitted sexual assault, a judge said it was 'lucky' that a passing motorist had intervened.
'I dread to think what you would have done if you hadn't been interrupted,' Judge Simon Mills added.
Naedw, of no fixed address, has subsequently withdrawn his asylum application, Mold Crown Court heard, and now wants to be returned to his east African homeland.
Judge Mills said he had been 'assured' that Naedw would remain locked up until he had left the UK, adding 'I expect the authorities to be good to their word.'
Behailu Naedw, 41, will be locked up in immigration detention and deported back to Eritrea after serving his four month sentence for sexually assaulting a woman in Prestatyn in July 2025
The case comes less than a week after the Home Office imposed visa restrictions on Eritrea for failing to accept deportations of criminals and illegal migrants.
Nearly 5,900 Eritreans illegally crossed the Channel by small boat in the year to June, the most from any nation.
Naedw's victim was not at home when she received a notification from her Ring doorbell in July 2025, the court heard.
'The camera showed the defendant looking through a window and trying the front door and ringing the bell,' prosecutor Elen Owen said.
'She returned home shortly afterwards and saw the defendant nearby. She says he appeared to be intoxicated and lost.
'She saw him enter the garden of another property and do the same thing.
'She approached him and challenged his behaviour.
'He then grabbed hold of her wrists and moved towards her as if trying to kiss her.'
At that point a passing motorist intervened, the court heard.
Naedw later told police the woman would have slept with him if she had been alone 'because her eyes were kind', the court heard.
He had ten previous offences dating back to 2022, including drugs, burglary, interfering with a vehicle, damaging property, and 'low-level assaults'.
Defence barrister John Wyn Williams said: 'His wish after the conclusion of these proceedings is to be returned to his home country of Eritrea.
'Notwithstanding any difficulties that may arise, his wish remains and that wish is for him to be returned as soon as possible.
'I anticipate he will agree to be deported on a voluntary basis.
'He understands he will remain in detention while that process is concluded.'
Through an interpreter, Naedw then claimed to be from Ethiopia.
Judge Mills remarked: 'It's for the authorities to deport him to the correct place.'
The court heard Naedw had withdrawn his asylum claim in February, with any delay in his removal due to him awaiting prosecution.
The Home Office is now expected to interview him and apply for an emergency travel order which takes 45 days.
If he were deported voluntarily, the process should be quicker, the court heard.
Judge Mills told Naedw: 'Any right-thinking person would be alarmed about what you did.
'The evidence is you were wandering around in a place in North Wales looking for a house to trespass into.
'You were under the influence of some substance.
'It doesn't matter whether it was drink or drugs.
'A citizen, in a public-spirited way, tried to challenge you about what you were doing. You responded in a sexual way.
'You had the effrontery to tell the police this woman would sleep with you.'
He added that it was 'lucky that a passer-by intervened'.
'I have been assured that following this sentence you will be held in immigration detention and then deported to Eritrea where I am told you wish to return,' he said.
'Given the findings I have made, I expect the authorities to be good to their word.'
The court did not hear how Naedw entered the UK.
The Home Office said it did not comment on individual cases.
But a Government spokesman said: 'Any foreign national who receives a prison sentence in the UK is referred for deportation at the earliest opportunity and will be barred from ever returning.
'Over 11,000 foreign criminals including murderers and rapists have been returned or deported in the two years since the last election – a 41 per cent increase on the two years prior.'