Since the mid-2000s, Senegal has been applying an anti-trafficking law to prosecute emigration attempts and activities that relate to facilitating passage out of the country. Implemented following Senegal’s ratification of the Palermo Convention and its Protocols, this law ushered in a new legal practice of making some forms of movement illegal, or at the very least, suspicious. We often see such activities both in Senegal and beyond framed around the legal framing of smuggling. While news headlines and occasional social media posts capture the dramatics of these migratory journeys over the Atlantic, with details of tragedies that occur at sea or patrols stopping those allegedly bound for Europe, our research focuses on what follows: the legal proceedings that unfold in courtrooms across Senegal’s coastal regions that frequently serve as points of departure. These socio-legal aspects represent a critical dimension of migration governance, which is often out of reach for researchers — often because of the practicalities and costs of fieldwork, regional travel and case law gathering.
The Perils and Joys of Gathering Case Law
Court data gathering often needs official authorization and ethics approval. We are deeply grateful to the Senegalese Minister of Justice for authorizing our research, and to all the helpful court presidents, clerks, judges, prosecutors, archivists and lawyers who have supported our work. Both formal interviews and more informal chats have been absolutely revelatory for getting into the complexities and nuances of migration control’s judicial ramifications.
The process of data collection is physically demanding, spending days bent over files spanning decades and sifting through countless files to select migration-related cases. As all of it paper-based, it also meant dealing with photocopiers from before 2000 as court equipment was often in disrepair. Yet the occasional discomfort and time has been worth it.
The overwhelming majority of migration cases are processed through the “flagrant délit” procedure (a fast-tracked process), resulting in case files between 2-6 pages that contain variable details on judicial actors, facts, the accused, and outcomes. We’ve also gathered several criminal law cases that provide richer information, including the accused’s interviews with police, which offers valuable insights into how more complex cases are informed. A handful of these cases are appealed, and in some cases, we have been able to locate the corresponding appeals as well.
Our timeline of cases captures a period of two decades. It follows the introduction of Senegal’s 2005 anti-trafficking law, and more recently, increased funding under bilateral agreements and the EU Trust Fund for Africa, which translates to some extent into more pursuits. We follow the case development through different jurisdictions over two decades until the most significant shift in the judicial handling of these cases with a legal change in 2023. This has meant that since 2024, cases linked to smuggling are all transferred to a new court in Dakar, which is tasked with handling financial crimes. Many questions remain on whether this intended ‘specialization’ of these cases changes the handling, procedures and outcomes of these cases.
With several hundreds of cases with many more defendants and separate charges, we can begin to piece together patterns in the legal side of the story.
Building a Research Database
Our ambition is to contribute to research on the judicial dimensions of migration control, an increasingly important phenomenon across West African states. Courts are now tasked with addressing complex transnational issues, often with limited resources and guidance. We have begun to code our cases from six jurisdictions in Senegal (Ziguinchor, Saint Louis, Mbour, Thies, Fatick and Dakar), with hopes to expand this research to other West African countries in the future.
The database we’re developing is fully anonymized and hand-coded, providing valuable metadata on case outcomes, legal qualifications, and sentencing patterns over time. This resource captures both typical cases and outliers, revealing how migration control is translated into specific legal charges, penalties, and judicial outcomes.
We encourage researchers interested in working with this database to contact us, and to consider a potential visiting stay at the Mobile Center of Excellence of Global Mobility Law.
A Disproportionate Caseload
One striking realization has been the significant resources these cases consume in certain jurisdictions and time periods. For instance, during a day of court observation in Saint Louis, migration-related cases constituted approximately 25% of that day’s daily proceedings. For the investigating magistrates who handle cases considered to be about more complex migration crimes, cases linked to smuggling have in some recent years in Mbour risen to around 10% of their annual caseload.
Through our ongoing research, we hope to understand these broader ramifications, as well as how the legal classification of migration offenses has evolved over time —shifting from generic “illegal emigration” charges toward more specific formulations like “migrant smuggling” and “complicity in smuggling”. These shifts reflect changing perceptions of migration within the legal system and highlight the evolving nature of this legal domain.
As our research progresses, we aim to provide insights into how judicial actors navigate these complex waters, balancing legal principles and priorities with the practical realities of migration governance in West Africa.
