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Kemi Badenoch declared Britain cannot be a safe haven for murderers and rapists as she slammed how European human rights laws are being exploited by criminals.

The Conservative leader said “we are being taken for mugs” after an investigation revealed two fugitives wanted for murder and child rape in Brazil successfully used human rights laws to stay.

Marlon Martins Dos Santos and Nicolas Gomes De Brito both successfully fought deportation after claiming it would breach their rights under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

Dos Santos fled to the UK after being sentenced to 14 years in jail for repeatedly raping a five-year-old girl.

But a British judge refused Brazil’s extradition request because it would violate his Article 3 rights – protection from torture and inhumane treatment.

The Home Office has confirmed it has widened a review into how Article 8 is used in British cases to include abuses of Article 3.

And Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood on Wednesday called for the European Convention on Human Rights to be reformed to end a crisis of confidence in the heavily criticised international treaty, which is being used by foreign criminals and failed asylum seekers to avoid deportation.

Mrs Badenoch told ITV News: “We are being taken for mugs. Britain is being mugged by this. It’s absolutely shocking.

“We cannot be a safe haven for rapists and murderers because the prisons in their country are not nice. That’s not our job.

“I said that if we need to leave, we should leave.

“And I’ve also said that I’m increasingly coming to that view. This is yet another piece of evidence that shows that the ECHR and the way it’s being used by hostile actors, foreign criminals, is no longer fit for purpose.

“And if the problem is not with the law then it is with the judges who are not applying critical thinking or any kind of risk management. The risk of someone being tortured in Brazil versus the risk of a child being killed in England are not equivalent.”

Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood admitted prisoners are using Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights – the right to a private and family life – to avoid being put into segregation units.

And she admitted public confidence in the ECHR is “fraying”.

Ms Mahmood said in a speech in Strasbourg: “There is a growing perception – sometimes mistaken, sometimes grounded in reality – that human rights are no longer a shield for the vulnerable, but a tool for criminals to avoid responsibility.

“That the law too often protects those who break the rules, rather than those who follow them.

“This tension is not new. But in today’s world, the threats to justice and liberty are more complex. They can come from technology, transnational crime, uncontrolled migration, or legal systems that drift away from public consent.”

Ms Mahmood warned that when the application of rights “begins to feel out of step with common sense”, that is where trust begins to erode.

She added: “We have seen this in the UK in two particularly sensitive areas: immigration and criminal justice.

“If a foreign national commits a serious crime, they should expect to be removed from the country.

“But we see cases where individuals invoke the right to family life – even after neglecting or harming those very family ties.

“Or take prison discipline. Being in custody is a punishment. It means some privileges are lost.

“But dangerous prisoners have been invoking Article 8 to try to block prison staff from putting them in separation centres to manage the risk they pose.

“It is not right that dangerous prisoners’ rights are given priority over others’ safety and security.

“That is not what the Convention was ever intended to protect.”

Professor Richard Ekins KC (Hon), Head of Policy Exchange’s Judicial Power Project: “The Government’s newfound enthusiasm for ECHR reform is a welcome development.

“However, any serious attempt at reform has to address the flaw at the heart of European human rights law, which is the Strasbourg Court’s conceit that the ECHR is a “living instrument”.

“As Policy Exchange has argued for years, the Court has used this doctrine to remake the ECHR over time, not least to invent a European law of migration and asylum that goes well beyond foreign offenders.

“Meaningful ECHR reform has to tackle this doctrine and the case law to which it has given rise.”

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp on Wednesday accused the Government of putting children at risk by failing to deport foreign criminals and control illegal migration.

Mr Philp highlighted the case of a convicted Zimbabwean paedophile who was allowed to stay in Britain after lawyers argued he would face “substantial hostility” at home.

An immigration tribunal ruled that deportation would breach the European Convention on Human Rights.

In a furious House of Commons clash with Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, who was standing in for Sir Keir Starmer during the Prime Minister’s Canada visit, Mr Philp asked: “What about the rights of children here to be protected from this dangerous paedophile?

Who is looking out for their rights? Not the Government. There are thousands of such cases involving foreign criminals.”

Calling for the Government to scrap the Human Rights Act, which incorporates the rights set out in the European Convention into domestic British law, he asked: “Why do the Government side with foreign criminals and not the British public?”

The Home Office said: “The Home Secretary has asked the Home Office to work with other government departments to urgently examine the way Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights is operating in these cases, specifically relating to prison standards overseas.

“Foreign nationals who commit crime should be in no doubt that we will do everything to make sure they are not free to roam Britain’s streets, including removing them from the UK at the earliest possible opportunity. Extradition is a largely judicial process.”