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Schapelle Corby: Six Years in an Indonesian Prison

By Jeralyn, Section Foreign Affairs
Posted on Fri Oct 08, 2010 at 08:55:00 AM EST
Tags: Schapelle Corby (all tags)
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Six years ago today, Schapelle Corby was arrested at the airport in Bali when authorities found 4 kilos of marijuana in her boogie board case. She was en route from her home in Australia to visit her sister Mercedes, who lives in Bali with her husband and children.

I've been writing about her case since the news of her arrest first surfaced here in 2005. She has always maintained her innocence, and believes that a ring of corrupt airport baggage handlers put the pot in her suitcase.

The day police allege a Sydney drug ring brought almost 10 kilograms of cocaine through Sydney Airport with the help of corrupt baggage handlers is the same day Schapelle Corby flew to Bali from the same airport.

Schapelle is serving a 20 year sentence in Kerobokan Prison, widely known as a hellhole. Doctors say she has become mentally ill -- childlike -- during her six years in prison. She's being treated with anti-psychotic medication. [More...]

Even the Australian Government is now backing her clemency bid.

A book is coming out soon with details of an alleged Qantas coverup of the baggage handler drug ring. From the site:

“AFP involved in drug smuggling: ex-detective

The Australian Federal Police have in the past failed to properly investigate allegations of drug trafficking at airports because serving police officers have been involved in the practice, a former senior AFP detective claims.

Ray Cooper, former head of operations for the AFP's internal investigations, told the Nine Network it was well known by the AFP that unwitting passengers were being used as `mules' to shift drugs between Australian domestic airports.

And he said his investigations suggested some state and federal police were in league with the smugglers. ‘It was well known amongst the federal police that this particular operation and strategy was being adopted by criminals,’ Mr Cooper said.” - Sydney Morning Herald 8 May 2005

This message is being placed on ABC News Australia Facebook pages:

When is the ABC going to tell Australians about "Tom," the career criminal/QANTAS baggage handler (a long-time trafficker in marijuana and many other drugs), who was complicit in using the luggage of an innocent airline passenger to smuggle millions of dollars worth of cocaine into Australia, on the day Schapelle Corby flew? The Australian Government later indemnified him from all criminal charges, and paid him $800,000 to keep his mouth shut. Find out the shocking truth here, in this scorching new book, "The QANTAS Cover-Up":

Why is Schapelle still in jail? I happen to believe she was set up. But even if she wasn't, six years is too long.

Free Schapelle. Boycott Bali.

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    Schapelle Corby: Six Years in an Indonesian Prison | 9 comments (9 topical)

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    Schapelle Corby (5.00 / 1) (#3)
    by kimbax on Fri Oct 08, 2010 at 10:38:39 AM EST
    In response:

    You're flogging a dead horse here. The majority of Australians think Schapelle Corby is guilty as sin, for the simple reason the evidence points it: in fact the evidence is the entire Corby clan is steeped in the drug world.

    Fact, here are the Queensland Police certificates, confirming that Schapelle, her father Michael Corby, her sister Mercedes, her brother Michael, and her mother Rosleigh had NO criminal record:

    http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1347376397989&set=t.268362329195

    http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1347376317987&set=t.268362329195

    http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1347376357988&set=t.268362329195

    http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1347376277986&set=t.268362329195

    http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1347376237985&set=t.268362329195

    And here is a quote from an Australian news article of Friday 8th October 2010 (The Courier Mail):

    A man claiming to be her father's marijuana supplier said drugs were regularly smuggled into Bali by Mr Corby.

    Police in two states, however, have dismissed the allegations as baseless.

    "Queensland police have no evidence to link Michael Corby with involvement in the drug trade," the Queensland Police Service said in a statement.

    And detectives in Adelaide said the claims of convicted drug dealer Malcolm McCauley were "laughable" and that an extensive investigation found no links between him and the Corby family.

    Further, none of Schapelle's family have ever been charged, or convicted, with trafficking drugs.

    With Corby on that trip to Bali was her then 16 year old half-brother, James Kisina. In 2006 Kisina broke into the home of a known drug dealer with two accomplices, committing assault and stealing cannabis, which was later found in Corby's mother's home. He plead guilty to assault, deprivation of liberty and drug charges. In 2009, he committed assault outside a Brisbane hotel.

    Here's some more background on that:

    http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1551870.htm

    Further, James was 16 at the time of Schapelle's arrest, so where do 16 year olds get $40,000 from, to buy 4.2 Kilos of marijuana?

    Her father Michael Coprby twice lived next door to a known cannabis grower, Anthony Lewis. Police have found vacuum bags similar to the boogie board bag on Lewis's property and in the Corby's Gold Coast home. Cannabis has been found on land adjacent to property Michael owns. His cousin Alen Trembath claimed, after Michael Corby had died and was no longer in a position to sue, that Michael was a drug dealer in the 1980s and had links to outlaw bikie gangs. He also had a drug possession conviction, for what that is worth.

    First, police NEVER searched Michael Corby's home for evidence of drug trafficking, and NEVER found the alleged "Vaccuum bags."  Firstly, see the above news quote from the 8th Oct (re police denying Michael Corby had ANY connections to the drug trade).  Secondly, see page 22 of Gold Coast journalist Tony Wilson's book "Schapelle - The Facts, The Evidence, The Truth," where he categorically states the Queensland Police NEVER searched Michael Corby's home (post his research into this very matter), also confirmed by THIS recent letter from the Queensland Police Minister, Neil Roberts:

     http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/520/neilletter2.jpg

    . . . with the extensive research background to that letter fully documented in this blog post:

    http://womenforschapelle.blogspot.com/2010/07/schapelle-corby-queensland-police.html

    Further still, the Australian Federal Police are currently refusing to respond, re whether or not they did the "Relevant" investigations, thus this Freedom of Information request has been lodged, with the outcome still pending:

    http://womenforschapelle.blogspot.com/2010/09/schapelle-corby-announcing-brand-new.html

    Further still, here's what Trembath's own sister had to say about his BS claims:

    http://news.smh.com.au/national/doubt-over-corby-dads-alleged-drug-ties-20080705-31zp.html

    As for Michael Corby's drug incident, he was fined $400 for possessing 2 grams of cannabis in the 1970's (with no conviction recorded), after police raided a party, and he was found with a joint.  Seems every else fled, but he couldn't, because he had a broken leg at the time.

    Her sister Mercedes refers to her amphetamine use in letters sent to her former friend Jodie Power from Japan when she was 19. This friend alleged that Mercedes took speed regularly and once gave her a parcel of drugs to drive up to Queensland. Mercedes sued, but while suing acknowledged speed was taken at parties she attended, while claiming that she never took any herself and that the letters were mere "boasting."

    Firstly, whether or not Mercedes ever personally used speed is completely irrelevant to anything.  Secondly, Mercedes sued as a result of these unfounded allegations, and won a resounding victory, in front of a jury.

    A documentary on Corby made by a media team allowed in by her own family shows her to be a skilled manipulator, at one point planning and then performing a fake "collapse" while plaintatively saying a pre-rehearsed line: "Help me Australia."

    News to me, and completely subjective anyway.

    While there is evidence of corrupt baggage handlers using passenger's baggage as mules, the cases all involve small amounts of cocaine. The implausibility of handlers having just enough vacuum-sealed hydro on hand to exactly fill a giant-sized boogie board bag (and video demonstrates the vacuum-sealed bag was shaped to fit precisely in the outer bag) beggars belief. What were they to do with the board? Send it separately and replace it before it got sent out of the country? Indonesian customs officers testified Corby was nervous, and initially refused to open the bag. A second official testifies Corby admitted owning the drugs. Corby has no coherent explanation for why she didn't notice the bag was heavier than it should be, and why it didn't feel like it had a hard boogie-board in it.

    This is NOT a "Small" amount of cocaine:

    http://womenforschapelle.blogspot.com/2010/09/schapelle-corby-government-pays-qantas.html

    And make sure you real ALL the background links in that blog, to get some idea of the massive nature of this criminal operation, plus "Tom's" extensive criminal history (INCLUDING the trafficking of marijuana).  Also, read page 111 of The Wheeler Report (para 4), re the trafficking of marijuana through Australian Airports:

    http://www.customs.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/SecurityPolicingReview.pdf

    Plus Ray Cooper's allegations here:

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/afp-involved-in-drug-smuggling-exdetective/2005/05/08/1115491036 872.html

    It's likely that the drugs were a domestic shipment, meant to be offloaded at Sydney, but mistakenly "Missed."  Read the extensive info here (including the top quote):

    http://www.womenforschapelle.org/womenforschapelle/theqantascoverup.html

    Further, the "Evidence" of the Bali customs officers was never corroborated  by any of the hard evidence Schapelle begged for, as all the CCTV from Bali Airport was trashed/destroyed as well (for unexplained reasons).  On top of that, the Bali customs officer in question couldn't speak English, so he really wouldn't have a clue what Schapelle said, or didn't say.

    Further still, Schapelle did not pick up the boogie board bag in Bali, her 17 year old brother grabbed it.  They were all tired after a long flight, and as a 16 year old kid, he didn't have clue what his sister had (or hadn't), put in her bags.  It could have been beach towels, or God knows what else as far as he knew - and he probably wasn't paying much attention anyway.

    Corby is guilty as sin (1.00 / 1) (#1)
    by valency on Fri Oct 08, 2010 at 06:59:41 AM EST
    You're flogging a dead horse here. The majority of Australians think Schapelle Corby is guilty as sin, for the simple reason the evidence points it: in fact the evidence is the entire Corby clan is steeped in the drug world.

    With Corby on that trip to Bali was her then 16 year old half-brother, James Kisina. In 2006 Kisina broke into the home of a known drug dealer with two accomplices, committing assault and stealing cannabis, which was later found in Corby's mother's home. He plead guilty to assault, deprivation of liberty and drug charges. In 2009, he committed assault outside a Brisbane hotel.

    Another half-brother, Clinton Rose, has fraud, theft and drug possession convictions.

    Her father Michael Coprby twice lived next door to a known cannabis grower, Anthony Lewis. Police have found vacuum bags similar to the boogie board bag on Lewis's property and in the Corby's Gold Coast home. Cannabis has been found on land adjacent to property Michael owns. His cousin Alen Trembath claimed, after Michael Corby had died and was no longer in a position to sue, that Michael was a drug dealer in the 1980s and had links to outlaw bikie gangs. He also had a drug possession conviction, for what that is worth.

    Her sister Mercedes refers to her amphetamine use in letters sent to her former friend Jodie Power from Japan when she was 19. This friend alleged that Mercedes took speed regularly and once gave her a parcel of drugs to drive up to Queensland. Mercedes sued, but while suing acknowledged speed was taken at parties she attended, while claiming that she never took any herself and that the letters were mere "boasting."

    A documentary on Corby made by a media team allowed in by her own family shows her to be a skilled manipulator, at one point planning and then performing a fake "collapse" while plaintatively saying a pre-rehearsed line: "Help me Australia."

    While there is evidence of corrupt baggage handlers using passenger's baggage as mules, the cases all involve small amounts of cocaine. The implausibility of handlers having just enough vacuum-sealed hydro on hand to exactly fill a giant-sized boogie board bag (and video demonstrates the vacuum-sealed bag was shaped to fit precisely in the outer bag) beggars belief. What were they to do with the board? Send it separately and replace it before it got sent out of the country? Indonesian customs officers testified Corby was nervous, and initially refused to open the bag. A second official testifies Corby admitted owning the drugs. Corby has no coherent explanation for why she didn't notice the bag was heavier than it should be, and why it didn't feel like it had a hard boogie-board in it.

    Circumstantial? Sure. But a web of evidence shows, in combination with the circumstances of her arrest (and Corby's channel nine interview protesting her innocence is, frankly, less than convincing) to be clearly guilty.  

    Now if you want to say justice in Indonesia is often rough, that Indonesia sentenced someone without forensics and CCTV evidence that would be routine in an Australian customs investigation, and that the sentence is very, very harsh, you are within your rights. But to suggest Corby is innocent, or to uncritically accept that poor Ms Corby has had a breakdown and is mentally ill, without acknowledging her proven record of manipulating us for PR purposes, is disingenuous at best. Corby had her chance to co-operate with the Indonesian authorities; she chose not too, and the harsh sentence is unfortunately a consequence of this choice.

    The insane sentence... (5.00 / 1) (#2)
    by kdog on Fri Oct 08, 2010 at 08:40:18 AM EST
    is all on Indonesia, not any choice of Colby...please stop blaming the victim. Colby, like the rest of us, was born into madness and had no say in setting up this system of injustice.

    Even if "guilty as sin", what is she guilty of really?  Murder?  Nope.  Theft?  Nope.  Carrying plants...which is no sin, no sin at all.  The sin is Indonesian "justice", American "justice", pick your country's "justice".

    And I can totally accept that she is a broken women for no other reason than who could possibly not be broken by 6 years of pure hell....that sh*t would break Superman.

    Parent

    Tragic (none / 0) (#4)
    by squeaky on Fri Oct 08, 2010 at 12:07:37 PM EST
    What a wast of a human being....  

    Release Schapelle Corby now!!

    Innocent (none / 0) (#5)
    by Venus on Sat Oct 09, 2010 at 07:26:45 AM EST
    Schapelle Corby is demonstrably innocent. The following PDF is a good intro to the facts:
    http://www.schapelle.net/propositions/hiddentruth.pdf

    But this is a hugely political case. Her human rights were grotesquely and repeatedly abused, as they still are (a mentally ill woman is dying in a squalid cell).

    The point is that the Australian government accepted this: they adopted a policy of appeasement.

    As such we had the inevitable: the use of the media to manage the opinion of the Australian public. They used her dead father: in Australia dead men cannot sue. We had lie after lie: all of which can easily be dismissed and disprovided, but were repeated nonetheless. JournOz provides some good examples of how this worked:
    http://www.journoz.com/schapellecorby/

    The problem is that it created the likes of Valency. These people buy the froth and consume it. But worse, they come to places like this and repeat it. Not a hint of compassion at the mental torture which has sent a young woman insane, and which she still ensures. Not a clue about the politics of this. No idea of how the media frames opinion.

    Meanwhile, Schapelle is running out of time. He rinnocence doesn't matter, because no-one is listening. No mainstream organ in Australia will publish anything on the show trial, the abuses, the refusal on the AFP to investigate the source of the marijuana (because they know it wasn't hers), or anything that debunks the propaganda which they have sold.

    Schapelle needs the world to open its eyes and DO something: because this is a stain on humanity.

    the problem is (none / 0) (#6)
    by nyjets on Sat Oct 09, 2010 at 08:18:10 AM EST
    I will admit, I never completely bought Schapelle's innocent. But that being said, history has shown that when people meddle in affairs where they have no business in meddling in, bad things happen. This whole business really does not involve the rest of the world and I question what the right the rest of the world has to meddle in the affair.

    Parent
    Blame the Bali Police (none / 0) (#7)
    by amsnet on Sat Oct 09, 2010 at 03:42:41 PM EST
    In all fairness to the AFP, QANTAS and the Australian Government, people should start looking at the Bali police. Here are a few facts that are overlooked by the media. * The drugs were never proven to have come from Australia. No test for pollens or hair in the package was ever done. * Corby via the Australian Consul requested the AFP be given a sample for testing. The AFP requested that and was refused by the Bali police. * Corby requested fingerprinting of the plastic bag butthe Bali police refused. * Corby requested that the baggage be weighed to compare with checkin weight which was recorded. Again the request was refused. * The shifting of blame onto the Aussie Baggage handlers was not done by the Corby's but by a shyster lawyer acting for them.(since debarred) * QANTAS at the time had recovered the video of checkin and offered it to the Indonesian lawyer who refused it when it would have shown a flat boogie board bag at checkin in Brisbane. Plainly and simply Corby was setup by the Bali police to gain a conviction of any Aussie on importation of Marijuana into Indonesia, something that had never happened before or since. Prior to Corby's arrest, Australia was interfering in the domestic affairs of Indonesia with PM Howard acting as George Bush's Deputy Sheriff in SE Asia. That all ceased after Corby's arrest and Australians were told to respect the Indonesian justice system and let the case run its course. When asked by the media why the Corby's had not been investigated in Australia, the then head ofthe AFP, Mike Keelty said 'it is not the job of the AFP to clear people'. The Australian Foreign Minister in an early radio interview with Monica Attard on the ABC said 'Look at the Bali End' when asked about Corby. All of the above is documented, yet because of the heavy investment by Australian Companies in Indonesia (including the media), Corby and her family have been victimised and made scapegoats of international relations and trade. It is time the bone was pointed at the the Bali police and their complicity in creating a crime that never existed. http://www.freeschapelle.com.au

    Blaming Australian Corruption (none / 0) (#8)
    by kimbax on Sun Oct 10, 2010 at 01:27:50 AM EST
    QANTAS at the time had recovered the video of checkin and offered it to the Indonesian lawyer who refused it when it would have shown a flat boogie board bag at checkin in Brisbane.

    This is completely incorrect.  QANTAS did not, at any point, recover any CCTV.  Here's an extract of Schapelle's book that explains that point in more detail:

    http://img201.imageshack.us/img201/7458/bookextract2.jpg

    Further still, Steve Jackson, Head of Security for QANTAS Airlines, rang me at home (a few weeks ago), re these very issues.  He admitted that not a single frame of CCTV was preserved, by anyone - and then went on to refuse to answer my more detailed questions about this.

    Further still, "Tom" was working as a baggage handler for QANTAS that day.  He was a career criminal, with a history of trafficking in marijuana.  Here's some more details on that:

    http://womenforschapelle.blogspot.com/2010/09/schapelle-corby-government-pays-qantas.html

    And here's some more details about other criminal baggage handlers employed by QANTAS at the time:

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/airport-drugs-swoop-nabs-two/2005/11/26/1132966002736.html

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/police-in-airport-drug-hunt/2006/04/07/1143916722763.html

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Bag-handler-in-court-for-drug-tipoff/2005/06/09/1118123959832.ht ml

    And page 111 of this report quite clearly admits marijuana is trafficked between domestic airports in Australia:

    http://www.customs.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/SecurityPolicingReview.pdf

    And, quite clearly, contrary to assertions made by some others, marijuana is trafficked between domestic airports in Australia:

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/04/06/2865094.htm?site=adelaide

    http://abc.gov.au/news/stories/2010/01/18/2795097.htm?site=darwin

    Further still, scroll down to this paragraph:

    10. Please note this document, especially pages 4 & 5, re the corrupt QANTAS baggage handlers (smuggling drugs between domestic airports), identified during the course of "Operation Precipice." Please note those pages also refer to a Kevin Geraghty, given a prominent mention in this shocking press article Airport Security Gaps Exposed.

    In this blog post:

    http://womenforschapelle.blogspot.com/2010/09/schapelle-corby-corruption-cops-under.html

    And click on the links contained in it, for even more detail.

    Please put your urls in html format (none / 0) (#9)
    by Jeralyn on Sun Oct 10, 2010 at 03:00:00 PM EST
    Long urls skew the site and I cannot edit comments I can only remove them.  You can't just copy and paste urls here. Use the link button at the top of the comment box.  

    Highlight the text in your comment you want to go to the link (like "this blogpost" or "this article", click on the link button and paste in the url. Use the preview button.

    Thanks, I hate to see comments people take a lot of time to write be deleted, but I can't let them skew the site.

    Schapelle Corby: Six Years in an Indonesian Prison | 9 comments (9 topical)

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