busker

20 years for drug bust

Uh ohh ... one of those cases ... Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia ... same difference. I marvel that people still think there's anything new about such arrests which should be old hat by now.

In this case, an Indonesian court hammering an Australienne with 20 years for trying to smuggle marijuana into Bali.

There was a time in Hong Kong when hardly a week went by without someone knowing someone who knew someone who'd been stitched up by one of those courts and were either on death row or looking at serious time in a not very nice caboose.

As I recall, it was never ever their fault. Indeed, according to 27-yr-old Schapelle Corby here, the drugs found in her unlocked bag were planted.

Now for the lengthy toing and froing tug-of-war as family, friends and the Oz Foreign Service engage Jakarta in the usual two-step.

These being Australians, and Schapelle being a bit of a looker, there'll be the usual tsunami of indignant phone-ins and huffing and puffing over her undoubted innocence. It also being Indonesia - not known to be overly concerned by world opinion - I'd say Ms Corby has a few years wait as any appeal winds its way through the courts.

While on this whole subject, here is where I'd also file Thai cop guns tourists-type items.