Smuggler or Scapegoat?

 

- SPECIAL INVESTIGATION

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SPECIAL EXCLUSIVE REPORT by GLEN CLANCY

For Immediate Release:- 1st August 2008

(SEANEWS-Australia )

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INTRODUCTION by the Australian Bureau of SEANEWS.org

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No other arrest of an Australian citizen was ever quite like the circumstances under which Schapelle Corby was arrested.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From day one the media had covered the trial and sentence following her every move, and it would seem sometimes in secret as well...

 

 

When we first heard about this incredible story back in October 8th 2004, most Australians could sense that something was definitely not right about the whole Schapelle episode. To say there was complete outrage in the public would be an understatement.

This rage against the Australian Government's handling of her case (or lack thereof) and her treatment by Indonesian authorities at the time was at boiling point.

 

On June 2nd 2005, after months of pressure building on then Australian prime minister John Howard took an unscheduled cancellation of his morning walk when he appeared on channel Sevens' Sunrise program to be interviewed about a breaking story; the first bio-terrorism attack on Australian soil announcing an Anthrax attack on the Indoensian Embassy. It was in effect yet another national false flag operation designed to get the people to shut their mouths about the Corby arrest or be known as a potential terrorist.

The Indonesian Embassy will remain closed while further tests are carried out on a bacterial powder sent in a letter to the ambassador.

Up to 50 staff members were quarantined for 12 hours in the building while they were decontaminated. They were allowed to leave, with none showing any early signs of sickness.

Prime Minister John Howard said early analysis of the powder determined it was part of the Bacillus bacterial family, which ranges from the causative agent of anthrax to relatively harmless germs.

But he would not say whether the substance was anthrax.

"It's being further analysed and when we know the results of that we'll be able to say something more," he said.

"But I'm not going to speculate."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/06/02/1117568282365.html

 

This occurred eight months after Schapelle's arrest and was strongly suggested by all official accounts that this anthrax hoax event occurred as a result of public outrage over the handling of the Schapelle Corby case.

When this crime occurred, it silenced overnight the all dissent surrounding suggestion of her guilt or innocence.

Approximately four days later in small print on page five on most state newspapers public attention was not highlighted to the fact that the so called "anthrax" attack was nothing more than a HOAX.

Public attention had been distracted by this breaking news story, and public rage had subsided now that anger against the Corby case had been proxy-linked with terrorism and more importantly John Howard himself had spread fear and terror and incited the spectre of terrorism amongst the community by announcing on national morning breakfast TV a terrorist scenario ie: powder linked to Baccillus family statement that simply WAS NOT true.

In essence John Howard had just broken the VERY terror laws about inciting fear and terror in the Australian community, that he himself had overseen the implementation of.

 

When we take a good look at the facts something just doesn't add up. Regardless of a persons background true justice systems are based on evidentary laws. It seems in this case these laws bend to suit a political need.

The Indonesian court which convicted her, has failed to explain this logic and provide a concrete motive as to why any sane person would do this. Motive is a very important element of a crime and usually the people who had the motive to do this are often the ones with the most to hide.

Is there indeed an element of this story that has been kept very quite from the Australian media?

In this article we will look at "why" this might have happened using the evidence from the time.

We will also look at what evidence if any there was to associate Miss Corby with this crime.

We will look closely at those central to her conviction. Who stood to gain out of the prosecution of Schapelle Corby.

Who are these people getting back slapped for "a good job well done" over the prosecution of not only Schapelle Corby but the Bali nine as well?

 

By all official accounts and the recent beat up hit pieces by Australian media, she is openly accused of trafficking. Smuggling high grade cannabis from Australia to Indonesia in her boogey board to sell and make a profit.

Sounds neatly wrapped up. Case closed she must be guilty.

Except when you take a closer look at her actual crime. 4.1 kilos of hydroponic cannabis.

Schapelle was caught with: 9 pounds or 4.1 kilos of hemp flower known as "bud". Usually grown these days under lights for concealment purposes.

Here are the 2005 prices on the black market within AUSTRALIA for this typical type of hydroponic marijuana :

1 pound of high grade gunja = Au$5000

2.2 pound = 1 kg ergo: 1 kilo =Au $12,000

 

4.1 kilo (boogey board load) 4 x 12,000 =$48,000-$50,000

Official Story goes like this:
According to "WHY SHE DID IT" theory used by the media and prosecution she was actually smuggling AU$50,000 worth into Bali where it was locally worth between Au$80 -$120

 

 

We are left then with the question well if she didn't do it, who did, what for, and who benefitted?

Here we present weeks of research to bring you the FULL INSIDE STORY into Schapelle Corby.

 

THESE ARE THE FACTS:

• Schapelle checked in her bag at Brisbane airport and neither she, nor her travelling companions, had any contact with it until after it arrived in Bali.
• Schapelle's travelling companion's luggage and Schapelle's own luggage were also never searched.
• Neither the Indonesian nor the Australian governments wanted to, or did investigate this case.
• There was no investigation into where or how Schapelle intended to sell the marijuana, if indeed the Bali police truly believed her guilty.
• The Bali Police refused to analyse the marijuana that convicted her. Hair from those who grew it would be in the resin.
• They didn't want anyone to investigate. Later, this marijuana was destroyed, obliterating any chance it could be used to acquit Schapelle.

 

 

_________________________________________________________________________

ARTICLE By Glen Clancy

 

Schapelle Corby: “Saga” or Smokescreen?
08/01/2008
By Glen Clancy
Southeast Asia News
Australia Bureau

    "It's not true,” Schapelle Corby’s former defence lawyer, Robin Tampoe claims, “That's why you can't put direct evidence relating to baggage handlers, 'cause they didn't do it.”
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Rkx4gclWZQs&feature=related

    Last month Channel nine Australia aired a two-part documentary, ‘The Hidden Truth,’ a self-described “definitive work on the Corby saga”.  A “saga” bled from a desperate family whose daughter faced the death penalty on drug trafficking charges by an opportunistic Australian media.  After speaking with Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer, Tampoe claimed he fabricated Corby’s defence. 

    In May 2005, just eleven days prior to Corby’s guilty verdict, Australia’s Foreign Affairs department sent Robin Tampoe a letter 

The letter revealed that Sydney airport baggage handlers were being investigated for their role in drug trafficking.  “We know there was an importation on a particular date and on a particular flight last year,” one police investigator reported.  “You can limit it to within ten [baggage handlers]."

   That particular date was October 8th 2004, the very same day Corby boarded her Qantas flight at Sydney airport on route to Bali.  On that day, corrupt Qantas baggage handlers were retrieving 9.9 kilograms of cocaine planted in the luggage of an unsuspecting traveller arriving from Argentina.

    On May 9th 2005 police arrested eleven men in connection with the Qantas baggage handling drug operation, including former Macquarie Bank director Ian Robert Chalmers.  Qantas sacked two baggage handlers within four weeks of the bust.  "We have a zero tolerance for any illegal activity,” Qantas CEO Geoff Dixon said, “and will act quickly to ensure people who should not be in our workforce are dealt with appropriately."

    Chalmers’ bail application revealed a drug ring member by the name of ‘Tom’. 

    Police documents revealed ‘Tom’ had the “responsibility for securing arrangements with Qantas baggage handlers at the international airport so that a briefcase containing the cocaine could be imported into Australia.”

    Superintendent Ken Finch, head of the NSW police force contingent of the joint taskforce removed himself from the investigation after he identified ‘Tom’ from surveillance footage as his brother, Ian Charles Finch.

    Ian Charles Finch was a former NSW drug squad detective.

 

Ian Charles Finch had been in contact with the NSW Crime Commission during the drug trafficking operation.

The NSW Crime Commission was forced to explain just why Ian Charles Finch was an “informant.”  This paved the way for damning revelations in the courts.

    It was exposed that Finch had sold several kilograms of cocaine on the streets of Sydney from his own registered vehicle with authorization from the highest levels of the NSW Crime Commission.  NSW Crime Commissioner Phillip Bradley had personally signed for the approval for the sale of the cocaine.

    Six kilograms was never retrieved.

    Ian Charles Finch, who was facing a maximum life imprisonment, was sentenced to just three and a half years’ prison after promising to “cooperate” with authorities.

    Not one shred of evidence was presented at Schapelle Corby’s trial demonstrating that she had packed or checked in the 4.2 kilograms of marijuana discovered in her boogie board bag at Ngurah Rai airport, Bali. 

A comedy of “errors” and “coincidences” then ensured that the origin of the marijuana would remain inconclusive.  In May 2005, Schapelle Corby was found guilty of drug smuggling and sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment in Indonesia, despite the ‘presumption of innocence’ written in three separate articles of Indonesian law. 

The Australian government provided no assistance to Corby’s defence.

    The four bags checked in at Brisbane airport tagged in Schapelle Corby’s name were not weighed individually but the total weight of the four bags was sixty-five kilograms.  Upon discovery of the marijuana the three other bags were only metres away.  Corby demanded that the bags be weighed for evidence.  Customs officials refused and the bags were taken from the airport.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/03/04/1109700677359.html

    The marijuana was sealed in a brand-named space bag; placed upside down inside another space bag.  Indonesian airport custom’s officials broke their standard investigative procedures, handling the outside space bag and the bottom of the inside space bag with unprotected hands.  First Ally McComb, Corby’s travelling partner, and Mercedes Corby when she arrived at the airport, demanded that they fingerprint the space bags.  They received the same reply from Indonesian customs authorities.  "Too late. Too many people have touched them." Mercedes said she replied, "Well, stop it right now." The customs officials laughed at her.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/03/04/1109700677359.html

    In late December 2004, almost three months after Corby’s arrest and after repeated requests to have the evidence fingerprinted, Corby’s lawyer, Lily Sri Rahaya Lubis confronted the head of investigations Senior Commissioner Bambang Sugiarto. "He confirmed the inside bag had not been removed,” Lubis reported, “He said he would have it fingerprinted.”
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/03/04/1109700677359.html

 

    In March 2006, prosecutors burnt the 4.2 kilograms of marijuana, the boogie board bag and the boogie board itself. The Evidence was effectively destroyed very quickly.   The evidence was never fingerprint tested.  This appears to be the MO (Modus Operandi) of Indonesian officials when confronted with evidential situations that may get “sticky” when heavily scrutinized in the courts.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/australia/qld/goldc/200603/s1594624.htm

    Within days of Corby’s arrest her lawyers repeatedly requested copies of the surveillance tapes at Brisbane and Sydney airports.  Guy Pilgrim, a Corby family friend, understood the importance of the surveillance tapes and travelled to Brisbane airport four days after Corby’s arrest to ensure the tapes were in safe-keeping.  Airport officials told Pilgrim “as long as they requested it, the tapes will arrive.”  The next day the Federal police told Pilgrim they had contacted Brisbane airport and the tapes would be preserved.
http://www.bluedogs.com.au/

    Brisbane airport public relations manager, Jim Carden told Schapelle Corby’s mother days after Corby’s arrest that they had the footage but “didn’t have time to look at it”.  After Corby’s defence failed to receive the tapes, Corby’s mother was told by Carden there was no footage.  Carden finally dismissed customs accountability for the tapes pronouncing it was the responsibility of Qantas:
http://www.bluedogs.com.au/

REPORTER: So you’re saying that the footage has nothing to do with the Customer Service relations at all?

JIM CARDEN: No.  No, you inquire via Qantas.  Qantas is responsible for all the baggage check in, passenger check in and baggage handling.

Qantas claimed that the Brisbane airport security tapes were wiped despite receiving requests for the tapes within days of Corby’s arrest.  Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer was questioned about the status of the tapes on ABC radio.  Downer declared that he had no control over airport surveillance stating: “I’m not the minister for tapes.”
http://www.abc.net.au/sundayprofile/stories/s1321407.htm

    At Corby’s trial the court heard that Australian Justice Minister Chris Ellison had confirmed in a letter that all cameras in Sydney Airport’s baggage handling area were operating on the day Corby boarded her flight to Bali.  Defence lawyer Erwin Siregar told the court, “I'm going to send a letter to Chris Ellison to request him to send the footage and I hope the footage will be presented at the next hearing.” 

The tapes were never supplied.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/schapelles-last-stand/2006/08/25/1156012703783.html

 

    Last year former customs official Allan Robert Kessing narrowly escaped a two year prison sentence after leaking two highly confidential documents in 2005 exposing organised crime at Sydney airport.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21952746-2702,00.html

    The following month Sir John Wheeler, senior British public servant was asked by deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson to conduct a report on the status of airport security in Australia.  Australia’s customs service threatened airport security to remain silent when co-operating with investigators.  The Customs service sent an email to staff members warning that they ‘should consider their obligations to the protection agency.’
http://www.uow.edu.au/arts/sts/bmartin/dissent/contacts/au_wba/whistle200511.pdf

 

    Nevertheless, the report found that baggage handlers with high-security clearances had been involved in drug-smuggling.

    Gary Lee Rogers, Assistant Inspector for Australian Protective Services (APS who was responsible for security at airports until 2002) was assaulted by his work colleagues after compiling a report on the security failings at Sydney airport.  "I have already had a gun placed in my mouth,” Lee-Rogers wrote in a May 2002 email to Whistleblowers Australia (WBA), “and WBA should know it was [name given] of the ACT police who did it. Make it known he is a corrupt police officer acting under instructions ... I am expecting an accident at any time."  Lee-Rogers filed an official complaint to the Ombudsman and a trial date was set for November 4th 2002.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/11/15/1037080914098.html

    On October 1st 2002 Gary Lee-Rogers was found in his flat with a blood-stained knife, bloodied pillow and two white plastic bottles in his right hand.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/10/18/1097951631677.html

--

    "My case will call the Prime Minister and other high-profile people to answer,” Lee-Rogers wrote to Whistleblowers Australia.  “I am in fear of my life and make it known through the WBA if I suicide that there is someone behind my demise.”  The coroner concluded that Lee-Rogers killed himself.

    “Today at 1400 hours I received an anonymous phone call,” Gary Lee-Rogers wrote to WBA, “saying that I had 'tripped' over evidence of drug importation through Sydney Airport involving the old Commonwealth Police Network."
http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Coroner-regrets-links-to-Corby-case/2005/04/20/1113854263244.html

    Former head of the Australian Federal Police anti organised crime operations, Ray Cooper said that police were involved in drug trafficking and were protecting corrupt baggage handlers from investigation.

ROSS COULTHART: And he says his investigations ten years ago revealed corrupt police were involved with drug traffickers using airports to move drugs around the country.

RAY COOPER: There were some people in there that were protecting these people and I was told to go softly softly.
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ROSS COULTHART: Were your concerns about corruption in baggage handling in Australian airports ever adequately investigated?

RAY COOPER: No. In fact we ran an operation with the Qld Police one weekend at Coolangatta Airport where we put sniffer dogs over bags and we found some narcotics and we were criticised for the operation.
http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/cover_stories/transcript_1775.asp

    Cooper also revealed that it was well known amongst the Australian federal police that unwitting passengers were regularly used as mules to traffic narcotics between domestic airports, especially cannabis.

ROSS COULTHART: You are aware from your own experiences as a senior federal police officer, of incidents where drugs were moved between Australian airports by drug traffickers.

RAY COOPER, FORMER AFP INTERNAL INVESTIGATOR: Yes I'm aware of it.

ROSS COULTHART: Using baggage handling staff.

RAY COOPER: Using baggage handling staff yes.

ROSS COULTHART: Were there incidents that you were aware of in your time with the federal police, where unwitting passengers were used as mules to shift drugs between domestic airports.

RAY COOPER: There was ample intelligence when I was there. It was regular intelligence regarding this particular practice was going on. See I was in charge, I was in charge of the Gold Coast. And I can tell you that I've, we've done some operations on the Gold Coast, checking baggage, internal baggage if you like on domestic flights, and there was no control at the back of that airport, everyone, every man and his dog could access those baggages.

ROSS COULTHART: Can I be clear on this, are you saying that there were regular investigations into intelligence suggesting drug trafficking and corruption amongst airport staff, including baggage handlers.

RAY COOPER: Yes, it was well known, it was a well-known amongst the federal police that this particular operation and this particular strategy was being adopted by criminals.

ROSS COULTHART: More concerning, Ray Cooper's investigations back then suggested some corrupt State and Federal police were in league with drug traffickers at the airport.

RAY COOPER: There were lots of allegations regarding various drug trafficking operations. And from time to time Police were linked to those operations. There were narcotics, particularly cannabis, being moved from airport to airport by syndicates, and the baggage handlers were playing a key role in it.
http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/cover_stories/transcript_1775.asp

 

    On the day Schapelle Corby departed Sydney airport, corrupt baggage handlers were extracting 9.9 kilograms of cocaine from an innocent traveler’s luggage, later sold with the signed approval of NSW Crime Commissioner Phillip Bradley.  That night Corby was arrested in Bali after 4.2 kilograms of marijuana was found in her unlocked boogie board bag.  "These dates,” investigators revealed of the Sydney airport drug bust, “were based on the work rosters of the corrupt baggage handlers at Sydney Airport."

    No baggage handlers were ever arrested.

Despite Robin Tampoe’s divulgence on Channel nine’s “definitive” documentary there is overwhelming evidence of Australian airport baggage handlers involved in drug trafficking.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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CONCLUSION By the Australian Bureau of SEANEWS.org

 

 

Schapelle Corby, Australian Federal Police and Baggage Handlers

 

During the eighties the AFP were found to be using totally corrupt liars for money as informants and the levels of state and national police corruption rose, especially in the area of drugs.

 

This continued into the nineties when at least one AFP officer was convicted of dealing in various drugs

 

Today corruption is rife within the Australian Federal Police and the Drug Section of the force

 

Former Australian Protective Services (APS) officer Gary Lee-Rogers tried to contact Federal Attorney General Darryl Williams QC Office to advise of this corruption going on and the drug smuggling ring officers within the Drug Section of the Australian Federal Police had set up with criminal record baggage handler’s hired by some airline companies

 

He also wanted to advise Attorney General Darryl Williams QC how State and Federal Police were involved in the growing, distribution and selling of drugs with the profits being share by corrupt officers within the force

 

Take for example Assistant Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police (AFP), Colin Winchester authorised Operation Seville, in conjunction with the NSW police after a tip-off was received about a big Marijuana crop.

The police authorised two more crops be planted a few kilometres away from the original crop to assist them in getting the ringleaders, or so they say why these crops would be planted and grown.

 

 

But no such thing went down, the whole operation was a farce.

 

A large portion of the crops got to market, sometimes with police approval and sometimes as a result of raids on the crops by rival groups of criminals.

 

Estimates vary, but it now seems that millions of dollars worth of the marijuana was harvested and sold.

 

Piles of grass were not listed and stored insecurely in Federal police's private garages and on sold with the profits going back to police officers involved in the operation

 

Gary Lee Rodgers a former honest, trustworthy, one of the good guys from Australian Protective Services found out this information about how the NSW & Federal Police were involved in growing and selling drugs

 

Also he found out how Australian Federal Police had set up a drug smuggling ring within Australia using some of these criminals employed with criminal records.

 

He went to Darryl Williams QC office and reported this corruption going on and corrupt staff in the Federal Attorney General Office in Canberra tipped off Drug Enforcement Officers within the Australian Federal Police

And Gary Lee Rodger was found dead in his Queanbeyan flat in October 2002 after alerting authorities to a Sydney airport racket in a letter

 

This is sheer and utter corruption at the highest level going on within the NSW Police, Australian Federal Police and Federal Attorney General Office right under politicians like Darryl Williams QC and then Phillip Ruddock who then took over from Mr William nose allowed to go ahead in leaps and bounds

 

Gary Lee Rodger family and whistle-blowers believe he was the victim of a revenge murder.

Since then there have been at least two more allegations of an interstate smuggling racket cantered on Sydney airport.

 

At this same airport worked Bilal Khazal, a suspected Muslim extremist and another baggage handler who recently helped themselves to some headgear out of a passenger’s luggage so they could clown around for five minutes.

 

Hence why the AFP have refused to fingerprint the boogie board bag they knew these drugs put in Schapelle Corby boogie board bag was part of this drug smuggling ring they had set up and she was the patsy to be caught and offered up as a sacrificial lamb to an inquisitorial and authoritarian system of repression in Indonesia.

The AFP desires to ingratiate themselves with the likes of the kopassus style police in Bali is bleeding obvious. They seem determined to offer up Shapelle Corby as sacrificial lamb for halal slaughter.

 

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________________________________________________________________

COMMENTS:

 

Comment: Fri 1st August 2008 .

Open Comment- Schapelle - The Inside Story

Posted 1st August 2008 http://z4.invisionfree.com/SouthEastAsiaNews/index.php?act=idx

Subject " Schapelle - Innocent or Guilty "

FROM: Bev54_life

Emotionally ripped apart the poor girl, who knows what shes been through... and what real crime she has caused other human beings?

 

- BEV, Ontario, CANADA

 

 

 

 

Comment: Fri 1st August 2008 .

Open Comment- Schapelle - The Inside Story

Posted 1st August 2008 http://z4.invisionfree.com/SouthEastAsiaNews/index.php?act=idx

Subject " Schapelle - Innocent or Guilty "

FROM: NiGhTViSiOn88

Wheres the evidence>? What did the cops do to preserve the evidence>? Nothing What did the Australian Govt do to help? Nothing ?

 

- Tony, Atlanta, GEORGIA USA

 

 

 

 

 

Comment: Fri 1st August 2008 .

Open Comment- Schapelle - The Inside Story

Posted 1st August 2008 http://z4.invisionfree.com/SouthEastAsiaNews/index.php?act=idx

Subject " Schapelle - Innocent or Guilty "

If Schapelle Corby is innocent, the Australian media have become her persecutor. So writes CLA member Roger A.Smith, probably Australia's most experienced, hands-on observer of the Indonesian legal system, in this letter to a writer on The Australian newspaper. Smith is backed-up by Kay Danes, who knows first-hand from experience in Laos how Asian legal systems and Australian media naivety are potentially a powerful and toxic combination.

A Letter from Roger A Smith To Caroline Overington -The Australian Newspaper

Dear Caroline I write to you in connection with the article that was published under your name on the front page of the Weekend Australian on 5-6 July 2008 titled ‘Corby Father a Dealer: Cousin’.

Let me say first of all say how much I admire your journalism, and in particular, your reporting on the Australian Wheat Board (AWB) scandal and Australian social affairs. Your most recent article, however, is aberration that is not worthy of the generally extremely high standards of journalism upheld both by yourself and the Oz, of which I am an avid reader.

Over the past three years, I have taken more than a passing interest in the case of Schapelle Corby. My interest derives from having lived in Indonesia for nine years, which included work reporting on court procedures for the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) and International Bar Association (IBA) as well as work as a consultant to an Indonesian law firm.

I have probably spent more hours in Indonesian courts than just about any other person in Australia – thankfully only as an observer and not as a litigant, or God forbid, a defendant! As an Australian-trainer lawyer and a keen observer of the Indonesian judicial system, my position on the Corby case is a simple one that is probably shared by anyone who has honestly followed the case. Corby is being unjustly imprisoned for a crime that was NEVER PROPERLY INVESTIGATED. The drugs were destroyed before they could be tested for origin. The bag in which they were contained was never checked for fingerprints. Airport CCTV scans were wiped.

There is no corroborating evidence in the case whatsoever aside from the drugs in the bag and that is not enough to put someone away for 20 years where considerable doubt exists. Article 66 of the Indonesian Criminal Procedural Codes (KUHAP) states: “The onus of proof is NOT on the Defendant”. Given that no one has been able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt either her guilt or her innocence, then she must be freed. This is a fundamental principle of any legal system. You can not send a person to jail for 20 years unless the prosecution has proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

 

It has still never been explained how a passenger could check in on to a Qantas flight a 4kg sack of ganja inside an unlocked surfboard bag and then have it pass without detection through not just one but THREE Australian airport terminals – two domestic (Brisbane and Sydney) and one international (Sydney).

 

Quite frankly, I don’t fancy my chances if I tried this tomorrow at Canberra airport and then expected it to pass undetected through Sydney on to my intended overseas location. It just wouldn’t happen!. Simply, we don’t honestly know who put the marijuana in the boogie board. I don’t believe it was Schapelle. You might suspect it was her or her family, but until this has been investigated and proven, no one should be imprisoned for it.

 

The real story here for anyone with the slightest modicum of a sense of justice is not to provide a vehicle for Australians to show how socially superior they are to a downtrodden family with few media skills.

 

The real story is how a young powerless woman is being imprisoned for a crime that she probably had nothing to do with. I would also have serious doubts about Schapelle and her family’s innocence in the matter except for one very important consideration.

 

Ever since the verdict was handed down and the Government falsely blamed her supporters for a biological terrorist attack on the Indonesian embassy, the media has been going gangbusters trying to find something to link her or her family to drugs. I have never seen any family in Australia subjected to such extraordinary scrutiny.

 

Every minute detail of their lives and associates from former next-door neighbours to ex-best friends and persons they were once photographed with has been exposed and examined.

 

But every allegation – and there are far too many in the media since 2005 for me to keep track of them all – has been found to lack substance.

The defamation verdict in the Today Tonight trial in which Mercedes Corby and her mother were vindicated is just the latest example. Like clockwork, your story too has already been discredited within days of it being published. If we are to believe even a small amount of the allegations against Schapelle, her sister, mother, father and brother-in-law, it still beggars belief that they could have been involved in the drug trade for a long period without even a single charge – let alone conviction – against any of them since the 1970s. And this after being subjected to the most intensive media and police scrutiny imaginable!

Whether it was to smooth over relations with Indonesia or for ratings, the media has been going all out to try to convince the Australian public that their initial assessment at the time of the trial back in early 2005 was wrong.

Yet it is precisely in this way, through observing directly testimony and the demeanor of defendants and witnesses at trial that our system determines the guilt or innocence of accused persons. At the time of the verdict, polls showed that some 80-90 per cent of Australians believed she was innocent. This was after direct observation of her demeanor at trial in live or delayed television coverage.

 

Since that time, there has been no substantiated or material or admissible evidence coming to light that would change such an evaluation. The only change has been the way the media has chosen to play it out – at first strongly supporting her innocence and, from June 2005 onwards, strongly advocating her guilt.

Because I believe in freedom of opinion, I will say what I truly think about the handling of the case by the Indonesian judiciary based on my involvement with their system. There are three elements to the outcome of judicial determinations in Indonesia and only one of these is justice and the law.

 

The other two are politics and money. In the Corby case, factor number 2 applied. Quite simply, the judges couldn’t possibly have freed her because the politics of the case meant that they couldn’t have been seen to give the benefit of reasonable doubt to an accused drug dealer despite the law requiring them to do so.

 

With the benefit of hindsight, the defence strategy should have aimed at winning public sympathy in both countries!

 

This is what her subsequent Indonesian lawyer, Hotman Paris, tried to do, but by this time the Australian media had turned against her and politics therefore meant she had to serve – in my opinion wrongly and as an innocent person.

 

Caroline, the Corby family doesn’t have sophisticated media minders, PR agents or political interest groups to lobby on their behalf and she has been almost totally ignored by the human rights groups that defended David Hicks despite the injustices in her case being, in my opinion, graver and her sentence obviously more severe.

 

To criticize the American judicial system is to uphold human rights, but to criticize far worse violations in the Indonesian system is racism. I will never understand this logic. I don’t honestly know why The Weekend Australian and the ABC choose to so prominently publish unsubstantiated allegations about a dad from a family that is down on its luck to say the very least. Is it because, unlike Mercedes and Roseleigh Corby, a dead man can’t sue for defamation?

 

It is traumatic enough having had a client as a foreign prisoner in an Indonesian jail, but I respectfully suggest that you can’t possibly imagine the pain that a family in this situation has to go through. Advocacy for Schapelle Corby is the most politically incorrect and naive action imaginable in Australia at this time, but it happens to be the right thing to do. We are all diminished and our rights and protections as Australian citizens severely comprised as a result of the shoddy way that she has been treated.

 

Regards, Roger Smith, CLA member ACT PS: Compare and contrast Schapelle's reaction to that of a guilty, female, convicted, drug smuggler faced with the same punishment, Renae Lawrence.

As one of Australia's most experienced barristers Philip Opas QC said in relation to the Corby case: "She’s either a better actress than Sarah Bernhardt ever was or she’s telling the truth and if that doesn’t raise a doubt in the minds of anybody observing her then, as I’ve said, I’d eat my wig. I would never convict her on the evidence I’ve seen". (ABC Interview, 15 May 2005) Corby and the family's appearance in the recent documentary The Hidden Truth screened on Channel 9 in June 2008, coupled with the total lack of any incriminating evidence to emerge since 2005, does nothing to detract from that reality.

 

If she is guilty, then I suggest we sign her up to play alongside Nicole Kidman or Cate Blanchett once she's released in 2024

Response from KAY DANES:

Dear Roger, I strongly support your writings and just wish this vendetta from the Australian media would cease. They do not seem to care at all that their inconsistent ramblings are damaging a legal case beyond repair.

 

They have clearly lost objectivity and now, as we have seen, even the ABC are running 'claims' made by distant family members, to whom no credibility has been established, in order to promote further bias towards Schapelle Corby.

 

This is something that shocks and sickens me because I would have thought better of the ABC than to succumb to such sensationalist media grabs.

 

I dont' know what can be done for Schapelle Corby now in a legal sense. Her situation is one of great concern to me, as is the fact that the media is causing Australians to focus more on TV-style drama & ratings than social justice and civil rights.

 

I am deeply disappointed and hope that Australians will realise that the media don't always get it right. Certainly those advising her to smuggle a TV camera into Kerobokan Prison obviously had very little regard to her present situation. It was highly reckless and we are yet to see the repercussions for Schapelle and the other Australians currently detained in Bali. When you are detained in a foreign prison you become vulnerable to all the elements, not just those within your controlled environment.

 

When my husband and I were unlawfully detained in Laos in 2000, in violation of international law, most of the media concerning our case merely perpetuated the false allegations put forth by corrupt Lao officials. The media reported what they thought would sell newspapers. To them a headline such as ‘Australian Couple Accused of Gem Theft’ was more attention grabbing than the closer truth ‘Australians held hostage!’ Where there's smoke, there's fire, they say.

 

This is surely a very lazy way of thinking that is responsible for many injustices in our world. How anyone could believe what our captors released to the media: that I had attempted to smuggle 160kg of sapphires in my underwear, while dragging two frightened children across the border, in the company of the Australian Embassy, and somehow passing this off without anybody noticing, is incredible.

As I said, lazy thinking.

But unlike Schapelle, we were lucky, we had the full backing of the Australian Government that believed in our innocence; and professional advisors who were able to handle our case in a manner that did not offend the Laotian authorities.

Hence our government was able to negotiate an unprecedented presidential pardon to secure our release.

But the truth remained buried beneath the media grabs and, with it, our previously unblemished reputations.

Regardless of guilt or innocence, I strongly believe that Schapelle Corby is being victimised by the Australian media. These constant attacks leave us with very little room to plead her case to anyone; and all the breaches of Indonesian and international law go unnoticed because they are overshadowed by hearsay and innuendo.

It is a shame people have the tendency to form an opinion based solely on media reports, often without knowing the facts. Is everyone guilty just because it‚s reported in the media that they are? When a person is detained in prison, they often have no control of what’s going on around them and not much knowledge of what people are doing or saying on their behalf or about them. Prisoners do not lose their rights simply because they are prisoners, or at least they are not supposed to.

 

Sadly, people tend to forget that prisoners are still human. Schapelle is still someone‚s daughter, sister and someone’s best friend.

There are many people who care about her 'rights' and continue to hope that she survives whatever decisions are made by the Indonesian authorities. She should still be allowed some dignity by virtue of simply being human.

Thank you Roger and Civil Liberties Australia for standing up for Schapelle's rights.

I will make sure she is made aware of this. Regards, Kay Danes, Capalaba QLD International Human Rights Advocate Foreign Prisoner Support Service www.foreignprisoners.com

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