Drugs smuggler Anna Bartlett has told for the first time how she risked her life by swallowing 50 packages containing cocaine, Ecstasy and hashish - all for £1,000.
The 24-year-old, from Sandringham Road, Southend, spent two-and-a-half-years in a Saudi Arabian prison for the crime. She could have faced a firing squad or died from an overdose if any one of the packages had burst in her stomach.
She said: "I knew what I was doing was wrong but all I was interested in was me, me, me and money, money, money."
When she agreed to take the drugs to Dubai she was told she would need to swallow the wraps, each more than 4cm long, over a 15-hour period, along with yogurt and muesli to prevent the packages from blocking her intestines.
However on the day of her flight, October 28 2000, the drugs were delayed and Anna only had three hours to swallow them all.
She got through customs but the problems started once she arrived and could not get the drugs out of her system and was forced to use the bath as a toilet so none of the wraps were lost.
When she took them to the man she was running the drugs for, he told her to give one package to an Australian girl. However, police were watching the Australian girl and when caught she directed the officers to Anna.
She said: "They kept going on about the death penalty. After two days they made me sign a statement that was written in Arabic. I didn't have clue what it said."
She was thrown into the isolation wing of a prison for ten days. She said: "I totally lost the plot. "My life was over, my family didn't have a clue where I was, I would never see freedom again and I was going to be shot dead for what I did.
"I lay on the floor on my filthy old blanket, sobbing and talking to the wall. It was hell on earth."
In May 2001 she was sentenced to 25 years, but on appeal in October 2001 the sentence was reduced to ten years and a £10,000 fine.
However her sentence was cut short when she was declared "medically unstable" by a judge and deported. She was reunited with her family last Monday.
She added: "I am pleased just to be alive. To be able to go shopping is fantastic and it is great to be able to eat what I want - I never want to see a bowl of rice again."
Published Tuesday, June 10, 2003
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