Thursday November 27, 2008
LONDON: A 36-year-old Malaysian woman has been jailed 10 years for trafficking in 2.1kg of cocaine to Britain.
Susanna Janury,a child minder from Selangor, caused a stir when she changed her plea to guilty at the start of the three-day hearing on Tuesday.
Leicester Crown Court judge Michael Pert QC passed the sentence and recommended that she be deported after serving her time.
The prosecution officer was Jonathan Vincent from the Customs and Excise Department while Graham Humston was defence counsel.
Susanna had in August claimed trial to having fraudulently imported the drugs at the East Midlands Airport in Loughborough, Leicestershire County, on April 30.
The prosecution said that immigration officers had “challenged” her when she flew in from Gambia on that day as they were not satisfied with her documents.
However, they issued her with temporary papers to enter the country and she had to report back the next day.
The drugs were subsequently recovered from a concealed compartment in her luggage at her hotel room.
Susanna is lucky to have escaped with a 10-year sentence as the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 provides for a maximum penalty of a life sentence and/or a fine because cocaine is listed as a Class A drug, regarded by British law as the most dangerous.
During the preliminary inquiry at a lower court in June, the prosecution had described her as a professional drug courier who had “travelled all over”, including to countries such as Peru, Spain, India, Australia and Gambia before arriving in Britain.
