Concerning Schapelle Corby

Hello...to everybody who isn't a New Zealander...note that I only make that
statement as I was dismayed at the inept & half-arsed comments that had been
dumped in this NG by people who clearly identified themselves as being of
that origin.

Concerning Schapelle, the obvious lesson is that if you are dealing with a
foreign legal system, no matter what you do it will never be enough to sway
the upholders of that system, ie the judges controlling, in this instance,
the preliminary legal process. They do not have the option of deviating from
the agenda delivered to them by the formal structure that they ploy their
trade within.

At a personal level, I believe that she is not guilty, it does not make any
sense to go to the effort of commiting such a crime. She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable. The reason I believe this to be true is that during my
working life I spent several years as an employee of an international
airfreight import/export company and the illegal acts that I was exposed to
during that time left me only with the option of feeling assured that a
considerable percentage of any population is prepared to do whatever ever
they feel necessary to enhance their own self gain whilst affording no
consideration to the impact that those acts may have had on others.

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

Good luck for the future to anybody out there who has the ability to treat
others as they would wish to be treated themselves.

Great post....
Richard
"Heathcote" wrote in message
...
Hello...to everybody who isn't a New Zealander...note that I only make
that
statement as I was dismayed at the inept & half-arsed comments that had
been
dumped in this NG by people who clearly identified themselves as being of
that origin.

Concerning Schapelle, the obvious lesson is that if you are dealing with a
foreign legal system, no matter what you do it will never be enough to
sway
the upholders of that system, ie the judges controlling, in this instance,
the preliminary legal process. They do not have the option of deviating
from
the agenda delivered to them by the formal structure that they ploy their
trade within.

At a personal level, I believe that she is not guilty, it does not make
any
sense to go to the effort of commiting such a crime. She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable. The reason I believe this to be true is that during my
working life I spent several years as an employee of an international
airfreight import/export company and the illegal acts that I was exposed
to
during that time left me only with the option of feeling assured that a
considerable percentage of any population is prepared to do whatever ever
they feel necessary to enhance their own self gain whilst affording no
consideration to the impact that those acts may have had on others.

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali
and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach
and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

Good luck for the future to anybody out there who has the ability to treat
others as they would wish to be treated themselves.

Great post....
Richard
"Heathcote" wrote in message
...
Hello...to everybody who isn't a New Zealander...note that I only make
that
statement as I was dismayed at the inept & half-arsed comments that had
been
dumped in this NG by people who clearly identified themselves as being of
that origin.

Concerning Schapelle, the obvious lesson is that if you are dealing with a
foreign legal system, no matter what you do it will never be enough to
sway
the upholders of that system, ie the judges controlling, in this instance,
the preliminary legal process. They do not have the option of deviating
from
the agenda delivered to them by the formal structure that they ploy their
trade within.

At a personal level, I believe that she is not guilty, it does not make
any
sense to go to the effort of commiting such a crime. She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable. The reason I believe this to be true is that during my
working life I spent several years as an employee of an international
airfreight import/export company and the illegal acts that I was exposed
to
during that time left me only with the option of feeling assured that a
considerable percentage of any population is prepared to do whatever ever
they feel necessary to enhance their own self gain whilst affording no
consideration to the impact that those acts may have had on others.

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali
and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach
and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

Good luck for the future to anybody out there who has the ability to treat
others as they would wish to be treated themselves.

On Sat, 28 May 2005 22:13:58 +1000, "Heathcote"
wrote:

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

I can confirm that. I've been in Bali for the last 5 days, and when
walking outside some guy hanging out on the street will always ask
"You want taxi?... massage?... marijuana?... girl?". The same line,
over and again, every night.

Chris

Chris Blunt wrote:

I can confirm that. I've been in Bali for the last 5 days, and when
walking outside some guy hanging out on the street will always ask
"You want taxi?... massage?... marijuana?... girl?". The same line,
over and again, every night.


I get that even in Bangalore, and Hanoi before that. Ubud (ca. 2002
when I was last there) seemed to be remarkably free of that ... perhaps
it's the absence of a beach culture.

Cheers,

George W. Russell
Bangalore

"Heathcote" wrote in message
...
cut

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali
and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach
and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

(cut)

That is not my experience. I have been to Bali 20+ times (while living in
Jakarta over 10 years) and don't remember being offered drugs, especially
not not the beach. Maybe I don't look like a likely customer of course
Probably I did receive some offers but not enough to remember. Maybe it
depends on where in Bali you are - I tend to avoid the Kuta area, but do
stay in Legian and Seminyak, not far away, and in Ubud. I understand that
the clubbing scene may be quite different with drugs more easily available,
especially for E, but I have not been to those places for years.
In Jakarta I was told last year that the marijuana supply had been much
reduced due to police/army action to stop it coming from the main supply
areas in Nth Sumatra (and there were news reports about the clamp down). I
dont know if that supply chain is still restricted, but if it is it may now
be easier to smuggle from Australia for supply to the tourist trade. There
are fairly regular cases of foreigners being caught coming into Bali and
Jakarta with drugs but without so much fuss from the press. Usually this
seems to be E, other pills, heroin, etc. - I assume that marijuan is too
bulky and maybe not profitably enough. I think most incoming baggage at the
airports Jakarta anyway, probably Bali) is scanned before it goes on the
carousels, and often there are reports where pills are detected, but I dont
know if the Bali scanners can detect marijuana.
I don't know if Shapelle Corby is innocent or not but there is a smuggling
trade involving tourists/foreigners.

A good article from The Age (Melbourne newspaper) on imports of hash/grass
from Oz to Bali.
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/20...&oneclick=true

Heathcote wrote (snipped):

At a personal level, I believe that she is not guilty, it does not make any
sense to go to the effort of commiting such a crime.

No it doesn't make any sense. But dealing or trafficking in drugs never
does. People still do it.

She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable.

Apparently from a fairly poor family. According to the reports I've
seen the Aussie government had to pay for her attorney and her family's
travel. So you have a girl who wants to go on a fancy holiday but can't
afford it and someone says "I'll pay for your ticket and even give you
$1,000 spending money if you'll carry this for me". Happens more often
than you'd think.

Did this happen to her? I don't know. But neither do you.

The reason I believe this to be true is that during my
working life I spent several years as an employee of an international
airfreight import/export company and the illegal acts that I was exposed to
during that time left me only with the option of feeling assured that a
considerable percentage of any population is prepared to do whatever ever
they feel necessary to enhance their own self gain whilst affording no
consideration to the impact that those acts may have had on others.

According to her story the drugs weren't meant to go to Indonesia. She
said they were supposed to stay domestic in Australia. So are you
saying that the baggage handlers that allegedly planted it were so dumb
and inexperienced that they couldn't see that the bag was marked for
Bali?

How much did that body board bag weigh? No much, I'm sure. If the drugs
really were planted she would have noticed the additional weight the
minute she picked up the bag. Had she stopped and questioned what was
going on immediately, then I'd buy her story. But she didn't.

Further to this, I have enough friends who have personally been to Bali and
have advised me that to get dope, all you have to do is lay on the beach and
a local will walk up and attempt to sell it to you.

That's true. Where do you suppose it comes from and how do you suppose
it gets there? In large part couriered by tourists.

Good luck for the future to anybody out there who has the ability to treat
others as they would wish to be treated themselves.

I want anyone who trafficks in drugs to go right straight to prison. If
I carry drugs to Indonesia I expect to go to prison. So this is how I
expect to be treated and she has no right to expect any different.

If she is guilty.

One thing we can be sure of: There was a travesty of justice commited
in Indonesia. If she is innocent, then it's a travesty that she got 20
years. But if she's guilty then it's a travesty that she got ONLY 20
years. What she did carries the death penalty and she had to know that.

She was caught with the drugs in her possession. Her only alibi was
that some unknown person in some unknown place with some unknown motive
planted a huge amount of MJ in her bag.

If I was on a jury in the US I would not believe her story. She would
have been found guilty by just about any court in the world.

"Tchiowa" wrote in message
oups.com...


cut

She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable.

Apparently from a fairly poor family. According to the reports I've
seen the Aussie government had to pay for her attorney and her family's
travel. So you have a girl who wants to go on a fancy holiday but can't
afford it and someone says "I'll pay for your ticket and even give you
$1,000 spending money if you'll carry this for me". Happens more often
than you'd think.

Did this happen to her? I don't know. But neither do you.


I have seen stories saying she flew to Bali frequently but my quick Google
did not find this on a verifiable site, only on blogs and newsgroups. Does
anyone know if this is true and was an issue in the trial? A trainee
beautician from a poor family seems an unlikely frequent flyer (unless there
is a rich boyfriend in the equation?). But maybe it was just a rumour.

RAK wrote:
"Tchiowa" wrote in message
oups.com...


cut

She was a student on
holidays who was sucked into a world created by those of us who are much
less honourable.

Apparently from a fairly poor family. According to the reports I've
seen the Aussie government had to pay for her attorney and her family's
travel. So you have a girl who wants to go on a fancy holiday but can't
afford it and someone says "I'll pay for your ticket and even give you
$1,000 spending money if you'll carry this for me". Happens more often
than you'd think.

Did this happen to her? I don't know. But neither do you.


I have seen stories saying she flew to Bali frequently but my quick Google
did not find this on a verifiable site, only on blogs and newsgroups. Does
anyone know if this is true and was an issue in the trial? A trainee
beautician from a poor family seems an unlikely frequent flyer (unless there
is a rich boyfriend in the equation?). But maybe it was just a rumour.

A rich boyfriend OR a regular business arrangement?