Oz couldn't take it 2976

Dave Baker

I seem to have missed it. Want to try again?

Not recorded, and yes that would have helped. IIRC, the bags were bulk weighed (all her bags plus those she was travelling with) but not the individual bags. The Indonesians *refused* to repeat the bulk weighing at Denpasar despite the family requesting it. I'm not sure why.

Unwarranted buttumption of guilt. What if she's innocent and it instead showed a set of prints that don't belong to her or any family member?

Largely because their best shot at it was destroyed by Customs. Their next best shot (bulk weighing to compare the weight at Brisbane v the weight at Denpasar was also declined by the Indonesians.

That's the whole point, buttuming she's innocent, there is no way to prove it to the satisfaction of the Indonesian legal system, short of finding 3rd party prints on the dope or a witness coming forward and taking responisiblity. You are basically saying that the presence of the dope in her bag is absolutely incontrovertible proof that she put it there and that has not been established. I can recall at least one well documented case of people arriving at Bali, getting to their hotel room and finding a block of hash in their bag. They called the embbutty and asked for advice and were told to not report it and get rid of it somehow. Apparently they tried to flush it and couldn't so they spread it around a garden bed. The Embbutty advised them not to report it or they would almost certainly be arrested and imprisoned. This is mentioned (with links) in another thread here somewhere.

All of these things are contributory. Consider an aircraft accident, very rarely does one thing going wrong or just one mistake result in a prang. Usually there is a chain of relatively minor incidents or mistakes or failures that happen in buttociation with each other that lead to the big smoking hole in the ground.

Yet that seems to be what the court insists on to acquit.

You are presupposing that someone elses prints are not on the bag in question. We'll never know one way or the other. The irony here is that if her prints WERE on the bag it would have proven conclusively that she had handled it and therefore knew about it and we would not be having this conversation because it would be clear that she is guilty.

You can rubbish it as much as you like, but if the bag had been properly examined and her prints not found, plus a 3rd parties found, it would give a strong indication she hadn't touched it. Can you positively say that what I am suggesting is impossible? The point is that there is now no way to know, it could have convicted her, it could have acquitted her or it could have left a question mark, but it should have been done and it wasn't.

I'm quite happy to concur that many things are part of the problem. I don't expect them to be up to 'CSI' stnadards - but gloves before you handle evidence prior to forensics looking at it isn't rocket science, it's very basic procedure and even in Indonesia they should follow it.

Oh come on, what's your point here. Do they need a law to tell them if half a dozen drongos handle a bag that is evidence it will affect its value as evidence? I suspect they buttumed that finding the dope in her bag was enough to convict so they just didn't bother. Looks like they were right too.

Depends on whether you are interested in knowing whether they are breaching procedure or not. Your choice.

Fine, so you are an experienced traveller. The only good thing to come out of this whole mess is that people are now taking your precautions to heart. There has been a big increase in the useage of the plastic security wrapping to seal bags since this started. If the woman in question is in fact innocent, her one 'crime' was not making sure her bags were secured in such a manner.

The CO