To not feel any sympathy for drug-smuggling women?

[DarceyBissell]

Just that really. Two young women facing 25 years in a Peruvian jail for trying to smuggle 11kg of cocaine. Saw they described as 'vulnerable' in one paper. Hardly. Greedy and stupid though.

don't do the crime, don't do the time

Anyone found guilty of carrying such large amounts of class A drugs will get a pretty heavy sentence. Where it takes place is a separate matter and comes down to what you see as the the purpose of prisons. At one extreme, there is the prisons are about education and rehabilitation point of view and at the other extreme, prisons should be places of punishment. If you take the rehabilitation, prevent reoffending point of view, British prisons have a very poor record.

Suppose you are found guilty in Peru, should you be sent back to your country of origin? It's one approach, but I imagine you would have to have some sort of international agreement set up. Do you establish and enforce (how?) agreed levels of prison standards? And, if that's the case, why should, say the generally inefficient British system be the one who sets the standard.

The images from the Peruvian jail look commensurate with what I imagine impoverished Peruvian homes look like.

I just love the idea of the British government going around the world telling the various governments to get their hell holes up to scratch so our girls can expect a minimum standard when they get caught smuggling shed loads of drugs.

I know. It's absurd really. What would they say back? Can't you stop these dozy kids coming over here?

nkf
they would say 'well we were going to spend a million dollars improving the drinking water for the kids but we realise how wrong that is. Lets make sure the drug smugglers have the internationally agreed level of comfort first'

Yes, but how does it match the local conditions? Is Peru the sort of country where people suffer treatable medical conditions because they don't have money? It's basically a third world country isn't it? So, lots of poverty and disease. In all areas of life. Why get all het up about the prison conditions right now? Did you object to them last week? There is something almost, how dare these foreigners punish our girls about it the focus on the prisons.

Sorry, that was a response to Needsaholiday.

nkf - i got it.

there are bad places in the world. dont go there.
there are bad places in the world. dont smuggle drugs there

it's not hard

fwiw, I have always told my older children never to take someone else luggage through, even if they are told a sob story.
I have also told them not to take someone elses luggage through, even if they are told that their family members are in danger if they dont do it.

I have also now told them, that should read.

This is why I like it here. We don't have an "I'm alright jack" attitude. We all have access to decent healthcare despite our level of income. People who are poor who go in to those prisons don't get anything, just as they wouldn't on the outside either

If your "here" is the UK, I'm not sure I'd agree that it's an "I'm alright Jack" free zone. Compared to where I live, I often find the lesser degree of compassion emanating from sources of opinion, across a wide range of contexts, uncomfortable reading.

Would you like to hazard a guess by which methods Britain for example was able to create accumulated wealth, assets and well developed industry to the extent that it had the social and economic infrastructure required in order to eventually create the welfare state ? By people wandering around being "I'm alright Jack" free-zones, or by turning the political map pink ?

The dire poverty, reflected in prison conditions, in many of the countries that come to our attention when our citizens get arrested is not disconnected from the wide ranging negative outcomes of an established drugs trade. How "I'm alright Jack free-zone" are casual drug users in developed countries (with their NHS access if the fun goes bent) being when they place their recreational high above ethics that dictate that if you can't be part of the solution, at least don't be part of the problem ?

Have now thought, I suppose, that there could be the occasional hijacker of drugs mules girls, or boys for that matter, who would go after the family members?
I will stay say the same to my children though.

I heard on the news the other day that groups helping women at risk of forced marriage overseas are telling them to put a spoon in their pants so they set off the scanner at the airport and, because the metal is detected in an intimate area, they will be taken to a private room for a search and will have an opportunity to tell them they are travelling against their will. Might make DS some travel cutlery .

The mail has printed a fairly believable transcript of how they were set up.

BUT surely if they were that scared for their families as the transcript says they wouldn't now be naming all the people? Wouldn't they still be worried that their families could be hurt?

Their stories seem to correlate but I do find the photo taking thing a bit odd, would a gang go to such lengths?

I dont know what to make of it all tbh.
I think they are "innocent" ie they were forced against their will and were afraid to "escape"?
It sort of though doesnt quite add up?

ooo tough one...

On the one hand they have done something morally and legally wrong if true that they are guilty.

I do feel sympathy for them though, must be terrified and no one thinks anything through properly in their late teens ( I didn't)

As far as being the cause of all the death and destruction...I don't blame the smugglers. I don't even blame the drug barons.

Fact is there is no supply without a demand.

It's the individuals who decide to take the drugs that bring destruction down on themselves and their families. There is help out there for addictions.

(Before anyone starts about my lack of sympathy for drug users... I was a hard drug user/addict from the age of 17 to 23. Been clean for three years now. And if I hadn't got clean and something bad had happened then it would have ben my fault)

• been my fault

Surely a basic prerequisite of travelling abroad, or going to work abroad as these two women were, is that you accept that you never ever carry unknown luggage for someone. And surely it's also pretty basic knowledge that people tend not to come up to you out of the blue holding a gun to your head and telling you to carry their luggage... The likelihood is that anyone trying this ruse will befriend you, spend time convincing you they are genuine and that they may even convince you that they are under threat so that you're putting them in danger if you don't comply?

I mean honestly these things are like the first rule of travel. It's hard to believe anyone old enough and independent enough to travel abroad doesn't get that