Police respond after Brit teen claims she was ‘tortured into trafficking £200k-worth of cannabis’
Thai police have responded to claims by British teenager Bella May Culley that she was 'tortured' into trafficking around £200,000 worth of cannabis.
Culley had initially been reported missing in Thailand before being detained in Georgia on drug trafficking charges and was facing the potential of spending 20 years in prison or even possibly life imprisonment.
Georgian authorities said she had been 'charged with illegally purchasing and storing a particularly large amount of narcotics, illegally purchasing and storing the narcotic drug marijuana, and illegally importing it'.
The British teen, who says she is pregnant, told a court in Tbilisi that she had been subjected to torture in order to force her to carry the drugs, showing the court a snake-like scar and telling them: “I didn't want to do this - I was forced under torture."
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She also made claims against the conduct of officials in Thailand, which they have now denied in a statement on Culley's case.
Culley's lawyer Malkhaz Salakaia claimed that corrupt Thai police officers had been part of the drug smuggling operation and that the British teenager had tried to appeal to an officer for help before realising that he was part of the gang.
According to Khaosod English, Police Lieutenant General Choengron Rimpadee argued that there was 'absolutely no factual basis to her claims', accompanied by CCTV footage which appeared to show Culley walking through passport control at Suvarnabhumi Airport normally.
"There is no evidence whatsoever that any immigration or police officers forced or threatened the suspect to smuggle drugs out of the country," the police officer said in a statement.
Culley claims that the bag containing the drugs was taken to the airport for her and put in the plane's hold while she was boarding a flight from Bangkok.
Salakaia said: “You’ll see her actual involvement with these charges in her own testimony that is coming shortly - she is innocent.
“Her emotional state exactly confirms that she was forced, I want to ask her to show the court her arm and you can see the burning scar.
“This scar occurred before she was ‘equipped’ with her baggage, that she never even touched.”
Her lawyer also claimed that she and her family had been threatened with 'beheading' if she didn't comply, alleging that 'they told her: we know the addresses of your parents, we know where your 16-year-old brother is' and then showed her a video of a person being beheaded.
Despite the lawyer's argument that Culley does not pose a flight risk, she has been denied bail and will continue to be kept in a Georgian prison.
Topics: UK News, World News, Crime, Drugs
Joe Harker