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Breaking news: 8 australians busted in bali for 10.9kg heroin

Off-topic discussion removed. This isn't the place for that kind of debate.

PM me if you don't understand why your post is missing :)
 
Howard begs young not to risk drugs
By SANDRA O'MALLEY
15 Feb 2006

PRIME Minister John Howard has begged young people to stay away from drugs after two Australians were yesterday sentenced to death by a Bali court.

"The warnings have been there for decades and how on earth any young Australian can be so stupid as to take the risk is completely beyond me," a clearly emotional Mr Howard said yesterday. "Can I just say to every young Australian, please take notice of this, I even beg them not to take the terrible risks that these young people have done," he said.

The death sentences handed to Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran came just months after Melbourne man Nguyen Tuong Van was hanged in Singapore for heroin trafficking.

The Federal Government will now step in to plead clemency for the men but it is likely to take a low-key approach to its lobbying until the appeals process is exhausted. Labor, too, opposes the death penalty. "(The Government will be) approaching the Indonesians seeking clemency for the two who have been sentenced to death and so will we," Opposition leader Kim Beazley said.

Australian Greens leader Bob Brown labelled the death sentence judicial murder.

While against the death penalty, Mr Howard said the Indonesian decision was predictable.

"You can't expect governments in other countries to take a soft view of drugs, they hate drugs, they have severe penalties and everybody knows that."

Mr Howard defended the role of the Australian Federal Police in the Bali Nine arrests.

The AFP has been criticised for passing on information to Indonesian authorities which led to the arrest of the Bali Nine.

"(Those) implying that it is some way the fault of the Australian Federal Police, I think that is very unfair, the police are there to protect us from the ravages of drugs," he said.
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From The Advertiser
 
Does Asian justice deserve our respect?

come on redneck bluelighers "chorus ad nauseum" how we should respect other countries.

Andrew West

Does Asian justice deserve our respect?

We tried diplomacy with Singapore when its petty dictatorship decided to hang an Australian citizen. It didn't work and last December Nguyen Tuong Van went with great dignity to the gallows. We should not make the same mistake with Indonesia ... but we will.

Frankly, I'm getting sick of the constant calls -- always driven by trade and commercial concerns -- to show "respect" for the values of our neighbours, even as they impose sentences out of all proportion to even very serious crimes, such as heroin trafficking.

I do not believe Australians should be exempt from the laws of the countries they visit. I believe the laws should reflect the nature of the crime, for everyone, and I oppose the death penalty -- again, for everyone.

But no doubt we'll hear the "respect" chorus ad nauseum in the weeks and months to come, following the decision of a court in Bali to sentence to death by firing squad two Australian drug couriers and imprison for life seven others.

You need to understand two things about Asian justice. First, it is tinged with vengeance. The system appears to acknowledge no prospect of redemption and forgiveness.

Second, it is overlaid with this notion of "face", of not wanting to be embarrassed. As we have seen in the case of another Australian, Schapelle Corby, when she appealed against the ludicrous severity of a 15-20 year sentence for smuggling marijuana, Indonesia's highest court increased her sentence in retaliation for her temerity in questioning the original sentence. Put simply, the Asian justice system seems to be based on overweening pride that dictates you should never question authority.

It was supposedly "face" that stopped the Singaporeans from backing away from Nguyen Tuong Van's execution last year and, in the end, the Australian government failed its citizen. John Howard and Alexander Downer may oppose, quite sincerely, the death penalty, but by refusing to contemplate economic sanctions they placed a price on Van's head. Perhaps it was a price worth billions, but human life still had a price.

There are expatriate Australian quislings in Singapore who were also willing to sacrifice Van's life in exchange for enjoying a 10 percent tax rate. Please, don't come home.

I fear we are in for the same compromise with the Bali nine, although this time the justification for not taking the ultimate sanction against Indonesia will be that we need its help in the fight against terror.

For several decades Indonesia -- even at its corrupt, brutal and kleptocratic worst -- has had a strange psychological hold over Australian governments. This was most noxious in the case of East Timor, where the Indonesia lobby that had infected Australia's foreign affairs, trade and defence establishments were prepared to ignore Indonesia's genocide in the territory to Australia's north which it occupied illegally for more than 25 years.

Paul Keating even called the despot Suharto a "father" figure, while attacking the man who championed East Timor's right to freedom from Indonesia, Jose Ramos Horta. How ironic that Ramos Horta is a candidate for the United Nations secretary-general's position, while Keating is now a discredited and marginal ex-prime minister.

The thing that grates -- really, really grates -- is the way Asian governments bleat about the need to protect their citizens from the undoubted scourge of illegal drugs. They would have more credibility if they did not allow their citizens to literally prostitute their nations' children.

It is a widely known fact that corruption in Asian law enforcement means the child sex trade is allowed to flourish.

Next time these hypocrites talk about their justice systems, make sure you have a bucket ready.
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http://blogs.smh.com.au/thecontrarian/archives/2006/02/asian_values_do.html
 
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Five of Bali Nine have jail terms cut
From: AAP By Rob Taylor And Olivia Rondonuwu
April 27, 2006

CONVICTED drug couriers Scott Rush and Martin Stephens were today considering appeals to Indonesia's highest court after judges reduced to 20 years the life terms for five other Bali Nine members.

Life terms for Newcastle woman Renae Lawrence and Rush's Brisbane schoolmate Michael Czugaj were reduced because they played only minor roles in the conspiracy to smuggle 8.3kg of heroin from Bali to Australia, the deputy chief of the Bali High Court, Hyster Arsan Pardede said.
The life sentences of the so-called Melasti Hotel three – Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen, Si Yi Chen and Matthew Norman – were also cut to 20 years.

"The role that was done by those defendants is only as couriers on the orders of Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, the masterminds," Pardede told AAP.

"They only did this once and they are still young, so life sentences handed down to them by the Denpasar District Court do not seem fair.

"It seems (originally) like they were going to spend the rest of their lives in prison."

But the mood of leniency did not extend to former Wollongong barman Stephens, who was the only member of the Nine to have his appeal rejected and his life sentence upheld.
Brisbane youth Rush did not appeal.

"I feel pity for Martin, but I also imagined how many thousands of people could have been affected by what he has done," High Court judge I Gusti Ngurah Lanag Prabawa told AAP.

The decision to cut five life terms means the legal gamble with Indonesia's tough anti-drug regime has paid off for most of the Nine.

The High Court could have upped their verdicts to the death penalty imposed on convicted masterminds Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran.

That was a risk Rush and his parents chose not to take.

Rush, like Lawrence, Stephens and Czugaj, was arrested at Bali's Ngurah Rai airport on May 17 last year carrying blocks of heroin strapped to his body.

The lawyer for Stephens, Adnan Wirawan, said he was "confused and still upset" at the High Court's decision, and he would now talk to his client and his family in Australia about an appeal to the peak Supreme Court in Jakarta.

Rush's lawyer Robert Khuana said while the time for his client to lodge a High Court appeal had technically passed, he could use settlement of Lawrence's case, known as "einkracht", to bypass Bali and appeal directly to the Supreme Court.

One of Lawrence's defence lawyers, Haposan Sihombing, confirmed Lawrence would end her legal challenges and accept 20 years.

"We happily accept it. It means she was only a courier, and Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were the real bosses," he said.

In making its decision, the High Court drew on the ruling which torpedoed the appeal hopes of another Australian drug smuggler, Schapelle Corby, who was last year jailed for 20 years for smuggling marijuana into Bali.

"Importing is more dangerous (to Indonesia) than exporting," Pardede said.peIn seeking to take the heroin out of Bali it would "actually reduce the impact," he said.

The High Court yesterday upheld death penalties for Chan and Sukumaran.

Chan was arrested reading a newspaper on an Australian Airlines flight waiting to depart Bali's Ngurah Rai Airport for Sydney in April 2005.

He was carrying three mobile phones, but no drugs were found in his possession.

Sukumaran, a London-born martial arts expert, was arrested with three others in a room at the Melasti Hotel on Bali's Kuta Beach on April 17, 2005, his 24th birthday.

Police testified he was the gang enforcer.

From News.com.au
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Same sentence for smuggling cannibis or heroin it seems...
 
Naughtiest_Maximus said:
Yes they were stupid but if some of the things i am hearing are true, and it was the Australian forces, federal or otherwise who tipped off the Indonesian police i think it's a pretty despicable act. If proven guilty they will have effectively signed these people's death sentences. Why they couldn't have let them board the plane and then apprehend them at this end is beyond me. Is this part of our new improved relations with the Indonesian government?:\
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They were extremely stupid (like many young people). I agree whole-heartedly with what you said. If the Australian Federal Police didn't tip-off the Indonesian Police Force, the perpetrators would have been sufficiently dealt with over here as they hit Australian shores. The AFP possibly would have been able gain certain information leading to the arrest and incarceration of the real "honchos" who were responsible for importing this substance into our country.

This Bali 9, were aware of the consequences to be suffered from engaging in the "Muelling" of Heroin into Australia. However, they are the little-guys being exploited for someone who can easily employ another naive young person to attempt this again for their profitabale means.
In my opinion, the Australian Federal Police would have had much, much more to gain had've they allowed the Bali 9 back into Australia. They would have had the oppurtunity to lure the "Kingpins" and catch them red-handed.
The Bali 9 are now getting punished and the guys in charge are getting off scott-free and given more oppurtunities to operate.

The death of the Bali 9 has and will, accomplish absolutely nothing, apart from a stupid point two Governments want to make.
 
It's an old thread but wanted to tack this on the end. While there was a lot of debate in the past about whether the Indonesians are justified in imposing death sentences, the complicity of Australia's federal law enforcement agency in this affair is being fleshed out in this final appeal for Scott Rush.


AFP bids to rescue Rush and image
Tom Allard
September 17, 2010

Former AFP commissioner Mick Keelty testifies at the final appeal of drug smuggler Scott Rush's death sentence.

THE Australian Federal Police came to Bali yesterday to save Scott Rush from the firing squad, and rehabilitate its sullied reputation for helping to put him in the predicament in the first place.

Former AFP commissioner Mick Keelty and current Deputy Commissioner Michael Phelan, the man who authorised the tip-off to the Indonesians about the arrival of Rush and the other Australians, appeared in a Denpasar court where Rush and other members of the Bali nine heroin syndicate faced Indonesian justice.

Rush was not present but parents Lee and Christine were, listening as Mr Keelty and Mr Phelan said Rush was a ''very minor'' player and a man who came from a ''good family'' but was ''trapped'' in the drug ring.
Former AFP chief Mick Keelty gives evidence at the appeal, with Rush's parents Lee and Christine in the background.

Former AFP chief Mick Keelty gives evidence at the appeal, with Rush's parents Lee and Christine in the background. Photo: Jason Childs

Mr Keelty said Rush would have received a ''limited'' sentence if arrested in Australia, perhaps only a bond or fine.

Mr Phelan said Rush was not known to the AFP before, and, as a low-level courier, would have had no knowledge of the workings of the syndicate.

Their testimony was part of the defence case for Rush, in his last legal appeal to dodge a death sentence by firing squad.

The stony faces of Mr and Mrs Rush, sitting behind Mr Keelty and Mr Phelan in the court, spoke of their disgust at the AFP. The AFP alerted the Indonesians to the Bali nine drug syndicate knowing they could face the death sentence.

Lee Rush was so concerned about his drug-addicted son's trip to Bali that he got a friend and lawyer, Robert Myers, to call the AFP and beg them to stop Rush from leaving Australia.

Yesterday, Mr Keelty insisted the AFP had no knowledge of Rush's involvement until he boarded the plane along with the other smugglers already on the AFP's radar. ''My recollection is he was added to the list because of the time he travelled,'' said Mr Keelty, who made no mention of Mr Myers's call.

Mr Myers insists he was called back by the AFP and told that Rush would be stopped.

While Mr Phelan confirmed that the Indonesians had no idea about the Bali nine until the AFP informed them, Mr Keelty said it would have been impossible to have arrested Rush before he left, as he had yet to commit an offence.

Why not wait for Rush to return to Australia before arresting him? Mr Keelty said: ''Sometimes the foreign police force allows these people to return to Australia as part of the co-operation.''

While Australia had to respect Indonesia's right to act within its jurisdiction, Mr Keelty said ''normally we would ask them to allow them to come back to Australia''. But Mr Keelty did not mention that the first letter sent to the Indonesian police informing them of the Bali nine did the opposite.

The letter, sent on April 8, 2005, said: ''Should they suspect that [Bali nine death-row inmate Andrew] Chan and/or the couriers are in possession of drugs at the time of their departure, that they take what action they deem appropriate.''

Last year, the Rudd government introduced guidelines to prevent the AFP from putting Australians at risk of the death penalty overseas. But sources yesterday said that another Bali nine situation could occur again as the AFP could act in the same way.

With DYLAN WELCH


The Age
 
So is this story similar to the Bali 9 arrested a while ago dating back a few years? Im not quite sure what actually happened to them but i think they got there sentences reduced from death penalty to life or sumfn like that. It sickens me to see people being caught then jailed for life or having the death penalty imposed on them just because of one silly mistake. Serial killers get away with alot less harsher punishments. Of course drugs cause alot of crimes but it is in no way comparable to someone who has taken someone else's life. Just makes me sick and that country in general makes me sick as well. I think no matter what the circumstances are NO ONE should have the death penalty imposed on them unless they have taken someones life away.
 
^^ Uh, Scott Rush is appealing his death sentence right now, he's had ex-Commissioner of the AFP, Mick Keelty pleading with the judges not to shoot the poor bastard over the last day or two. Jesus. Do you not watch the news or read newspapers or anything like that?
 
bit_pattern said:
^^ Uh, Scott Rush is appealing his death sentence right now, he's had ex-Commissioner of the AFP, Mick Keelty pleading with the judges not to shoot the poor bastard over the last day or two. Jesus. Do you not watch the news or read newspapers or anything like that?
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Naah not really. There is shit happening on a daily basis all the time. I just cant keep up with all the latest shit unfortunately.
 
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