this is terrible. I hope the appeal helps, though going by the psycho judge, i have my doubts.

Mate, I'm so not ever going to holiday in Bali. Fuckers. Huzzah for the war on drugs.

...By which I mean, Bali ain't getting any of my money. Which is unfortunate, because they need it.

Seriously, the place exists for the sole purpose of allowing aussies to get shitfaced. To encourage that, while locking someone away for 20 years for a very suspicious load of cannabis is fucking unforgivable.

Not surprising though, considering that the judge has never brought down a not guilty verdict in a drugs case.

jimbob, I have been to Bali - you are not missing much.

dg - if by bali, you mean kuta, you're probably right, and you didn't miss out on much.

jimbob - and yes, aussies have somehow imagined that the place exists for the sole purpose of them getting shitfaced.

but there are many other things to see and do there. and it's a breathtaking pace if you leave the beaten trail.

personally i think she's guilty of the importation charges - but the draconian drug laws in indonesia are unwarranted, especially for vegetable matter.

it's a real pity she obviously couldn't get out her fist full of foreign currency to buy them off quickly enough, before it degenerated into this media circus.

i guess it's become a matter of saving face now.

She has to pay $A14,000 or she gets an extra 6 months huh. Well you'd invest it now and not pay it until just before the 20 years is up. Should be a tidy little bonus at the end.
That was pretty disingenuous of the family friend to invoke the tsunami aid card.
I've really tried to avoid the case as much as possible. I knew the basic 'facts'. I have no opinion really. But I doubt that there'd be many Aussies that would ever have bothered trying to export ganja. Skunk seeds YES. But not weed. That's quite silly on the face of it.

o/t:[Oh....dg -- do you have any plans to come down to Sydney at any stage? There may be another meetup brewing.]

personally i think she's guilty of the importation charges - but the draconian drug laws in indonesia are unwarranted, especially for vegetable matter.
Which ignores the simple fact that, to be guilty, she must have paid way more for the grass than she could possibly sell it for in Bali. You have to ask why someone would do that?

dg - i asked myself that. and then i realised - you can't easily get the chronic in bali (as opposed to local bush weed), and there's a real market for it (at least according to some indo friends i spoke to).

The market would be Aussies I'd reckon soi-disant. Would locals be paying $$huge for bitchin' gear? I doubt that most could afford it.

you're right on both counts peacay. the market is aussies. and the locals can't afford it.

[hmm. another meetup you say? is there a timeframe on said event yet?]

(well, aussies and other monied tourists, anyway)

meetup will be posted in the usual way....i just thought I'd sound out dg while I was in here. If he's got schedule it'd be just fairer to work around him. Or at least that's what the benevolent part of me thought. My felonious side sees potential quarry, but that's another story altogether.

No trips planned to the deep south at this stage, unfortunately.

I think on the evidence provided her sentence was valid under Indonesian law. It does suck, sure, but the law is the law. Personally I hope she wins her appeal though and comes back to Australia. The poor woman must be so fucked up mentally now that her life will never be the same anyway. Oh, and this is my first post here. Hello everyone. I'm Scott from Melbourne Australia.