Inside Indonesian jail where drug-smuggling Brit gran is waiting to be executed

18 November 2023 , 08:34

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Lindsay Sandiford, in a cell after her trial at a court in Denpasar, is facing the death penalty (Image: AFP/Getty Images)

A woman who became a drugs mule is awaiting her execution by firing squad in one of the most brutal prisons in the world – which inmates describe as a "hellhole" with frequent "murders, rapes, drug overdoses and bashings".

Lindsay Sandiford, 64, is awaiting the date of her execution in one of the toughest prisons in Indonesia and the site of many deadly riots, known ironically as Hotel K. The grandmother-of-two was incarcerated in Kerobokan Prison in 2013 after she was caught with £1.6million of cocaine in her suitcase.

Sandiford, who was flying into Bali from Bangkok with 10.16 lb of cocaine in 2012, has now spent 10 years on Death Row. Smugglers face severe penalties in the country as around 80 percent of the prison's population are locked up on drug charges waiting to be executed.

Indonesian custom officers show off the drugs they caught Lindsay Sandiford carrying (AP)

The grandmother, from Redcar in Yorkshire, who has no previous convictions, claimed a UK-based drugs syndicate forced her to smuggle cocaine from Thailand to Bali by threatening the life of one of her two sons in Britain.

Despite co-operating with police in a sting to arrest those higher in the chain of command in the syndicate, she still received a death sentence, which triggered an outcry from human rights lawyers and former UK Director of Public Prosecutions Ken Macdonald who said she had been treated with "quite extraordinary severity".

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The British government has continually refused to fund Sandiford's appeal, despite a ruling from Supreme Court judges in London who said "substantial mitigating factors" had been overlooked in her original trial. The drugs syndicate's alleged ringleader Julian Ponder, 50, from Brighton, was freed from Kerobokan prison in late 2017 following rumours more than £1 million in bribes were paid to drop trafficking charges against him, his former partner Rachel Dougall, and fellow Brit Paul Beales. Dougall served one year and Beales four years for involvement in the conspiracy.

Kerobokan jail in Denpasar has been described as a 'hellhole' (AFP via Getty Images)

When and if her death penalty is carried out, Sandiford will be transferred to Nusa Kambangan – known as Execution Island – and shot by firing squad at midnight with up to a dozen other prisoners. She failed to lodge a final appeal so could face execution at any time.

She said: "I really cannot face asking anyone for help or having to deal with another lawyer. I just can't face it. I've been burnt enough times. I've had 10 different lawyers. If I actually turned my mind to the legal process I would get angry and bitter and it would be destructive."

Sandiford said she did not want the help of the Foreign Office after the shocking revelation about former vice-consul and Britain's top diplomat in Bali Alys Harahap's alleged seedy liaisons with Ponder. She said: "If they started getting involved, they would probably end up getting me shot even sooner."

Lindsay Sandiford spends a lot of time giving other inmates knitting classes (Newcastle Chronicle)

Her last contact with British officials was a letter from the holiday island's new British Vice Consul John Makin in October 2016 asking her to contact him if she wanted any assistance. Sandiford did not reply.

Now suffering from arthritis and visibly aged with grey hair, Sandiford spends days at a time knitting in the tiny five metres by five metres cell she has to share with four other women prisoners, most of them poorly educated locals also convicted of drug crimes. The grandmother's final wish is to just die as she battles it out in the brutally overpopulated jail.

The prison houses 1,300 inmates – four times its official capacity when it was built for in 1979, and has previously been described by inmates as a "hellhole" with frequent "murders, rapes, drug overdoses and bashings". Announcements and sirens on loudspeakers scream every day and inmates are constantly vying for space in the crowded cells.

However, despite the huge number of inmates waiting to be executed for drug smuggling, the last time the prison carried out a death penalty was in 2015. Prisoners have a choice to sit or stand when armed officers take their shots aimed at the heart. In the event that a prisoner survives a commander will shoot them in the head.

Paul Donald