Brits Bella May Culley, 18, Charlotte May Lee, 21, and Isabella Daggett, 21, are all facing lengthy prison sentences in harsh overseas prisons if convicted of drug smuggling
Three British women are now being held in brutal prisons as they deny drug smuggling charges abroad and here is all we know about each case.
Bella May Culley, 18, was the first to hit the headlines after she was arrested after flying into Georgia from Thailand on May 11 and pictured on national television in handcuffs. And then that was quickly followed by former TUI stewardess Charlotte May Lee who arrived in Sri Lanka, again from Thailand, allegedly with a stash of cannabis in her luggage valued at £1.2million which she denied knowing anything about.
Isabella Dagget, 21, is another alleged drug mule who is being held in a hellhole Dubai prison where she has not been able to shower or change clothes. Her case has been highlighted by her family after she was arrested in March, just five weeks after moving to the United Arab Emirates for work.
The arrests have led to fears that naive holidaymakers or expats are being targeted by local gangs to traffick drugs in their luggage. All three cases appear to have in common that there were other people involved and their exact roles are not yet clear.
Bella May Culley
Bella May Culley, from Billingham, County Durham, is accused of carrying about 14kg of cannabis and around 2kg of hashish into Georgia. Little is still known about how she came to be caught at Tblisi Airport after her family reported her missing in Thailand.
She faces a lengthy spell behind bars if found guilty — which could be life if she receives a severe sentence. She was regularly on social media during a dream holiday which her family said she went on before starting to study nursing. But the reason for where she travelled remains unclear although there has been mention of a mystery male called ‘Ross or Russ’ in the Philippines before she went to meet a group of young men from the northwest of England in Thailand.
Bella May, who told a court she is pregnant, is currently being held at Tblisi’s only female prison, the infamous Women’s Prison No 5 where her dad Niel visited her this week and is believed to have dropped off a bag.
A new lawyer representing the Brit, Malkhaz Salakaia, said the teenager had requested fruit and warmer clothing. It comes after we reported last week how dad Niel faced an agonising wait to be reunited with her.
Their first meeting was said to have lasted two hours. The lawyer said his client was ready to defend herself in court, the BBC reported. Mr Salakaia said Bella does not have any complaints about the location of detention. Asked whether he would describe Bella as an adequate adult, he answered “no”. His impression was that she was “not far from childhood”. During the meeting, Bella was reportedly also giving evidence to investigators.
Charlotte May Lee
Charlotte May Lee, 21, was arrested after landing in Sri Lanka from Thailand last week, and is accused of having 46kg of the drug in her luggage. The part-time beautician from Chipstead, Surrey is currently being held in a “rotting” cell near the capital of Colombo. She had just landed from Bangkok when she was arrested at Bandaranaike Airport on May 12 and she has been held in custody since.
She reportedly claims that a British man of Pakistani origin who she only knows by the first name Dan, bought her the airline ticket. He also is alleged to have given her the suitcases which he packed while providing cash for the airline’s excess baggage fee and he said one of the bags contained his clothing.
‘Dan’ is also supposed to have told her that Sir Lanka was a “lovely place for a holiday” and that they would have a “wonderful time” but he had to first remain in Bangkok to see a friend, before joining her.
Police sources in Sri Lanka, reported the Mail, said that Charlotte has changed her story various times, while claiming her to be “desperate and incredibly naive”. She apparently said that she knew nothing more about Dan – not even his surname or phone number.
It is also claimed that she said she had never visited Sri Lanka before but police believe she came in January. “This woman is in a lot of trouble and will not help herself by failing to tell the truth,” reportedly said the police source. “The investigation is only just beginning and we will be looking closely at her previous visit, who she was with and where she went.”
Currently she is at Negombo Prison, north of the capital, and she was told in court this week that she may not be sentenced for another 12 months while she could face 25 years in jail at the brutal Welikada Prison if convicted.
Isabella Daggett
Isabella Daggett, 21, from Leeds, is understood have been arrested just five weeks after moving from Yorkshire to start a new job in the United Arab Emirates.
But her family insist she was taken by police simply for being “in the wrong place at the wrong time” and has never used drugs. And she has not taken a shower or even changed her clothes in months after being banged up in a prison in March, her family claims.
She was working for a businessman doing internet recruiting for construction sites in the UK and he offered to send her to the Middle East for a similar role. But police in Dubai allegedly arrested her along with another man not long after she arrived in Dubai.
Her grandmother Heather Smith told the DailyMail : “Bella has been locked up because she was in the wrong company. Wrong place, wrong time. Wrong boyfriend. The bloke she was working for said for her to come to Dubai, you’ll love it there, the lifestyle is wonderful. Now she is locked up. But she is innocent because they have done all the tests and there was nothing in her system.”
Exactly what charges Ms Daggett faces have not been made public. Mrs Smith said: “She was arrested with a lad, who was not her boyfriend, with whom she was staying because things had fallen through with another house. She didn’t really like him that much. He may be guilty of something, but she isn’t. We told Bella before she went to Dubai, ‘you know the rules in Dubai, play by the rules, don’t flaunt this, don’t do that’.”