It sounds as an invented story but the problem is that we live in year 2013 with social networks where even strangers can investigate family members and friends. Because the criminals are also operating internationally they can very easy arrange for a little traffic accident back home so parents, siblings and other extended family can be hurt if the tourists are not following the instructions from the criminals. If you while you were on Holiday were presented with photos of your nephews, siblings, parents etc. would you be able to decide whether the photos were taken from a social network, Instragram or Google Street View or the result of a person back home who has taken the photos when stress are added because they even put a gun to your head?
No of course not! You have to follow their orders!
Because police has become better catching smugglers, an operation are often done in group where the criminal masterminds expect to lose some of the drug mules. In this case they expected the two women to be caught so other smugglers using the same plane could carry drugs in larger quantities while the police were busy taking photographs of their catch for the media.
The real smugglers may not even be other passengers. In Copenhagen Airport a criminal group of baggage handlers were caught who operated with baggage handlers in other countries.
These girls were setup not when they arrived in Peru but the very minute they decided to leave for a holiday. Employees at the hotel would very easily be able to give contact information for every guest to the criminals so they can start to Google their victims and give the impression that they have been selected as drug mules after months of investigation. Remember that when you book a hotel or pay with your credit card, you give criminals a lot of information they can use searching for personal information about your beloved family members back home.
We are no longer anonymous when we arrive in a foreign country. Due to the Internet it is very easy to find out about everything not only about yourself but also about your family.
What can you do to keep yourself safe?
- First and foremost - set all social networks of your entire family to private before you leave for holiday. In fact does it before you order the tickets because a recent case in Denmark proved that criminals were informed by employees at the travel agencies which houses were empty for certain periods. We don't know who employees at the travel agencies work with. We don't know who the employees at the hotel abroad work with. Don't become a victim by giving up any information in advance.
- Second - avoid destinations where the criminals are known to work. Ibiza is such a place. Romania is another. They spike drinks so you can drink more putting your health at risk.
- Third: If they get you, end your life or try so they get the impression that you are mentally instable. They cannot use a drug mule who acts out. If you are caught the prison standard will kill you anyway even if you get off with a prison sentence as short as a few months. Your family will have to pay for your protection inside the prison - even the food. The criminals have friends inside and if you have told anything but your name they will kill you and the police will not be able to protect you and in fact they have little interest in your life because they have got their 5 minutes of fame when they caught you.
There are no longer drug mules who do it for money. 10-20 years ago a lot of students saw it as their only chance to get their student loans paid. Recent studies have showed people that studying long and hard doesn't pay unless your social heritage allows your to get your education paid fully, so the dropout rate in Denmark are now 20 percent and it is just as the Danish Industry want because they believe that too many get their high school diploma compared to the jobs available. It leaves drug mules who are pressured into crime and because it is a lose-lose situation regardless of the choice people make it is safer to avoid traveling abroad at all and if it cannot be avoid then to set up precautions so you don't end up as a victim.
Source:
- Gang 'run by nephew of rock star Phil Collins recruited British drug mules' accused of trying to smuggle £1.5m of cocaine out of Peru (The Daily Mail)
- Rejsebureau-ansat bag indbrud hos kunder (Ekstra Bladet - article in Danish)
- Lufthavnsansatte anholdt for heroin-smugling (Jydske Vestkysten - article in Danish)
I have been reading this post over and over again. Something is missing. What was the financial situation of these girls? Were they from good solid families? Had they borrowed money to finance their fine education? I am asking this because I remember a case many years back where a mother and a daughter smuggled drugs from Thailand and were caught down there.
ReplyDeleteIn the start they gave a story about the mother being very ill and the daughter getting along because she wanted to pay for an operation which could prolong the life of the mother. Everyone told that the mother was terminal ill. Guess what? The mother lived for years and it turned out that the daughter came from the working class and had borrowed a lot of money so she could get an education. It was the reason for her crime. If you go to a bank in Denmark the highest interest rates you can get is if you have a poor background and you state that you want to borrow money for education. Most people lie and tell the banks that they want to buy a car or a radio so the interest rates are cheaper. This daughter wanted a high style life and didn’t want to work the debt off so she turned to smuggling.
I suspect that these girls have so to say cheated themselves to a lifestyle which is above the class they were born into and it disturbs the order of a society. That is the lesson we have learned in Denmark. That is why it is almost impossible for children of poor parents to get an academically education. That is why children of immigrants in Denmark often turn to crime. They are frustrated because none tells the truth to them that they cannot make it in Denmark because our tradition demands generations of hard work because they are accepted as equals. A native Dane cannot even move from Copenhagen to Jutland without being considered as a kind of foreigner.
The daughter from the Danish smuggling case used her dual citizenship to get extradited to the United States where she continues to hide from her creditors. In fact the state of Denmark because whenever a student loan is not paid back the state has to cover the loss the bank suffers. You can say that she got free from the crime without consequences and we Danish tax-payers are those who are punished.
I hope that the truth is found in this case and one way to find out is to warn everyone to travel to Spain for their holiday. Once the money flow from the tourists is gone the police in Spain will start a real investigation by arresting everyone who has even the slightest connection to Peru. Only mass-imprisonment can put the pressure on Peru which everyone knows is a corrupted country to participate in the investigation and send these girls back to the UK so they can live the rest of their lives in shame.
I also remember this case. Was her name Nameth? Her mother had cancer but it was treated rather easily. The mother was transferred to Denmark where she had to serve 15 years because it should look like the Thai police wasn't bribed into arresting the two women so a larger drug quantity could pass the same custom officers unnoticed.
ReplyDeleteThe case had a huge impact scaring children from low income families from establishing debt while they were trying to achieve a higher education. People learned that you cannot cheat the social heritage. The mother had been a drug user for many years and the daughters destiny hadn't she committed the crime was to either serve as a shop assistant or even worse a parking attendant which is almost the same as being a prostitute.
Instead she made the choice to study and it is expensive in Denmark. Normally she would have gained the possibility to leave her children better off while accepting that the debt would have made it impossible for her to ever own a house or a car.
She made the choice to commit a crime and it is only fair that she got punished regardless of how much the police in Thailand are corrupt.