Why the Bali judges found innocent Schapelle guilty.
Why the Bali judges found innocent Schapelle guilty
ALMOST EVERY AUSTRALIAN knows who Schapelle Corby is.
On Friday May 27, 2005 an Indonesian court found the 27-year-old beautician from Australia's Gold Coast guilty of importing 4.1 kilograms of marijuana into Bali in her boogie-board bag in October 2004.
The court sentenced her to 20 years jail and fined her almost $14,000.
Most Australians have no sympathy for drug traffickers. In fact, most Aussies will tell you that drug traffickers deserve whatever punishment they get.
But Australians showed unprecedented sympathy and support for Schapelle Corby at the time. Why?
Because they did not believe she was guilty.
In fact, an early poll by television's Channel 7 found that more than 90 per cent of Australians believed she was innocent.
Accusations
After accusations from a former friend, Jodie Power, on Channel 7's Today Tonight program in February 2007 accusing Schapelle's sister Mercedes of being involved in drugs, many Australians thought Schapelle was guilty by association. A poll showed most of those surveyed now thought Jodie Power was telling the truth instead of the Corbys.
Both Mercedes Corby and her mother Rosleigh Rose sued Channel 7 over the allegations, and in May and June 2008 won undisclosed sums from Channel 7 in out-of-court settlements.
Early allegations were that Schapelle could have been an innocent victim of bag tampering by airport baggage handlers in Australia who were shifting drugs at the time authorities arrested Schapelle.
But Schapelle's former lawyer Robin Tampoe admitted in a TV documentary that baggage handlers had nothing to do with it.
Baggage handlers themselves said they would have noticed the weight difference if the drugs were in Schapelle's bag when it went through an Australian airport. (The drugs weighed twice as much as the boogie board.)
Family
There have been other suggestions that people close to Schapelle planted the drugs, although she has never accused them of this. Her half-brother James was carrying the bag through Customs at Bali airport when officers found the drugs. He was convicted of a drug-related home invasion on October 13, 2006.
In July 2008, Alan Trembath — Schapelle's father's cousin — said Schapelle's now-deceased father Michael had been involved in the drug trade for 30 years and had smuggled drugs into Bali. Trembath said Michael Corby had once offered him $80,000 to get involved.
But the next day, Trembath's sister Lyn Lack said Trembath's allegations were totally false. She told The Australian newspaper that Trembath hardly knew the Corby family, despite being Michael's cousin, and that Schapelle “probably didn't even know he existed”.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported on July 6 2008 that Schapelle's mother, Rosleigh Rose, said she could not believe her ex-husband ever had $80,000 to offer Trembath. “That was like a million dollars in those days,” she said. “We were buying $20 cars on Compton Road with no floor and I was at home with three kids in a housing commission house.”
Queenland Police also refused to accept Trembath's allegation, and said they had investigated the claim in 2004 and found no evidence that it was true. They said it was an old story that is now dead.
A few days later, Queensland's Premier, Anna Bligh, said rumors and allegations surrounding Schapelle Corby's family did not necessarily point to their involvement in trafficking drugs to Bali. “I don't think you judge people on the basis of who their family is,” Ms Bligh said.
Bribe claim
On July 13 2008, The Sydney Morning Herald website published an interview with Adelaide drug dealer Malcolm McCauley, who claimed the drugs in Schapelle's bag were her father's. McCauley said there was an “arrangement” involving Schapelle's father and corrupt Bali airport officials who would “pocket bribe money placed inside the bag” — usually US$1000 — in return for waving the drugs through.
The Brisbane Sunday Mail reported on the same day that Channel 7 and Channel 9 had allegedly offered McCauley up to $60,000 for his story.
Schapelle's sister Mercedes responded by urging the Australian Federal Police to urgently investigate and disprove Malcolm McCauley's claims. “This man is a self-confessed and convicted drug trafficker,” Mercedes said. She told The Sydney Morning Herald that her father loved his children and would never let them take the rap for something he had done, especially as he was dying of cancer and a jail term wouldn't matter to him.
“Schapelle was his baby girl. There's no way on earth he would let her go to jail for something he did,” Mercedes said.
On July 14 2008, Australian Federal Police rejected the Corby family's plea to investigate Malcolm McCauley's claim that Schapelle's father owned the drugs that were in Schapelle's bag. The police said they had already investigated similar claims and could find no evidence that Schapelle's father, Michael, had links to the drug trade. They were not going to investigate the same allegations again.
Judges
The bag of marijuana found in Schapelle's boogie-board bag was huge, and it was not locked. It would be a stupid person who would think this could escape detection through two Australian airports (Brisbane and Sydney) and an Indonesian airport. And Schapelle is not stupid.
So why did the Indonesian court find her guilty?
Because Indonesian law says to punish severely anyone caught with drugs in their possession. And the bag of dope was in Schapelle's belongings.
The Indonesian judges looked at it this way: Were the drugs in her possession? Yes. Did she show any remorse over bringing the drugs into the country? No.
Therefore she should receive a harsh punishment. And she did. She got 20 years' jail, even though some people thought she may get the death penalty.
To the judges' way of thinking, this was a reasonable sentence.
But most Australians are concerned that if someone plants drugs in your bag without your knowledge, you should not have to pay for the other person's crime. And you are not going to show remorse for something you did not do.
Innocent
Most people are suspicious of criminals who say they are innocent. But Schapelle is different. She looks innocent. She sounds innocent. And she almost certainly is innocent.
Among all her family, friends, teachers, former school-friends, relatives, and acquaintances, no-one has ever come forward to claim they believe Schapelle is guilty because of personal knowledge they have about drug taking or drug running.
Leading Australian criminologist Professor Paul Wilson gave evidence in Schapelle's defence at the trial, and Australian expert in lie detection Steve Van Aperen identified Schapelle as one of the few people telling the truth in an analysis of a large number of well-known people.
Professor Wilson pointed out on the ABC's 7.30 Report in March 2005 that Indonesian law is not like Australian law in which you are innocent until proven guilty. He said, “You have to understand that under Indonesian law you really have to prove your innocence.”
Religion
Schapelle found religion in jail and became a Christian. A Pentecostal pastor from Sydney baptized her in jail.
She almost certainly would have got an easier time if she had become a Muslim instead of a Christian. She didn't.
And she knows that she almost certainly would have received a lighter sentence if she had admitted guilt to the court. She wouldn't.
Twenty years' jail is a long time for this alleged crime — especially since the Indonesian court gave Abu Bakar Bashir only 30 months' jail for his “evil conspiracy” in the Bali nightclub bombing that killed 202 people.
Schapelle's sentence may have been right if you look at the crime the way the Bali judges did.
Tragically for Schapelle, it seems the judges may have
looked at it the wrong way. 
See also:
Photo of Schapelle Corby behind bars © Jason Childs. Some rights reserved under Creative Commons licence.
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