A young woman with a heroin addiction, who was thrown out of her home then tricked into becoming a drug courier, has told judges that she is now a changed woman and pleaded for a second chance.
In February, the 20-year-old Bahraini woman was acquitted of drug trading charges for snitching on her dealer, but was sentenced to three years in prison and fined BD1,000 for possessing an assortment of narcotics.
The Lebanese man, who coerced the woman into working for him, was sentenced in absentia to life in prison (25 years) and fined BD5,000 by the High Criminal Court.
Her 27-year-old Bahraini boyfriend was sentenced to five years in prison and fined BD5,000 for delivering drugs alongside her.
The couple has since taken to the Supreme Criminal Appeals Court to contest the verdict.
“Your Honours, it is not a mystery to you the circumstances that led me to this position,” the female appellant told appeal judges in a handwritten letter, asking for a second chance to get her life back on track.
“I committed several mistakes that turned my life upside-down and tore my family apart.
“Being an addict and without a house to stay at, I believed at the time that there was no path in front of me except this one. But thank God, my arrest was a turning point that woke me up from this nightmare.
“I went through painful – very painful – withdrawal symptoms, but I am now a recovering young woman, who is happy to have her family back, who has ambitions and future plans awaiting her outside of prison.”
The court previously heard that her mum kicked her out of the family home due to her drug use. She was convicted of possessing pregabalin (Lyrica), morphine, meth, heroin and alprazolam (Xanax).
After being made to leave, the homeless appellant began sleeping in a rental car and started spending most of her time with her boyfriend, she earlier testified.
On a late night in June, the couple were spotted in the parking lot of a shopping centre in Saar. They were woken up by a policeman’s knocks on the car, and they appeared to be ‘in an impaired condition’.
The officer stated that, due to their state, he suspected them of having consumed narcotics and arrested them. Policemen later found a collection of narcotics in the vehicle.
“I started doing drugs with my boyfriend, and we bought them from Pakistanis via dead drops,” the 20-year-old earlier told the Public Prosecution.
“In June, my mum threw me out of our home because she believed that I returned to using drugs. I slipped further back into old habits.
“I rented a car, and I would drive my boyfriend to and from his job at a Lebanese restaurant. We were together all of the time, except when he was at work.”
She recounted that a Lebanese man, who she knew through a former friend, reached out offering her heroin a few days after she was told to move out of her room.
He quizzed her and found out she was unemployed and still using drugs, so he offered her the hits free of charge.
The estranged daughter did not know at the time that she was being set up by her supposed benefactor, who was entrapping her so she would have no choice but to join his ranks, the court heard.
A week after that conversation, the couple went to a building in Riffa to pick up a concealed package with drugs in it, which also contained two sensitive scales, empty packaging (baggies), a burner phone and a charging cable.
After using the stash for a few days, she claimed that the Lebanese man told them they would need to sell drugs in exchange for the package.
To compensate the man for his ‘gift’, she began packing and fulfilling orders for him, while her boyfriend dropped them off at designated locations to be later picked up by customers.
In a High Criminal Court hearing, the boyfriend took responsibility for the drug dealing, declaring before judges that his girlfriend was uninvolved and asserting her innocence. She earlier pleaded with prosecutors, asking for a second chance. “I just want to be with my mum and go to rehab.”
The court heard that the Lebanese man had been deported on account of a criminal case hearing a few months before this case came to trial.
The appeal verdict is set to be issued on April 27.
zainab@gdnmedia.bh
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