Authors: Schapelle Corby
I looked anxiously around at Mum and Merc, who were sitting behind me, in the front row. They knew exactly how I was feeling; this was their life, too. Mum blew me a kiss. Just seeing them, their loving looks, their smiles saying ‘It’s OK’, helped me to relax a little. But even before it had all begun, tears were pouring down my face. It all hurt so much.
I am so relieved to finally have it starting; the Indonesian courts never find anyone innocent because they can be sued, so I’m mentally preparing myself for a stay here: depressing.
Diary entry, 27 January 2005
I still couldn’t quite comprehend the bitter twist in my fate. Someone out there knew I was enduring this hell instead of them. How did they sleep? Didn’t they feel the guilt? Would they ever come forward? I wasn’t so naive as to believe they would, but I fantasised and even dreamt about it sometimes. But the reality was, I was in the hot seat taking the rap.
It felt like a bad omen when my translator didn’t show up. Vasu suggested that we could use his secretary, Eka, who happened to be with him in court and who spoke English pretty well. She wasn’t a professionally trained translator, but the judges swore her in anyway just so we could start. It was another mistake.
The next thirty minutes were tough. Tears just kept pouring down my face as I sat shocked and helplessly listening to the lies – lies that could help take away my life. In his indictment, the chief prosecutor claimed I’d acted suspiciously when I walked over to pick up my bag, that I’d refused to open it when I first got to customs and that I’d claimed the marijuana was mine. None of it was true. Not for the first time, I was left in no doubt the police would do whatever it took to send me down. They hadn’t managed to trick me into a signed confession, their stunt in the Polda visitors’ room had failed, so now they were just going to make it up.
This was insane. How could they lie? My head was spinning. I felt sick and dizzy. This was my life. I could feel the cameras and microphones closing in on me, everyone staring at me, scrutinising me, waiting for my reaction. I felt like collapsing in tears or running to my mum for a hug. But I sat still and took some deep breaths as I desperately tried to stay in control. I focused straight a head, clasped my hands and prayed. When the judge asked if I understood, I answered, ‘I understand, but it’s not true.’ It was bullshit and a bitter taste of what would come.
The prosecutor told the court I’d been charged with possession, which could lead to ten years in jail, and drug trafficking, which carried the death sentence. My heart squeezed even tighter.
When the devastating thirty minutes were over, I didn’t want to stand up. I was full of terror and fighting for my life, but in this moment it was sweat marks down my bum that panicked me. It was so hot. I could feel my shirt completely glued to my soaking back and beads of sweat dripping from the bend in my knees. What if my dark brown skirt was covered in sweaty patches from the little plastic chair? There were so many people right behind me who’d see! I finally stood up when the perplexed guards became impatient. Every week after that, Merc put a towel down on the chair for me before I arrived.
I was taken back to the tiny holding cell around the back. All twenty of us were crammed in like monkeys, with people crouched down on the concrete floor or leaning up against the bars or walls. The air was hot and sticky with a hazy blue hue from all the cigarette smoke. Everyone was smoking. It was hard to breathe and my eyes were badly irritated, red and sore. In the corner was the dirty, stinky cell toilet, which became my hideout from prying cameras in the weeks ahead. I ended up spending so much time shut in there that Mum started coming in early and scrubbing it clean for me.
It would be another week before I went to court again, as my case was heard on only one day a week. This meant it would drag on for months, but at least it would give us more time to get evidence.
So hard to concentrate: the courtroom is covered with cameras, reporters, TV cameras sitting on the floor in the middle of the court, and when I speak all these microphones are placed down on the table in front of me, and there’s a window behind me with people speaking in Indonesian. Cameramen calling ‘Corby, Corby’ in my ear; as I turn, they snap the camera. Couldn’t they have a little respect? I have to be completely aware and with no distractions: I am on trial for my life! Don’t they understand?
Diary entry, 3 February 2005
For the next two weeks, the prosecution witnesses backed up the lies in the indictment with their own lies. It was shattering. If they’d done their jobs properly in the first place, I wouldn’t have been fighting for my life. But it was obvious that with no secondary evidence from the police’s botched non-investigation, their lying testimonies were going to be used instead.
First up was Gusti Winata, who was the customs officer who’d originally asked James whether the bag was his. He testified that he’d asked me to open my boogie-board bag but I’d refused and said, ‘Nothing in there.’
‘She was nervous, then I opened it myself. My hand was stopped and she said, “No.” When I opened it a bit, she yelled, “No!”
‘I asked, “Why?”
‘She said, “I have some . . .” and looked confused. I asked the suspect what was in the plastic bags. She said, “That’s marijuana.”
‘I asked her, “How do you know?”
‘She said, “I smelt it when you opened the bag.”’
I was trembling with fury and shook my head in utter disbelief. I focused ahead and clasped my shaky hands tightly in my lap. When the judge asked if I agreed, I said, ‘No, he’s lying.’
He then asked me to point out what was untrue.
‘Well, firstly he didn’t ask me to open the bag. He just asked whose bag it was. I opened the bag, and I don’t remember saying anything or hitting anyone’s hand. I opened the bag and then I closed it. I was scared. I didn’t know what it was. Then when I closed my boogie-board bag up, a strong smell came out. I was very scared; I didn’t know what was going on.’
The second customs officer, Komang Gelgel, said I looked suspicious as I went to collect my bag, and then gave the incredible and damning evidence that I had admitted owning the marijuana. ‘She said, “This is mine, I own it.”’
My response to this was: ‘I was not suspicious-looking or acting restless. I was happy because I was on a holiday and I love Bali. I open it, I lift it up, and I’m surprised: there’s a plastic bag half-open . . . And I close it up; I can smell it. I never at any stage stated that that marijuana belonged to me. Never, ever, have I stated that.’
It was my word against theirs. But there was one bit of evidence I thought might speak louder than words. When I had arrived at customs, the inner plastic bag had been slashed, exposing the marijuana through the unzipped outer bag. Bits of it were even sticking out. This was proof that the bag had been tampered with. Surely the judges’ legal brains could plainly see that. I would not have cut it open, whether I put it in or not. Someone had tampered with the bag.
But there was no explanation and, unsurprisingly, no further investigation. When the judge asked the customs officers if they’d slashed it, they said ‘No’, and added that no one else at customs had touched it either. The judge did not ask any further questions about it. It was just another thing the judges had no interest in chasing up.
My lawyer’s theory was that a customs officer had cut it after spotting it on the X-ray machine out the back. Mr Winata testified that he had seen something suspicious in the boogie-board bag when it went through the machine but did not put a blue chalk cross on it, as they routinely did when a suspicious bag went through, because he thought no one would pick it up. I suspect he thought no one would pick it up if it had a blue cross on it because he knew exactly what was inside it. He’d already seen and smelt it. This didn’t make me innocent, but it added to their rule-breaking bungling of my case.
The outer bag had not been fingerprinted because it was ‘contaminated’ by the very people now giving evidence against me. They broke the rules: they didn’t wear gloves. But now it seemed very likely that the inner bag had also been touched. Was that why the police and prosecutors had refused to fingerprint it, despite our continual pleas to do so? We had pleaded for months for it to be fingerprinted. The fact is they refused. Why?
Can’t help but break down when I see that plastic bag. It has destroyed my life.
Diary entry, 3 February 2005
When the judge called for the bag of marijuana to be put on his bench, it was not treated like evidence but like an old bale of hay. Bits of it were being pulled out and falling everywhere. When a bit fell on the floor, the judge just casually bent down, picked it up and put it back. The smell was so strong that the judge even put a tissue over his nose – proving that it was one hell of a smell for check-in staff or sniffer dogs to have missed if it had been in my bag and cut open when I had checked in.
But the most shocking thing was that everyone – the judges, the prosecutors and the customs officers – started touching the ‘uncontaminated’ inner bag. My blood went cold. How could this be happening? The judge was not only letting it happen but also taking part in ruining evidence. Right up until this point we had been pleading with the judge to have that inner bag fingerprinted. It would at least be something – proof my fingerprints were not on it. But right before our eyes, my last hopes of forensic evidence were dashed.
The most sinister moment came when Winata handled the inner bag. To my mind, there was no mistaking his clear intention to touch it. It was a deliberate action. He put his hand inside the outer bag, then tugged at the inner bag. It was such a bizarre and unnecessary thing to do. Mum has a videotape of that extraordinary moment. Why did he need to put his hand in and touch the inner bag? Was he concerned that the judge might finally agree to have it fingerprinted?
As all hands kept grasping at the marijuana, Merc yelled out to Lily and Erwin (another lawyer Lily had brought in to help her) to make them stop. Erwin replied that this would be good for my defence, as they were breaking more rules. But it turned out to be just another bit of lost evidence.
Today we were taken to the court in a smaller police van that seats four in the back. They decided to take a different route, which was a very bumpy and dangerous ride along a road/rocky track. The driver was on a power trip: almost had so many head-ons, and at one stage a motorbike crashed into the back of us as we came to a sudden stop.
Diary entry, 11 February 2005
My third day in court started with just the same craziness. The mad drive, the media scrum and then the insane lack of order in the courtroom. The laid back judge didn’t seem to give a damn about it.
As the first anti-drug squad officer sat down to give evidence, he casually placed his gun between his feet. There was no objection from the judge, but it was a little indelicate, given the penalty I was facing, and I urged Lily to tell him to put it somewhere else. He did. He simply picked it up and placed it on the edge of the prosecutors’ table, where it was well within the reach of all the people constantly walking in and out of the busy side door. Anyone could have snatched it and fired.
There were two officers helping to make the prosecution case against me by telling more lies. It seemed like they’d been told to strengthen it a bit. Not only did they confirm what the first two customs officers had said, but they claimed my reactions at the customs desk had been even more dramatic. This was despite the fact they’d been standing fifteen metres away from the desk. Both also claimed that I’d said the plastic bag of marijuana belonged to me. Neither spoke English.
More lies, more lies! I’m so tired of listening to the same shit over and over.
Diary entry, 11 February 2005
Both officers demonstrated, with sweeping hand gestures, how I supposedly stopped Winata opening my bag. Police officer Gusti Astawa said: ‘The hand of Gusti Winata was stopped and pressed by Corby when he started to open the bag. She said, “No! No! I have something.”’
My heart was slamming against my chest. I couldn’t stop my tears. How could this be happening? This was such bullshit. These people were lying, just telling straight-out
lies
. But again, it was my word against theirs. There had to be something to
prove
I was telling the truth.
I put it to the judge: ‘Do they have a security camera to prove I opened it myself? Isn’t there a camera to say that . . . to help me save my life? If it’s the death sentence, don’t they have something to help me here?’
Erwin also asked if the existence of security camera vision could be investigated, saying that after all his client was on trial for her life.
The judge initially agreed that enquiries should be made but later said, ‘We’ll get it if we need to’! He obviously never felt the need. Why? Would it prove my story by showing that I had happily collected my bag and in one swift movement willingly flung it up on the customs desk and unzipped it? Yes! Yes, it would!
They give the death sentence to drug traffickers but it’s the customs officers’ and the police officers’ words against mine. Me, a mere traveller . . . the death sentence. These customs officers and police officers are obviously not given any training; they do not wear gloves, they do not take fingerprints, no interrogation questions, nothing. No tape recorders, surveillance cameras, nothing to back me up. My word against theirs. You’d think that if a country gives out the death sentence they’ll be equipped to give the accused a fair trial for their life!