‘MY DREAM JOB LANDED ME IN JAIL’

Teresa Daniels

NEWS OF THE WORLD

Sunburn and insect bites aren’t the only things to worry about on holiday. British women are being increasingly targeted by traffickers who plant drugs in their luggage or in gifts. You didn’t know, so you won’t be in trouble, right? Wrong, as Terry Daniels, 36, discovered...

I spent the night in the small, dingy room. The next morning; the guards hammered on the door and I was taken for questioning. With the help of a translator, I explained which suitcase was mine, why I was on holiday with Antonio and how I knew him. I kept repeating the drugs were nothing to do with me. Then I was told that we were being taken to court the next day. As they locked me in a cell in the local police station, I couldn't stop crying. I knew I was innocent but I was being treated like a criminal and I was scared.

After 12 years of support from lawyers, MPs, the media and organisations like Prisoners Abroad and Fair Trials International, I secured a partial pardon in December 2008, reducing my sentence to six years. On January 29, 2009, after serving three years and three months, I was allowed home. I ran to the phone and asked my mum to pick me up. She got there at 7pm and gave me a hug. We were both in tears - but so happy that I was free.