Posted on 07/04/2005 12:43:41 AM PDT by Critical Bill
JUDGES in Bali have agreed to reopen the drug-smuggling case against Schapelle Corby to hear new evidence from up to thirty witnesses. The chief judge of Bali's High Court, Made Lingga, said he would allow Corby's lawyers to present new witnesses backing the former beauty therapy student's claims she did not know about 4.1 kilograms of marijuana found in her luggage at Bali airport last year.
One of the witnesses was said to be a person already in custody who had admitted owning the marijuana stash.
"The possibility of freedom is there if the alibi is true," Lingga said.
Lingga said that after reviewing the lower court decision to sentence Corby to 20 years in jail, he believed the original hearing had been "clear enough" and properly conducted.
But he said he would instruct the same three judges who presided over the original trial in the Denpasar District Court to reopen hearings and take evidence from any new witnesses who could be found.
Judge Lingga warned the defence team not to string out the appeal, instructing them to present only witnesses who could shed new light on the ownership of the drugs.
"This order is granted on behalf of Corby's lawyers who have asked for a fresh examination with witnesses who may add favour to leniency requests for the convicted." Advertisement:
Corby's pistol-packing celebrity counsel Hotman Paris Hutapea said the High Court's decision was encouraging and the result of three letters he had written to the court president.
But he challenged the Australian government now to play its part and help uncover fresh evidence backing Corby's claims of innocence, including the identities of the real masterminds behind the drug shipment.
"My message is to (Prime Minister) John Howard and the Australian public, if Corby is not released, it will be mostly because of your government's unwillingness to help," Hutapea said.
"We Indonesians, including the High Court, now give a chance, so please do not blame the Indonesian court and Indonesian people anymore."
Corby and her lawyers have repeatedly insisted she was the unwitting courier for a drug smuggling gang using Australia's airports and corrupt baggage handlers to shift narcotics between Brisbane and Sydney using unlocked passenger luggage.
During her original trial the Federal Government allowed a Victorian prisoner to travel to Bali and tell the court how he overheard a jail cell conversation about Corby being an unsuspecting drug "mule" used by the gang.
Australian QC Mark Trowell, who was called in to assist Corby's team, said he was delighted by the development.
"It's good to see a lot of hard work has paid off for her," he told reporters in Perth.
Can't they do a private deposition or something like that. It's not like Bali courts have to worry about the openness laws of Australia or America.
It's a political exercise - the Indonesian courts are trying to show that she is getting every advantage they can give her. They really want people to believe she has had a fair trial, so from her perspective they want this done in public - so if it turns out this evidence doesn't hold up, everyone can see that is the case.
Which will be kind of difficult if there is a divide between the societies on what 'fair' is.
This is the first time that someone has suggested a plausible explanation -- Bali is being used as a waypoint for intra-Australia smuggling. Australia and Indonesia should work together to get to the bottom of this, and if it turns out that Corby looks like an unwitting mule, then let her go.
Actually the claim is - and it's been around for months now - that drugs were placed in her luggage at one Australian airport to be removed at another, and the pick up was missed so they flew on to Bali.
There's no real evidence for the claim, although it's not entirely implausible as there certainly were problems with baggage handlers at the airports in question.
It did come up at her trial and a witness was allowed to appear who said this had happened based on information he had overheard in an Australian prison - the new claim is that somebody has now admitted the drugs were theirs.
If that is so, then it might make a difference - provided their claims are credible.
Frankly, I do think she has had a fair trial - I'm not sure if she's guilty, but with the evidence that existed, I think an Australian jury probably have returned a guilty verdict. I've no problem with the case being reopened if there is new evidence - but on the evidence at trial, I think the verdict is reasonable.
But if Indonesia wants people like me to continue believing she got a fair trial, they have to do it openly - I don't trust their system enough to trust it if it isn't open.
Hopefully justice will be served, however it turns out for Corby, regardless of impending Larry King shows. I haven't tuned in to one of his programs since he was on Mutual radio in the middle of the night.
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