GEORGE TOWN: The police foiled a Georgian woman’s maiden attempt to smuggle five kilogrammes of Syabu (‘ice’) inside photo frames, into the island, via the Penang International Airport in Bayan Lepas on Monday.
Now, the 37-year-old woman is dismayed she had been treading on thin ice over her link to an international drug syndicate.
The authorities are framing charges against her under Section 39B of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 which carries the mandatory death penalty upon conviction.
About noon, the woman — believed to be a drug mule — brought the syabu worth about RM1.3 million to hand over to a local ‘contact’.
However, she had hardly arrived at the airport when she found herself surrounded by a team of narcotics policemen who found the Syabu hidden in specially-modified photo frames inside her travel suitcase.
State police chief Deputy Commissioner Datuk Wira Ayub Yaakob said the police detained the woman as soon as she arrived from the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA).
“A check (of the woman’s luggage) led to the seizure of four photo frames inside which 28 packets of Syabu weighing 5.289kg were found hidden,” he told reporters here yesterday.
He said the police were in the midst of determining the destination of the drug whose street value was in the region of about RM1.3 million.
Ayub said initial police investigations had not ruled out the probability the woman might have been working with an accomplice. — Bernama