A British beautician facing decades behind bars after being accused of smuggling cocaine into the US from Mexico has insisted she believed she was only carrying bags of cash across the border.
Kim Hall, 28, from Middlesbrough, was arrested after Homeland Security agents intercepted the loaded suitcases at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport in August.
Investigators unzipped them and found 43kg of cocaine stuffed inside – worth a staggering £15 million.
Now facing up to 60 years in prison, Kim pleaded: ‘I’m not a bad person. I’ve never been in trouble in my life and I’m not guilty of what they are accusing me of.’
The beautician claims she was offered a free holiday to Cancun by two British men she had befriended on an earlier getaway, but by the end of her week-long stay she says they asked her to take two suitcases carrying $250,000 home with her.
‘I agreed to it because there was no reason not to. It was just money, and I didn’t see anything wrong in it,’ she told The Sun
‘I had no suspicion that this was about drugs.’
But she described events taking a sinister turn when she missed her first two flights out – one because of a mix-up over times and another because she didn’t have an electronic US visa.
She claims the two men started threatening her ‘because they thought I was trying to avoid taking the suitcases’.
‘One of them dragged me off the bed by my hair and held a handgun to my head,’ Kim said.
‘He said, “I’ll f***ing shoot you”. It was the most frightening thing I’ve ever experienced. I was screaming at them to let me go. I thought, I’m going to end up dead if I don’t carry this money.’
The peril of her situation finally sunk in as she watched the agents unpack the cases before placing her in handcuffs.
Kim said she was so ‘hysterical, upset and confused’ that she asked one officer if America ‘still has the death penalty’.
Her dad John has previously spoken out to insist his daughter is guilty only of ‘stupidity and naivety’.
He told the newspaper: ‘We’ll do everything we can to bring her home. She is innocent.’
Kim’s is currently on bail but has to wear an electronic tag as she awaits her next court appearance this week to fix a date for her trial.
She is charged with unlawful possession of a controlled substance and intent to deliver it and faces a sentence of 15 to 60 years in jail.
The Foreign Office has said: ‘We are supporting a British woman detained in the US and are in touch with the local authorities.’
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