A young Adelaide woman faces up to 25 years in a Colombian prison after she was caught with 5.8 kilograms of cocaine in her suitcase, but her family say that the CFS volunteer is innocent.
Cassandra Sainsbury, a 22-year-old personal trainer from Moana, was arrested on drugs trafficking charges at El Dorado International Airport, in Bogotá, on April 11, just minutes before she was due to board a plane back to Australia.
Sainsbury, who is also a volunteer for South Australia’s Country Fire Service (CFS), was in Columbia on what should have been a working holiday and now faces the maximum penalty of 20 to 25 years.
The cocaine was allegedly hidden inside 15 pairs of headphones Ms Sainsbury bought before her departure. It is believed that in the few days prior to her return to Australia, Sainsbury who was on a solo marketing trip to promote personal training, had wanted to buy headphones for her wedding party while shopping with a male friend she had met just before travelling to South America.
Ms Sainsbury said the friend had taken her to buy them from a contact, “which should have rung alarm bells”, and she had been offered the headphones in a pre-wrapped package.
Sainsbury claims she just put them straight into her luggage without checking them first.
Sainsbury’s family told 9NEWS the personal trainer had been “set up” by a man she had only just met.
Sainsbury passed on the man’s number over to police however he was no longer contactable.
It was when Sainsbury had her luggage x-rayed at the airport, that the cocaine was discovered by Columbian authorities and she was immediately detained.
Sainsbury was denied bail at her court appearance. She was immediately transferred to El Buen Pastor women’s prison, Colombia’s largest women’s prison, which is reportedly heavily over populated.
Ms Sainsbury, who was set to be married next February, will now spend the next two months in prison while she awaits trial.
Her family said no date had been set for a future court appearance, but it was likely within months.
Sainsbury has endured hellish conditions in El Buen Pastor jail, with the past two weeks only made easier by Australian diplomatic staff taking her a mattress and blanket to use in her cell.
The prison is notorious for its squalor and overcrowding, with up to 250 women in cell blocks. It is also famous for an annual beauty pageant.
In prison, Sainsbury doesn’t get any medical care because she doesn’t have any money to pay for it. The Australian consulate has said they’ll open a fund for her so she can buy things in jail. The phone calls she can get in, are only one minute and 30 seconds, but this is often harboured by a language barrier. Not many people speak English there and it’s really tough.
On advice, a Colombian lawyer has advised the family to consider a guilty plea to avoid a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison, but communications have been difficult because of language barriers. Her current lawyer hopes to get the charges downgraded with a plea of guilty, however the family have decided to seek a second opinion.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) confirmed it was providing assistance to an Australian woman arrested in Colombia, but would not provide further details.
With legal costs soaring by the day, Sainsbury’s family have turned to a fundraising website to help ease the financial strain. Sainsbury’s family have set up an online campaign to raise the $15,000 or so needed, they currently have managed to raise $2,000.
Prior to her arrest, Sainsbury was living with her fiance, Scotty Broadbridge, and her three huskies in Adelaide South.
“It’s hard, she’s on the other side of the world, we’re just trying to do what we can,” Ms Sainsbury’s sister said.
