‘Frail’ Brit, 79, faces time in Chile prison after crystal meth found in luggage

A British ‘typical grandad’ who allegedly attempted to smuggle five kilos of methamphetamine into Chile says he was promised a £3,000,000 reward.

The unnamed 79-year-old flew in to Santiago from the Mexican city of Cancun, and was preparing to make his way to Australia.

But he was detained after cops allegedly found him travelling with powerful crystal meth worth £200,000 in a hidden compartment.

The pensioner has claimed he had no idea how the five kilos of methamphetamine ended up in his luggage.

Speaking to authorities in English, the British tourist said he had been deceived and was handed the suitcase at Cancun airport.

He claimed he was promised $5,000,000 (£3,714,600) to deliver the suitcase to its final destination.

The Brit even produced a certificate with the prize money pledge before being remanded into custody.

Sergio Paredes, head of the Chilean PDI police force’s Anti-Narcotics Division at Santiago’s international airport, said: ‘This case has its peculiarities.

‘A frail-looking, elderly person being caught with a large amount of methamphetamine who had recently been operated on and still had scars from that medical intervention and looked like a typical grandad if I’m going to be honest.

‘I always say anyone could be a potential drug smuggler. That’s the philosophy we work off here.

‘The false bottom in the British pensioner’s suitcase where the drugs had been hidden was filled full. It couldn’t have held any more methamphetamine.

‘We believe he was a drug mule in the pay of a criminal gang.

‘We’re still looking into where the drugs came from and where they were going to end up.’

The man is being kept at Santiago 1 Penitentiary alongside mostly non-violent offenders.

He can be held there for 120 days before he needs to be formally charged by investigators.

Initial reports pointed to a possible 15-year prison sentence if convicted, but Chilean legal experts have said five years behind bars is more likely.

The pensioner is far from the only British traveller allegedly caught up in a murky web of organised crime. 

Bella May Culley sparked a massive international search operation in early May after she was reported missing while she was believed to be holidaying in Thailand.

But it was later revealed that the 18-year-old from Billingham, Durham, had been arrested 4,000 miles away on drug offences in Georgia, allegedly carrying 14 kilos of cannabis.

And recently 21-year-old Charlotte Lee May, from Coulsdon, south London, was arrested in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo after police discovered 46 kilos of ‘Kush’ – a synthetic strain of cannabis – in her suitcase.

The former flight attendant, who faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted, is claiming she had ‘no idea’ about the drugs and insisting they must have been planted in her luggage without her knowledge.

Dr James Windle, of the Department of Sociology and Criminology, University College Cork, gave an insight into the ruthless tactics used by the traffickers to recruit mules.  

‘Larger, more sophisticated groups are very good at identifying people who might be open to exploitation,’ he told Metro.  

‘At first it might be consensual, with the person targeted being offered something they value, be it money, a holiday or something connected to an addiction.  

‘There will very often be a grooming process where they might say a person has to go somewhere to pay for their holiday, with the flights paid for.

‘If they try and back out then they might say, here’s a photograph of someone you love or even something as subtle as, “you know we’re very dangerous — only joking.”

‘Sometimes it takes the mules months, even years, to realise how they have been manipulated.’ 

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