A trial opened yesterday against a pregnant British woman on heroin trafficking charges in a case that has raised questions about how she managed to conceive while behind bars.
Samantha Orobator, 20, was arrested last August, but her case didn’t draw international attention until news of her pregnancy became public early last month amid concerns that she could be executed by firing squad if found guilty.
The Laos government days later confirmed that under the country’s criminal law, a pregnant woman cannot receive the death penalty, but officials delayed her scheduled trial date because of questions about how she became pregnant.
Orobator arrived in court wearing a blue prison outfit and smiling to reporters.
She was escorted by female prison guards but was not in handcuffs or ankle chains. Security around the courthouse was tight.
Police said they found 680g of heroin in 68 capsules on Orobator’s body when she was arrested at Vientiane airport on her way to Australia.
The British legal charity Reprieve said the drugs were found in Orobator’s luggage.
Orobator says she is innocent.
Even if convicted, Orobator may not spend much time in a Laotian jail. A deal struck between British and Laotian officials could allow Orobator to serve any jail sentence in Britain. But Laotian officials could still veto her return.
Laotian officials said Orobator initially told authorities she was pregnant by her boyfriend in England, but tests after she was arrested showed no signs of pregnancy.
It was not until March 2 that a hospital test showed she was pregnant, verified by a second test on April 4, police said.
That meant she must have gotten pregnant while in prison, they said.
Orobator’s mother recently said her daughter had not been raped by prison officials or fellow prisoners, as some media had reported.
The Vientiane Times on Tuesday quoted police as saying Orobator told authorities she secretly obtained sperm from a fellow prisoner to impregnate herself to avoid the death penalty.
The state-run newspaper did not name the sources or give other details.
As Orobator is in prison, she could not be reached to verify the newspaper’s account.
Orobator’s mother Jane has said her daughter told her that she had not been sexually assaulted while in prison and that the father of her unborn child was not a Laotian prison official.
However, Jane Orobator did not reveal the identity of the father.
An earlier Vientiane Times report said Bouavanh Sengsathit, director of the National Mother and Child Health Hospital, had listed self-impregnation as one of several theories.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion