Woman smuggled 394 ecstasy capsules inside her body

An 18-year-old nursing student is being put back on trial after she was found guilty of internally smuggling 394 ecstasy capsules into a music festival in Sydney, Australia on December 8, 2018.

The person responsible, Tina Thanh Truc Phan, was initially put on trial in Burwood Local Court and plead guilty to supplying a prohibited drug. The judge handed down a 12-month community correction order which included 80 hours of community service with no jail time required.

According to Daily Mail, senior police officials were unhappy with the lenient sentence and have asked the Director of Public Prosecutions in New South Wales to consider an appeal. Phan is now going back on trial later this February and could face hard time in the penitentiary.

She was arrested at the two-day hardstyle event Knockout 2018 Games of Destiny - an event billed as the largest indoor music festival in the southern hemisphere. The music festival saw a total of 16 people who required transportation to the hospital while over 130 more were treated for various conditions during the event. Three were placed in medically induced comas and one attendee, 19-year-old Callum Brosnan, lost his life to a suspected drug overdose. In total, 62 people were found in possession of drugs at the event, including Phan who was found out by a drug detection dog.

A statement of facts that were rendered to the court said that Phan was brought to a designated searching area where she was asked to remove the unknown item that she was hiding internally. Concealed by condoms and tissues, Phan handed a resealable bag containing almost 400 capsules over to the police.

Phan's lawyer Cheryl Khurana claims her client had agreed to smuggle the drugs into the festival to support her family financially. Feeling obligated to help her mother who had just separated from her father after 21 years of marriage, Phan decided to accept an offer from a mutual acquaintance to take the drugs in the venue for money.

She was recently been accepted into the University of Technology Sydney to study a bachelor of nursing. Despite the fact that she is 'extremely remorseful' about the entire situation, Phan may have to face serious jail time for her actions.

Australia's national debate regarding the legality and practicality of using on-site pill testing at music festivals as a method to prevent drug-related deaths continues to rage on with little end in sight. Learn more here

[via: Daily Mail]