Prosecutors want to jail grandmother for 10 years

By PETER ROWE

Japanese prosecutors want to jail an Australian grandmother accused of importing two kilograms of methamphetamine into the country for ten years.

Indigenous woman Donna Nelson, from Perth, was found with the drugs hidden in a false bottom of her suitcase when she arrived at Tokyo’s Narita Airport in January last year on a flight from Laos.

Ms Nelson told the court last week she picked up the suitcase in Laos for an online romantic partner, ‘Kelly’, who said needed it as a sample for his fashion store.

She did not declare the bag as someone else’s on arrival in Japan and wrote “business” as the reason for her travel.

Ms Nelson has told the court she believes she was duped into collecting the bag and taking to Tokyo, not knowing it had drugs hidden in it.

But prosecutors argued she tried to illegally import the drug.

“She was ready to receive cash, and a diamond ring and marriage,” they said on Tuesday in summing up the case.

“She took an action for her own benefit and to help Kelly.”

Prosecutors then accused Ms Nelson of being “untrustworthy” and said he must have doubts over the origin of the suitcase or of what it might have contained.

Ms Nelson cried and said she was innocent.

“I was tricked by Kelly to import methamphetamine,” she told the court.

Her lawyer told the court Kelly had manipulated his victim, and Ms Nelson was an innocent victim of a love scam.

“Of course, she knows how devastating the drug is,” lawyer Nishida Rie said.

“If she had known Kelly was a criminal, would she have sent her granddaughters’ picture to him?”

The panel of judges are expected to announce their verdict next week.