I was arrested in Polynesia in 2007 for transporting cocaine. I'd like to talk to you about the
role of the Australian Consulate and what they could and couldn't help me with while I was arrested.
When I was arrested, I was taken to the Police Station and held in remand
I suppose at the Police Station for 72 hours before the Consulate, the Australian Consulate,
was notified of my arrest. It was then in total a week before I first saw Derek from
the Australian Consulate, but only after I had been moved to the actual prison.
The first words Derek said to me were, "G'day Lyndal. How are you going?" And it was exactly
the Aussie slang that I needed to hear. (Laughs). Derek and I sat down for about two hours and
we talked about the legalities of my situation. We also talked about what the Consulate's
role was in helping me and in notifying my family at home.
Derek explained to me that the Consulate was there to make sure that my civil liberties
were met as part of the Geneva and Vienna co-Conventions.
I think people have to understand that when you're arrested overseas, that the laws of
our country do not... do not apply and we are bound by the law of that country.
The Australian Consulate can't work and break those laws - they have to work in to the law
of the country where you're arrested. So, what the Consulate could do and couldn’t do,
really did depend on the political environment of the country. It couldn't pass me a pack
of cigarettes - couldn't make it all go away and bring me home.
I was visited by three different Consular officers. Two were Australian, who were based
in Noumea, and a third was a French national who was an Honorary Consulate who actually
lived near where I was arrested. I would see... I would see them on about a monthly basis.
Then we'd talk…. sometimes... sometimes about absolutely nothing; just anything to
get my mind away from where I was - anything to break the reality of the prison.
Right
Sometimes I'd sit and cry and just to be able to sit and cry;
and at times we wouldn't say anything at all, but it was the hand stretched out in comfort -
the human contact that was wanted. The Consular officers who came to see me became my angels.
They were really... they were the light in a very dark place.
Jane, Derek, Axelle - I know not just in my heart - in my mind, that if it had not been
for you, I would not be sitting here today; I would be dead. I would not have made it
out of the prison - I would not have come home. They got me through and they brought
me home and I will be forever indebted to them. Thank you.
So if you knew of a young person thinking about committing some sort of drug crime in
a foreign country, what would you say to them?
Do you like breathing? Do you like seeing the sun rise and the sun set? Because if you do - don't!
You go into a prison in another country, you have to be aware that the law
of Australia does not apply and that a death penalty is nothing to be handed down; a twenty-year
sentence is nothing to be handed down. Don't risk! If you don't care about your own life
enough, don't risk your family's - don't do this to your family. Families suffer; my family suffered -
my children suffered. They probably suffered more than I did, because I only had
myself to look after and deal with over there; they had each other to look after and deal
with here; and they had it so... and they had it so much harder than I did.
If you’re travelling to another country - be smart! Get on the smartraveller website!
Find out the laws of the country. Know what... know that in some countries that you can be arrested
for walking on the grass in a park and be locked up. Know these things before you travel.
Make an educated and informed decision on what you are going to do.
Prisons are notnice places - they're not meant to be. Think twice; really, really think twice about what
you're doing before you decide to do something that could not only alter your life, destroy
it and take breath from your lung, but it has the capability of affecting so many other
people in such an horrific way that nothing is worth it - no amount of money is worth it.