Tytherington businessman launches campaign to free girl from prison (From Community Newsgroup)

Tytherington businessman launches campaign to free girl from prison

11:50am Thursday 27th November 2008

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A TYTHERINGTON businessman has taken up the cause of an Australian woman who is serving 20 years in an Indonesian jail for drug offences.

Steve Addison is convinced Schapelle Corby, aged 27, is innocent and has set up an international support site, managed from Macclesfield to bring the story to the world’s attention. Its purpose is to bring international pressure to bear on the Australian and Indonesian Governments.

The Australian’s story was discovered when Steve, who runs a Tytherington based internet company, searched Google images for a picture to illustrate a new corporate website.

Steve said: “One image was of a young woman who was clearly in serious distress. Like a fool I clicked on it. From there, there was no way back.

Steve said: “Schapelle went on a two-week break to a tropical paradise to prepare her for several years of nursing her dying father to the end. But it ended up being a never-ending nightmare.

“She was arrested at Denpasar airport, Bali in 2004 after marijuana was found in her board bag. She had become the victim of every traveller’s darkest fear, the drugs had been placed in her bag after she had checked it in and she was forced to face the consequences of someone else’s crime in a country where the penalties for drug smuggling are barbaric.”

According to Steve, the evidence which could have cleared her was ignored, the police burned the evidence, her legal and human rights were denied, the judge had never acquitted a defendant in more than 500 drug related trials and despite her pleas the court refused to test the marijuana for country of origin. If it was Indonesian, she could not have imported it.

Her appeals were all dismissed.

Steve said Schapelle is imprisoned in conditions which are barely imaginable.

He said: “Her life has been taken away from her. She will never have children and may well not survive her ordeal. Her father died earlier this year and she has suffered a series of illnesses. She is suffering from severe clinical depression. Unless something is done, she will either die in her cell or serve almost the full 20-year term.”

Steve is urging everyone to do what they can to help - write to the Australian embassy, sign the online petition, tell friends and colleagues about the case, perhaps send a basic care package to Schapelle or write to her.

Full details are on the website: www.schapelle.net Steve has also produced two short films which are on the website and has launched Artists for Schapelle which provides a platform for musicians to spread the story through their music.

Steve added: “This could have been anyone. It could have been my daughter or it could have been the family of anyone reading this. The bottom line though is that Schapelle Corby desperately needs the world to act and speak out for her. I couldn’t walk away, can you”?

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