A
22-year-old Colombian model is facing the death penalty after she was
caught with a plastic bag full of drugs hidden inside her laptop.Juliana
Lopez seemed to have the world at her feet, running a trendy boutique
and hosting a television show, as well as being a well-known
professional football player.
And
winning the Miss Antioquia beauty pageant, she was going to participate
in the Miss World Medellin competition this week but her family suddenly
lost contact with her while she was in China to purchase items for her
shop.
Worried about her whereabouts,
her family contacted the Colombian embassy saying that she had vanished.
She had apparently flown into the airport in the city of Guangzhou, in
the southeast Chinese province of Canton, after which they lost contact
with her.
Chinese officials confirmed
to the family she had been arrested for drug smuggling. It was not
specified what kind of narcotics were inside her laptop but police say
they found a large quantity of a banned substance.
Lopez
plays for the women’s team Divas del Futbol in Medellin. She is also a
student at the University of San Buenaventura, in the city of Bello, in
the north central Colombian district of Antioquia.
Carrying
drugs in China is not only banned, but can carry the death penalty and
relatives and friends are now desperately trying to collect money to get
top lawyers and a team sent over to defend Lopez. They also want family
and friends to travel over to support her.
The
smiling profile picture of the model’s Facebook page was taken on her
first visit to China last year, and she has since been back to buy goods
for her business.
Alejandro Duque is
the coach of Divas del Futbol. He said: ‘Juliana was the central point
of the group, she spoke a lot with the press and she gave her face to
the team.’
About the drug charges he
added: ‘She is a good girl, student, model, contestant of beauty
contests, and she has always been an athlete.’
He said he had last seen her two weeks ago shortly before she travelled to China to buy shoes, clothes and other accessories.
Duque
said: ‘My heart tells me that she is not guilty, she is a fighter. She
cannot be sentenced yet, I have hope that she is innocent and that
everything can be sorted out.’
According
to the newspaper El Tiempo, the Colombian Foreign Ministry has provided
legal assistance and support to Lopez and her family through her
mother, Nubia Sarrazola.
A spokesman
for the ministry said: ‘We work to ensure the preservation of the rights
of private individuals and the right to a proper defence and the
presumption of innocence, as well as respect for due process and the
preservation of her personal integrity and her health.’
But
the Chinese police investigation could take between six months and two
years and the amount of contact the model will be allowed with her
family is likely to be limited.
Currently,
there are 138 Colombian prisoners in China’s jails for a range of
offences and 12 of them have been sentenced to death. Nine of these
cases have been frozen thanks to the efforts of the Colombian
government. Another group of 11 has been sentenced to life imprisonment.
Of those detained, 90 per cent were linked with drugs-related crimes and the rest were related to prostitution.
China
executes the highest number of people of any country annually and is
believed to put to death more than the rest of the world put together,
according to Amnesty International.
