MONTEGO BAY, St James – Two British women who tried to smuggle nearly 150 pounds of cocaine out of the island in November 2010 were on Tuesday sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined $350,000 each in the Montego Bay Resident Magistrate’s Court.

Joanne Gordon and Pierrsha Kuranchie both 37 -years- old hairdressers who have nine children between them, will serve a further six months in jail if the fines are not paid.

The women were found guilty late last year at the end of a trial that dragged out over a year. Sentencing however was held up as the court tried to get Social Enquiry Reports on both.

In handing down sentence, Resident Magistrate Winsome Henry pointed out that despite a plea of lenience from defence attorney Roy Fairclough, neither women showed any remorse for what they did and were both maintaining their innocence despite “overwhelming evidence” otherwise.

RM Henry said that the women’s defence that they knew nothing about the drugs that were in their six bags and suggestions that they might have been “set up by cunning, conniving Jamaicans” was not acceptable.

She said she believed both women came here in November 2010 with the purpose of smuggling drugs and they had contacts here as one of the convicted women’s passport showed she had visited the island over 20 times, and as often as three times a year.

In his plea of mitigation, Fairclough had argued that the women had been held with out bail for about 16 months in the Freeport lock- up and given the confines of the cells there, he was asking that the court not add anything further than three more months to the time they have spent in jail.

He asked that the court consider the impact of any further incarceration on the families of the women, including their children who had not seem their mothers for two Christmas celebrations already.

In her response, the RM said while she agreed that the conditions in the Jamaican prisons were harsh, she could not distinguish between those from overseas who had broken our laws and Jamaican nationals.

She also pointed out that if the woman had managed to get past the Jamaican security at the airport and had been held when they got to England, they would be facing a minimum 20 years in prison rather than the five years maximum here.

The woman were arrested on November 27 2010 when their bags were searched at the Sangster International Airport and cocaine hidden in hair care products found.

Kuranchie was found with 74 pounds 15 ounces, while Gordon had 70 pounds and 15 ounces.

They were both sentenced to 18 months on each count of possession, dealing and taking steps to export cocaine, but all three sentences are to run concurrently.

They were also fined $350,000 or six month each on the count of possession of cocaine.