Life after Cookham

Her fellow inmates at the Cookham Wood Prison for women in Rochester Kent, called her Lady C. It’s a title she earned for “good behaviour and lady-like qualities” during her two years of incarceration, and one she is reluctant to relinquish even though she has since been paroled and deported to Jamaica four weeks ago.

In the small sanctuary of her bedroom strewn with memoirs of her sojourn behind bars, Lady C, attractively attired in a leopard stripe black spandex bodysuit, and bedecked with jewellery, related her experience as a cocaine courier.

Her incredulous story, while a tale of desperation and tragedy, is quite common place.

A 38 year-old mother of five children ranging in age from 20 – 5 years-old, Lady C does not strike you as a drug mule or someone who would readily flout the law.

She worked as a bartender in the inner-city community where she grew up. Life as she relates was “extremely difficult” as all her children were in school and she did not have the support of a spouse.

“I don’t have luck with men, the best man I had was father of the last two, but he died”, she said sadly.

“I worked every other week as a bartender, earning $2,500, and this could not keep us going. There were so many things I wanted to do for my children and I just could not manage. In my heart, I wanted to open a bar for myself, but had no start-up funds.

While pondering how to break through the cycle of poverty that gripped her and enveloped her children, she entered the world of cocaine economics. She was asked to sell the hard drug “under the counter” for her boss, raking in thousands of dollars for him weekly.

“I realised money was in it, but I had no thought of doing any kind of business for myself that involved the use of drugs. I told myself I could not afford to do anything that would adversely affect my children.

“I love them so much that I would always talk to my clients about them. One day, a well-dressed man driving a Mercedes Benz came into the bar. He was not a regular customer, but easy to talk with and so I told him about my situation. He became immediately interested, and started visiting the bar quite often.”

It was not too long before Lady C’s life took a dramatic turn.

“He came in one night and asked me if I would not do some business with him, I said, ‘like what?’ He said that since life was so hard for me, I could make some quick money by taking up some ganja to England for him.

“He said, it would be easy and that several persons had done it and had made good money. Of course, I declined, because I know the consequences. But he was not put off, he came back with a flashy girl and told me that she had just returned from a successful run the previous night. He finally persuaded me telling me that where he is going to hide it, no one will find it. I reluctantly agreed and gave him my address”.

Far from being naïve, Lady C knew the risks she faced from being caught.

“Up to the day when I was supposed to travel, I was still not too certain I wanted to do it. But he came for me early the morning and checked me into a hotel. We went shopping. He bought me a nice blue linen suit with a plaid inner blouse, and we had dinner. He bought me an expensive lobster meal”.

Then it was down to business.

“He had the cocaine already packaged. It was tightly compressed and wrapped with clear plastic and so dense that I could not tell whether it was ganja or cocaine. Somehow I preferred to think it was ganja rather than cocaine I would be trafficking.

“He had already decided where the drug was going (up into my most intimate parts). I had no choice in the matter so I took the package (about the width of a large egg and the length of a festival), and tried to insert it into my vagina, but the pain was unbearable and I eventually gave up.

“He took it from me and said, ‘come let me oil it and put it in’. I gave in because it was getting late and I had to be at the airport early.”

The ‘goods’ securely in place, but there was one more kink to iron out. A quick call was made to London, to a woman whom Lady C was instructed to call as soon as she had cleared immigration.

“I had a brief conversation with this woman who had a British accent. She gave me a number to call, but did not give me an address. She assured me that everything would be OK.”

Body packed and ready, Lady C was given her ticket and carted off to the airport. Her troubles did not start until she was airborne, somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.

“I had travelled to the United States previously, so I was familiar with immigration procedures and I was not at all nervous. I boarded and settled into my seat, sandwiched between an elderly woman, and a young man who, like myself, was visiting England for the very first time.

“About three hours into the flight, I felt a cramp in my belly bottom and had very strong urges to urinate so I was making several trips to the bathroom. I said, Lord, don’t let anything happen to me, I have my children to live for. The cramp gave way to pain, and when I could not bear it any longer I asked the flight attendant for painkillers. I could not eat anything because I was so tense. It was only later that I realised that I had given myself away by not eating anything.

“To make matters worse, I started to bleed. I cursed myself and started blaming God for allowing this to happen to me. I managed to endure the 8-hour flight, but I was in a lot of pain and discomfort.

Lady C’s in-flight nightmare intensified as soon as she landed at the Heathrow International airport.

“They (immigration officers) were waiting on me. I was picked out of the crowd and told to sit on a bench to the side. I started to fret, it was cold and I was sweating. I knew I was in deep trouble. I said, ‘Lord, what is this me put myself through and me leave the children back home. I felt guilty and apprehensive.

“Several other persons on the flight joined me on the bench and I said, ‘at least I am not alone’.

After an exhaustive and extensive interview, Lady C was informed that she was being held as a drug suspect and that she would be required to do a series of tests. Awash with different types of emotions, she was taken to the holding area within the airport.

” I received some rough treatment. They body-searched me but did not find the drugs, but they still held on to me, because the urine tested positive for cocaine. That’s when I realised I was carrying the hard stuff. I wanted to tear it from inside of my body and throw it away, but they (the officers) followed us everywhere, and someone (another detainee) told me that they had cameras on us.

“I spent three days in this holding area. But by this time I was bleeding heavily and I was worried that I would get an infection, so on the third night, I took brave heart and told the officer that I had it inside. She escorted me to the bathroom and I took it out and gave it to her.”

Lady C was charged for smuggling drugs and slapped with a four-year sentence. What is a courier’s life like in prison?

“Prison life is not sweet. I was placed in a lock-down facility, which means I spent most of the time indoors, locked behind heavy metal doors.

“This took a toll on me mentally. Every time I hear the big heavy door close, I feel like part of my brain shut down with it. I was constantly on anti-depressants and had to see the psychiatrist several times”.

Several times during our interview she paused to appeal to women, “Ladies do not do it, do not smuggle drugs, try to find something else to do”.

She told All Woman that she felt like she was losing her mental faculties every time she thought about her children. She agonized over the fact that they did not know she was serving time in prison, and that she could no longer provide for them, no matter how meagre it was.

She would have pocketed £2,000 if only she had not been caught, and she had so many plans for the money.

“It would have been a lot of money for me. I badly wanted to do some repairs to the old house. It is falling apart, and I have no help.”

Most of her waking hours were spent daydreaming about the new life she would start when she is released, especially if things worked out with a male inmate from another facility with whom she was corresponding with, exchanging photograph and love letters.

“This helped to keep me going. Also, I was allowed to work for a few hours, so I managed to save some pounds and purchase personal items at the prison store, as well as stuff for the children.”

While locked away from her children, her two eldest daughters quit school to care for the younger ones, and in that process became mothers themselves.

“That was the greatest shock of all to me. I became a grandmother while in prison. I was really depressed because I had so much faith in my daughters and I knew they would do well in school. If I was here, they would not have dropped out and had children.”

Picking up the pieces is proving a mammoth task for Lady C. She is slowly coming to terms with the harsh realities of being unemployed and single-handedly having to care for her children and grandchildren.

While she wants to put the past aside, she is urging young unsuspecting women not to be lured into the drug trade.

“Nothing is as precious as your freedom, and you need to cherish and value it.”

* Names have being changed to protect the identify of the interviewee.