Zambian woman drug peddler gets 30-year jail term reports business standard

A special NDPS court today convicted a Zambian national and handed her down 30 years of rigorous imprisonment for attempting to smuggle drugs from Mumbai to South Africa.

Naney Tembo, 28, was apprehended on December 22, 2008, by the sleuths of the Airport Intelligence Unit (AIU) on a tip off that she was carrying drugs when she was about to board a South Africa-bound flight.
The AIU officers recovered 77 tablets of heroin, weighing 840 gms, stashed in four socks hid by Tembo under her dress.

Tembo initially tried to misguide the interrogators saying that she was not aware that the consignment was a contraband and she did the "job" to support her family in Zambia. During the trial special public prosecutor Arun Gupte examined 13 witnesses.
Tembo was convicted on counts of attempting to smuggle drugs out of the country and contravention in relation to manufactured drugs and preparations under the provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.
The court also imposed a fine of Rs 2 lakhs on Tembo.
She will have to undergo the sentence for 30 years with each term extending up to fifteen years