Indonesia Threatens to Revoke Corby’s Parole if She ‘Causes a Stir’ With TV Interview

Jakarta Globe, Rizky Amelia, February 18, 2014

A foreign tourist imitates freed Australian drug trafficker Schapelle Corby by
 covering her face as she passes journalists at the resort where Corby is staying
in Seminyak, Bali. (AFP Photo/Sonny Tumbelaka)

Jakarta. Paroled Australian drug trafficker Schapelle Corby could find herself back behind bars if she goes ahead with a planned tell-all interview slated to run on an Australian news network, an Indonesian official warned on Tuesday.

The interview, for which Corby was allegedly offered more than $1 million, was scheduled to run as a Channel Seven news exclusive, according to reports byAgence France-Presse. But discussing her sentence, and eventual parole, could prove to be too controversial for Indonesian officials.

Lawmakers, angered by what they called a weakening of the nation’s strict anti-drugs stance, have already lobbed criticism at the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights over the marijuana trafficker’s release. The claims that Corby would profit handsomely from telling her story only fanned the flames in Indonesia, prompting the nation’s Justice and Human Rights Minister Amir Syamsuddin to publicly urge Corby to turn down the cash.

“Corby is not allowed to do any activities that can make people feel uneasy or trigger a sense of injustice in society,” Amir said last week.

Accepting the payout, an exorbitant sum by anyone’s standards, would likely play poorly in front of the Indonesian public and could be a violation of Cobry’s parole terms, Amir said. On Tuesday the ministry’s deputy minister Denny Indrayana upped the ante, threatening to revoke her parole one week after her release.

“We are considering revoking the parole,” Denny said.

Any action that disturbed the greater public could be grounds to place Corby back behind bars, he explained.

“The factors [for the revocation] are causing a stir in public, such as the interview, [receiving] money, and the interview content, which could create negative polemics,”  Denny said.

The interview, for now, is only a rumor, Denny said. No one at the ministry had been informed that it will actually occur. But the suggestion that Corby stands to become a millionaire have proven controversial in Australia as well. Australian Federal Police raided Channel Seven on Tuesday, reportedly in connection with the interview negotiations.

Corby was released from Bali’s Kerobokan Prison on Feb. 10 after spending more than nine years behind bars for attempting to smuggle 4.1 kilograms of marijuana through customs. She was sentenced to 20 years in jail in 2005, but saw the sentence reduced by annual sentence cuts and a presidential decision to slash five years off the term.

She will have to remain in Bali until 2017 under the terms of her parole.

Related Article:

Australian Media in Overdrive as Indonesia Grants Schapelle Parole