Mum who showed Border Force photos from holiday immediately arrested at airport

Larissa Lins has been arrested by Border Force Investigators at Manchester Airport.

A woman who hid over 100 cocaine pellets within and outside her body was arrested at an airport after accidentally showing Border Force investigators photographs of the drugs on her phone.

Larissa Lins, 27, had been detained at Manchester Airport after arriving from Brazil. She said she came to the UK to "research nice places" after flying via France and Portugal, the Manchester Evening News reports.

Denying that she had brought anything unlawful into the country, she showed authorities photos from her stay in France. However, as they scrolled, they came across a photo of the "white pellets" and she was arrested. Additional investigation revealed that Lins had eaten, secreted, and concealed a kilogramme of the drug both internally and externally.

After pleading guilty to being involved in the fraudulent evasion of a prohibition on the importation of a class A drug, she was sentenced yesterday to three years in prison. Lins was warned she will "almost inevitably" be deported back to Brazil after serving 40 per cent of her jail time.

Prosecutor David Toal stated that Lins flew from Sao Paulo to Manchester via France and Portugal on August 24 of this year, with just a little pink cabin bag. Border Force officials spoke to her through a Portuguese interpreter, and she said that this was her first visit to the UK.

She also stated that she travelled here to "walk around and research nice places". Lins stated that she packed her bag herself and that she did not bring anything illegal into the UK. “She volunteered her phone to show officers images she had taken in France, and whilst looking through officers saw images of white pellets, which were believed to be cocaine,” Mr Toal said.

“The defendant was arrested, and she told officers she had pellets of cocaine inserted inside her body since the previous day. She was taken to Wythenshawe Hospital where, at various stages, she passed all of the internal pellets."

Officers performed another check of Lins and discovered further pellets concealed within the lining of her bra. In all, 99 pellets were confiscated, weighing 1.1kg with packaging and 923g without. The court heard that the wholesale price for that amount of the class A substance was roughly £30,000, with a street value of around £72,000.

Lins was arrested and interviewed, at which point she admitted swallowing 100 pellets before flying to France, and spent the next three days passing them before returning them to another person. The day before flying to Manchester she admitted swallowing ten more and inserting further pellets internally whilst her ‘cousin’ placed some more inside her bra.

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She said would have received the equivalent of £1,400 in Brazilian Real. She was said to have no previous convictions in the UK or in her native Brazil. Laura Broome, mitigating, said her client was in a "state of sheer desperation".

“That desperation was exploited,” she said. “She tells me she was instructed how to swallow, conceal and insert the pellets. Had any of those burst, she could have died.”

The sentencing judge, Patrick Field KC, said Lins was taking a risk with her safety and liberty, which "emphasised her state of mind". “It almost demonstrates the little regard those above her had for her safety,” Ms Broome agreed.

She said the mum of four young children was genuinely remorseful and was "desperate" to return home. Ms Broome added that she had been recruited through coercion, intimidation and control, and was ‘naive’ with ‘no influence’ on those above her in the chain.

“Once she had realised the seriousness of the situation, she tried to stop her partaking any further, but was told she had no choice,” the barrister said. Lins, of no fixed abode, was jailed for three years.

“This sort of crime is regarded very seriously in these courts,” Judge Field KC told Lins, who wept throughout. "There is no doubt you were recruited to carry out the task and you were recruited by organised criminals who were more sophisticated than you and utterly unsympathetic to the risks you were running. I have no doubt [that amount of money] was a significant sum to you.”

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