{"id":57817,"date":"2025-07-01T13:00:24","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T13:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/bella-culley-tells-court-she-was-tortured-into-smuggling-drugs\/"},"modified":"2025-07-01T13:00:26","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T13:00:26","slug":"bella-culley-tells-court-she-was-tortured-into-smuggling-drugs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/bella-culley-tells-court-she-was-tortured-into-smuggling-drugs\/","title":{"rendered":"Bella Culley tells court she was tortured into smuggling drugs"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Tom Burgess<\/span><\/p>\n

BBC News, North East and Cumbria<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Rayhan Demytrie<\/span><\/p>\n

Caucasus correspondent<\/span><\/p>\n

Reporting from<\/svg>Tbilisi, Georgia<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\"BellaBella Culley<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Bella Culley’s family is being supported by the Foreign Office<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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A British teenager held in prison in Georgia was “tortured” into smuggling drugs, she told a pre-trial hearing as she was refused bail.<\/p>\n

Bella Culley, 19, from Billingham, Teesside, appeared at Tbilisi City Court and pleaded not guilty to charges of possession and trafficking a large amount of illegal drugs.<\/p>\n

Mr Malkhaz Salakaia, representing Miss Culley, said she had been threatened with a hot iron to coerce her into travelling with the suitcase filled with drugs.<\/p>\n

Miss Culley stood in front of the judge in the courtroom and showed her right wrist which had a scar on it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Speaking in court, the 19-year-old said: “I did not want to do this. I was forced to do this through torture. <\/p>\n

“I just wanted to travel. I am a good person. I am a student at university. I am a clean person. I don’t do drugs.”<\/p>\n

Miss Culley initially went missing in Thailand before being arrested in Tbilisi International Airport on 10 May.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

’18 weeks pregnant’<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Mr Salakaia, who does not speak English and specialises in juvenile law, said the teenager was not aware of what was in her suitcase.<\/p>\n

Addressing the court, Mr Salakaia said the teenager tried to inform customs officers in Thailand “but nobody paid attention”.<\/p>\n

“She was instructed to fly to Georgia – she did not even know where Georgia was located geographically.”<\/p>\n

He also told the court that Miss Culley was 18 weeks pregnant.<\/p>\n

Her family were ready to pay 50,000 georgian lari for bail money to get her out of prison, he said.<\/p>\n

Miss Culley had been detained for 52 days before trial while the prosecution investigated where the 12kg (26lbs) of marijuana and 2kg (4.4lbs) of hashish found in a travel bag came from, and whether she was planning on handing it over to someone else.<\/p>\n

Judge Lela Kalichenko remanded her into custody until the next court hearing scheduled for 10 July.<\/p>\n

Miss Culley’s father, aunt and grandfather were all in attendance at the small courtroom in Tbilisi.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"RayhanRayhan Demytrie<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Bella Culley was detained in prison number 5, in the city of Rustavi<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Georgian Police said officers had seized marijuana and the narcotic drug hashish in a travel bag at Tbilisi International Airport.<\/p>\n

The BBC understands Miss Culley arrived in Tbilisi on a flight from Sharjah, in the United Arab Emirates, on 10 May.<\/p>\n

The BBC has been told the British Embassy has advised the teenager’s family not to speak to the press.<\/p>\n

A Georgian police spokesperson said the arrest was the result of a joint operation between multiple departments and, if she was found guilty, Miss Culley could face up to 20 years in jail or life imprisonment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tom Burgess BBC News, North East and Cumbria Rayhan Demytrie Caucasus correspondent Reporting fromTbilisi, Georgia Bella Culley Bella Culley’s family is being supported by the Foreign Office A British teenager held in prison in Georgia was “tortured” into smuggling drugs, she told a pre-trial hearing as she was refused bail. Bella Culley, 19, from Billingham, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":57818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[67],"tags":[16866,595,17697,381,12184,1221,17698],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57817"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57817"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57819,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57817\/revisions\/57819"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}