May 30, 2012

Bali drugs 'orphan': Girl, 6, left alone on island as British parents ,Julian-Ponder-Rachel-Dougall face death penalty over '£1.6m cocaine smuggling operation'




A six-year-old girl,Kitty Ponder was left alone in Bali after her parents were arrested over an alleged £1.6million cocaine smuggling operation on the Indonesian island.
Kitty Ponder has been looked after by their maid and gardener since Julian Ponder and Rachel Dougall were detained the day after her birthday.
Mr Ponder, 49, and Miss Dougall, 38, face death by firing squad if they are convicted of being part of the alleged drugs ring.
Their daughter may never see them again if they are taken to the notorious Kerobokan jail to be put on death row, as happened to two Australians who were part of the infamous 'Bali Nine' smuggling ring in 2005.
The couple are among four Brits accused of being part of an 'international network' attempting to smuggle 4.7 kilograms (11 pounds) of the narcotic on to the holiday island."lol"
They are suspected of being the buyers of the cocaine allegedly carried in the suitcase of mother-of-two Lindsay Sandiford, 55.

Kitty Ponder is now being looked after at Mr Ponder and Miss Dougall's luxury villa by Dayu Ariani, 33, wife Ketut Suranchana and their young son.Mr Ariani said: 'We were shocked when the police came.
'They came with Mr Julian and collected a lot of bags and left with the mother and father. We have been looking after Kitty, who is a sweet girl.
'She thinks her parents are coming home. We cannot tell her the truth. Nobody from the authorities has taken any steps to look after the girl.'

As the first pictures emerged of the couple on Monday, their friends on the island dismissed the allegations as a 'joke'.They said Miss Dougall, from Brighton, was a 'party girl' who had been innocently caught up in a 'bigger game'. Distraught relatives had been calling Bali from Britain worried about the well-being of her daughter.


Housewife Mrs Sandiford was initially the focus of the investigation after she was arrested at Denpasar airport last week and used in a police sting. She was forced to pose for pictures on Monday next to packages containing the Class A drug.

The attention has now shifted to Mr Ponder and Miss Dougall, however, who used to restore antiques together from fashionable homes in Brighton and west London.Looking strained, Miss Dougall was yesterday pictured wearing an orange prison-issue shirt and shorts outside a police station in Bali.
As she was led away at Bali police headquarters, she shouted: ‘It’s a fit-up, get us a decent lawyer. I’m being treated badly.’ Her husband, next to her, shouted: ‘Get us an international lawyer.’

Until 2008, Mr Ponder ran an antiques restoration business, Pen Productions Ltd. Their home was a £500,000 apartment overlooking the seafront in Brighton.He was previously director of a London-based caterers and party organisers, which collapsed with debts of £500,000 in 2004, according to dailymail.





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