A Malaysian flight attendant has been sentenced to spend five years and eight months in an Australian prison after he pleaded guilty to “repeatedly” smuggling commercial quantities of Heroin into the country.
The 51-year-old veteran flight attendant was nabbed by Australian Border Force officers at Sydney International Airport (SYD) in January 2019 and has been held in custody ever since as prosecutors initially built their case before the pandemic delayed proceedings.
After first contesting the charges, the long-serving flight attendant changed his plea to guilty just weeks before he was due to stand trial. A court has now sentenced him with a non-parole period of two years and 10 months.
The man is part of a criminal gang who managed to smuggle around A$6 million worth of heroin into Australia. The gang made use of Malaysian flight attendants to smuggle drugs into Australia with the majority funnelled through Melbourne Tullamarine International Airport.
Another Malaysian flight attendant was jailed for nine and a half years after being caught trying to smuggle a bundle of heroin in her underwear and bra after working a flight into Melbourne.
Zailee Zainal, 40, a mother of two who had never touched drugs or alcohol, was roped into the smuggling ring as she desperately tried to raise cash to cover medical bills for her sick daughter.
The self-described ‘queen’ of the smuggling ring, a 49-year-old Australian woman has already been sentenced to 18 years imprisonment with a non-parole period of 13 years. The woman acted as a contact for the Malaysian-based drugs supplier and met the flight attendants in a hotel where they offloaded the drugs.
