China to review woman's death penalty

BEIJING -- Rosalia Amarilla stepped into the international terminal of Beijing's cavernous main airport on the afternoon of July 24, 2012, wearing more than 7 pounds of cocaine stuffed into her underwear and bra.

An acquaintance named Carlos had given the Paraguayan, 31, the drug-filled undergarments to wear in Sao Paulo before she boarded a flight to Doha, Qatar, and then Beijing. Security officials nabbed her before she could meet two Chinese waiting for her outside the airport.

Chinese prosecutors and her defenders agree that is how the clothes vendor ended up in a women's prison far from home, awaiting execution on drug-trafficking charges. Paraguayan prosecutors and diplomats, as well as human-rights activists, argue that Amarilla was forced to carry the narcotics and should not be put to death.

Paraguayan senators have signed letters demanding her release, and her friends and former high school classmates have marched through the streets of the capital, Asuncion, demanding she come home. Earlier this month, the country's top diplomat brought up Amarilla's case with his Chinese counterparts during a Beijing meeting of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, according to Paraguay's Foreign Ministry.

Santiago Fiorio, an official with the ministry's human-rights department, said the Chinese have revealed that the courts will review the case in July. The Chinese Foreign Ministry added more details in a statement, saying the Beijing High Court approved a two-year suspension of her death sentence in July 2013. Judicial authorities in China often commute death sentences to life in prison or other non-capital punishments after such suspensions. Amarilla's court-appointed Chinese defense attorney, Bai Baoli, declined to comment.

Back at home, the woman's older sister, Patricia Amarilla, said her family is hoping the campaign to save Rosalia Amarilla will shed light not only on her case, but also on those of other Paraguayan women who have been forced to serve as drug mules for international traffickers, usually under threat.

Patricia Amarilla said the family lost contact with Rosalia Amarilla for about six months before learning that she had been sentenced to death -- a typical punishment in a country where drug offenses are severely disciplined.

"We want this to be an example so that there are no more women in this situation," the sister said. "We're hoping that we will see Rosalia coming home."

Elba Nunez, the regional coordinator of CLADEM, a Latin American women's rights group, said it's unknown how many women share Rosalia Amarilla's plight but called the trafficking of Paraguayans a "grave and very dangerous problem."

A clip from Chinese TV news shows another Paraguayan woman, Eulalia Duarte Estigarribia, caught at Beijing's airport with cocaine stuffed into her undergarments. Neither Nunez nor Fiorio knew the circumstances of Duarte's arrest, and neither could say whether she had been forced into carrying the drugs.

In Amarilla's case, Paraguayan prosecutors have identified her as a victim of human trafficking even as they continue investigating how she was brought from Paraguay to China, said Alice Resquin, an official in the prosecutors' human-trafficking department.

Nunez said Amarilla was first approached by an acquaintance in Paraguay in 2012 to travel with him to buy clothes in Brazil that she could sell back home. According to a document from the Beijing 2nd Intermediate People's Court provided to the Paraguayan Foreign Ministry and then translated into Spanish, the acquaintance, Carlos, told Amarilla she could travel on to China to buy more goods but, a day before her departure, asked her to wear weighted-down undergarments.

The court document said Amarilla suspected the undergarments held drugs but was promised $7,000 if she delivered them to China. While acknowledging Amarilla was ordered to carry the drugs by third parties, the court maintained her death sentence, although with a two-year suspension, due to the offense's "level of damage to society."

In its report on Amarilla's case, CLADEM said her traffickers were also being sought in the cases of other Paraguayan women who were trapped "under severe threat" and "who remain for weeks and even months under their traffickers' control."

Once in court, Amarilla was not given an opportunity to talk to her attorney before the session, and at least one of two hearings was not translated into Spanish, Nunez said.

Now, Amarilla's sister said the family has learned that she's being forced to work in a Beijing prison manufacturing sofas and chairs in exchange for room and board, a common practice in China's justice system.

The Beijing 2nd Intermediate People's Court did not respond to requests seeking comment.

A Section on 01/25/2015

Upcoming Events