Bali Drug Arrests: Brit Rachel Dougall Could Receive Death Penalty, Leaving Behind Daughter Kitty, 6

Six Year Old Girl Could Lose Her Mother After Bali Drug Bust

A six-year-old girl faces losing her mother after the British woman was arrested over a £1.6 million cocaine haul in Indonesia.

Rachel Dougall could receive the death penalty for the alleged smuggling operation - leaving behind her little girl, Kitty.

She was being held in Bali with fellow British nationals Julian Ponder and Paul Beales, the Foreign Office confirmed.

Rachel Dougall was arrested but shouted "it is a fit up"

Dougall and Ponder are believed to be partners and Mr Ponder the father of Kitty, who after the arrests was reportedly in the care of the couple's maid and gardener on the island.

The Foreign Office said British officials were helping the little girl as well as the arrested Britons.

A spokesman said: "We are aware of the daughter of Rachel Dougall. Consular officials from the consulate in Bali have visited the daughter and will continue to provide consular assistance."

Earlier Dougall shouted the customs sting was a "fit up" and that she was being badly treated in prison.

Her arrest came after British housewife Lindsay Sandiford, 55, was allegedly caught with 4.8kg of cocaine stuffed in the lining of a suitcase as she arrived in Bali.

She agreed to take part in a sting operation in which police swooped on four other suspects after her arrest last week - the three other Britons and an Indian man.

Housewife Lindsay Sandiford, who faces the death penalty

A friend of Sandiford told ITV's Daybreak on Tuesday she remembered her as "someone that helped me", adding she was "very surprised" at her arrest abroad.

"Our children played rugby for Cheltenham and, because I wasn't driving at the time, she'd transport my children, so I helped her with jobs around the house," she said.

"I just can't believe that she's gone that low. I'm just gobsmacked."

Dougall later shouted through the bars of her cell at Bali police headquarters: "It's a fit-up, get us a decent lawyer."

Customs officials told ITV News that Mrs Sandiford may be spared the death sentence because she helped to catch three other members of the smuggling operation, who could face a firing squad.

Mrs Sandiford, originally from Redcar, Teesside, is thought to have told police she only agreed to make the smuggling trip because her children in England were being threatened.

She was paraded at a press conference alongside the drugs, wearing an orange prison T-shirt and hiding her face from cameras.

Masked, armed officers in Kuta, a town on the holiday island, flanked her as she was brought into the room and a customs official cut open packages wrapped in brown tape to reveal a white powder.

Customs official Made Wijaya said at the press conference: "After weighing, the total cocaine is 4.791kg."

The drugs have an estimated street value of 23.9 billion Indonesian rupiah (£1.6 million), he said.

"This is a big international network," he said. "The charge against them would carry the death penalty."

Another 68g of cocaine, 280g of powdered ecstasy and a small amount of hashish were also seized following the arrest of the other gang members at separate locations in Bali, officials said.

Indonesia has extremely strict drug laws and convicted smugglers are executed. More than 140 people are on death row, a third of them foreigners.

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