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A British A grandmother facing death row for smuggling large quantities of cocaine into Bali will be freed, more than a decade after her arrest.
Lindsay Sandiford, 69, Is Currently held in the notorious Kerobokan prisonIn which there are about 1,000 prisoners.
Sandiford, from Redcar in Teesside, could be free to return home as soon as Tuesday Indonesian government The source told AFP That an agreement has been reached with the UK government.
Here’s everything we know about Sandiford and why he was given such a long sentence.
Who is Lindsay Sandiford?
Sandiford was Arrested at Bali’s Denpasir National Airport in 2012 When she arrived from Thailand customs officers found a consignment of cocaine worth an estimated £1.6 million in a hidden compartment of her suitcase.
Grandmother of two claims a British gang forced her into trafficking drugs – and threatened to kill one of his two sons if he refused to cooperate.
Sandiford was later found guilty of smuggling 4.8 kilograms of cocaine hidden in the lining of his suitcase on a flight from Bangkok. Prosecutors sentenced him to death.
Police had accused him of being part of an international drug network that imported drugs from several countries, including Peru, Colombia and Thailand.
Timeline of Lindsay Sandiford’s arrest and imprisonment
early 2012 Lindsay Sandiford immigrated from Gloucestershire, England and settled in India.
17 May 2012 Sandiford allegedly met two members of a drug syndicate in Bangkok, Thailand and collected a suitcase full of cocaine.
19 May 2012 When Sandiford arrived in Bali from Bangkok, she was arrested after cocaine was found in her luggage. Police accused him of being at the center of a drugs ring involving three other Britons.
20 May 2012 Sandiford begins to cooperate with the police and gives them information about the drug syndicate. He insisted that he was forced to bring the cocaine to Bali.
22 January 2013 Sandiford has been sentenced to death for smuggling 10.6 pounds of cocaine from Thailand. The prosecution had recommended 15 years’ imprisonment but a panel of judges sentenced him to death by firing squad.
29 January 2013 Julian Ponder was acquitted of trafficking but convicted of possession of 23 grams of cocaine. He was one of three Britons detained following Sandiford’s arrest for cocaine trafficking.
31 January 2013 Sandiford lost her bid for the UK government to fund a lawyer for her appeal against the death penalty.
15 February 2013 The British Consulate in Bali produced a statement on Sandiford’s appeal. An FCDO spokesperson said: “It remains the long-term policy of the United Kingdom to oppose the death penalty in all circumstances and we will do everything we can to assist British citizens facing the death penalty.”
8 April 2013 Sandiford lost her first appeal against her death sentence. The appeal judges ruled that the original decision was “accurate and correct”.
30 August 2013 Sandiford lost her second appeal to Indonesia’s highest court. “The decision is unanimous,” Chief Justice Artizo Alcostar said.
12 September 2015 Sandiford meets her granddaughter Ayla for the first time, mailonline Informed. The then two-year-old girl was born seven months after Sandiford was jailed. She met her grandmother in jail.
22 February 2019 Sandiford gave an interview mailonline from prison and said that “Despite everything, I feel blessed.”
She said, “I’ve been fortunate enough to live long enough to see both of my sons grow up to be fine young men, and I’m also fortunate to be able to meet my two grandchildren. Not many people get that in their lifetime.”
18 May 2019 Sandiford’s fellow inmate, Heather Mack, explains mirror Lindsay “spends the entire day alone in her cell and does not socialize much with other inmates.”
Mack said, “She snaps at me for no reason but I still make an effort with her. She said she wants to die.”
Heather Mack was jailed in 2015 for helping her boyfriend murder her mother. The couple wrapped their mother’s body in tape, stuffed it in a suitcase and tried to escape.
March 15, 2024: Human rights barrister Felicity Gerry Casey, who visited Sandiford in 2015, called for him to be returned to the UK. Gerry said the Indonesian government should “take active steps to facilitate his return to the UK, either to serve his sentence near his family or to consider his release.”
October 21, 2025: Sandiford, now 69, may be free to return home after a Indonesian government The source told AFP That an agreement has been reached with the UK government.
Other foreign nationals imprisoned in Bali
Sandiford is not the only foreign national imprisoned and threatened with the death penalty in Indonesia. In 2005 a group of Australians, later dubbed the Bali Nine, were arrested while attempting to smuggle more than 8 kilograms of heroin from Bali.
two gangsters, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were hanged in 2015sparking diplomatic tension and leading Australia Recalling its ambassador in protest. Of the remaining members, the group’s only female member was released in 2018, while another member died of cancer in the same year.
Matthew Norman, Scott Rush, Martin Stephens, Si Yi Chen and Michael Czugaz returned home in December 2024, with five returning to Australia.
“These Australians spent more than 19 years in prison IndonesiaIt’s time for them to come home,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese Said.