Canadian drug mule in Australia says role was to make smuggling look like vacation

Melina Roberge (left) and Isabelle Lagacé, along with Andre Tamine, were convicted of smuggling 95 kg of cocaine

SYDNEY, Australia - A Canadian woman told an Australian court on Wednesday that her only role in a plot to smuggle cocaine worth $16 million into Sydney was to make the luxury cruise ship operation look like a vacation.

Three Canadians have pleaded guilty in the New South Wales state District Court to smuggling 95 kilograms (209 pounds) of the drug in their luggage in a seven-week cruise in 2016 from Britain to Ireland, the United States, Bermuda, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Chile then Australia,

Melina Roberge, 24, appeared in the court for a sentencing hearing on Wednesday.

A date for her to be sentenced will be set next week. She was to stand trial last month, before she changed her plea to guilty.

"I was meant to just be there and look like I was on holiday and look like a cover for everyone else," Roberge told the court.

Roberge told the court she initially refused to take part when her unnamed "sugar daddy" asked her to carry drugs on the cruise. But she later agreed when told she could enjoy a free vacation while helping the group.

"Other people would be there to look after the drugs," she said.

She began to cry while telling the court she made the decision without thinking about the consequences. As a remand prisoner in a Sydney jail, she had met women who struggle with drug addictions.

"I do not want to be part of that. I want to be able to help them," Roberge said.

"I am really sorry. I should have thought about the consequences and not what I would have gotten for it," she added.

Prosecutor Tom Muir told her she had been aware of what she was doing.

"She was not doing it for debt," Muir told the court. "It's for the lifestyle she wants to enjoy."

In a letter to the court, Roberge wrote that she had been motivated by a desire to "take photos of myself in exotic locations for 'likes' and attention, and hurt so many people in the process."

She posted photographs of herself in New York's Time Square and other locations throughout the drug run.

Her lawyer Avni Djemal said Roberge played no part in dealing the drugs and had been young and naive.

Police with sniffer dogs found 35 kilograms (77 pounds) of cocaine in the cabin she shared with Isabelle Lagace on Aug. 28, 2016, when the MS Sea Princess, operated by California-based Princess Cruises, berthed in Sydney.

Another 60 kilograms (132 pounds) of the drug were found in Andre Tamine's cabin. It is not clear from what port the drug was collected.

The U.S. Department of Homelands Security and the Canada Border Services Agency identified the three as high-risk passengers among the 1,800 on board. The haul was a record for cocaine smuggled in luggage through an Australian air or sea port.

Lagace, 29, was sentenced in November to 7 years and 6 months in prison backdated to her arrest. She will likely be deported after serving a non-parole period of 4 year and 6 months. She told the court she took part to settle a debt in Canada.

Tamine, 65, will be sentenced in October.