Once a Jolly Hangman (16 page)

In a statement she wrote in her cell for her defence lawyer, P. Suppiah, Krol-Hmelak said Oloo took her to a second hand spare parts shop in Bangkok in a tuc tuc taxi. She waited in the cab while he went inside. 'He returned shortly afterwards with a grey traveling bag', she wrote. 'When I tried to lift it I found it very heavy. I looked inside and saw those greasy spare parts. He told me they were piston rings. At first I refused because they were too heavy, but agreed when he said Mr Obeke would be very angry if I did not take them. Since I was very eager to return home, I agreed. He said I would have to deliver them to a cargo company in Singapore for shipment to Nigeria. He said
he would give me the name of the company later and returned to my hotel. Then I remembered that I forgot to ask him for the invoice for the spare parts. I tried to reach him in his hotel, but could not'. Krol-Hmelak returned to Singapore with the engine parts and briefed Johnson about her itinerary. He knew nothing of the pistons - or piston rings as she described them in her statement - and promised to call the office in Lagos because he wanted to know what was going on. 'The following evening he came to my room and asked for one of the engine parts because he wanted to find out more about it. I gave him one and reminded him to give me money for the hotel bill and other outstanding expenses'. Krol-Hmelak said she did not hear any more from Johnson and decided to call his room several times the following evening. There was no reply. A final call was answered by another person who passed the phone to him. Her statement continues:

He told me he had been arrested because there was heroin in these
machines. He said the police were with him. I was worried because
I was left without funds and asked him to leave some money for me.

Mr Johnson did not reply. He dropped the phone. Later I started wondering which machines he had with him that could have heroin inside, but I never connected the spare parts with it, simply because a spare part is just that: a part.

Krol-Hmelak said she then called the company in Lagos and informed them what had happened. 'I was very worried and upset because I was left in a bad condition, in a strange country without money to pay my hotel and my expenses. The company told me to hold on. They would send someone with money'. She waited six days and the evening before her arrest, sitting having coffee in a patisserie in Centre Point Shopping Centre it 'suddenly occurred' to her that Johnson was referring to the pistons she had in her hotel room. 'I then became very much afraid because I remembered the warning on the visa entry card for Singapore, that anyone carrying drugs can be sentenced to death. So I decided that though I was not sure that I was correct with my suspicions, the best thing for me was to throw them away'. She quickly obtained several black plastic bags from a nearby store and carefully wrapped the pistons separately then together and put them in a large traveling bag. Then she put the traveling bag in another plastic bag. 'By then I was feeling ill with stomach pains after I completed this task and decided to take them away the next morning even though an inner voice was prompting me to take the things away at once'.

The knock on her hotel room door came early the next morning. Officers of the Central Narcotics Bureau wanted to talk to her. 'I delayed opening the door', she wrote for her defence lawyer. 'I was very scared and decided to try to hide the spare parts. I did not know where to hide them at first, but decided to put them in the sofa which converted into a spare bed'. It did not take the police long to find the hiding place. Krol-Hmelak was ordered to provide two urine samples. A week later, accused of being a drug addict according to tests they had carried out, she accused her interrogators of trying to frame her. 'I had never taken any kind of drugs', she declared. 'You are
framing me with that urine'. Despite her protests she was charged with one count under the Misuse of Drugs Act.

After van Damme was convicted, much to Krol-Hmelak's horror and the amazement of many, a Dutch newspaper, AD, published a report quoting a spokesperson for the Central Investigation Information
Bureau (Centrale Recherche Informatiediens) in Holland accusing her of working with a Nigerian drug ring. "The Dutchman, J. van Damme who has been sentenced to death in Singapore for smuggling heroin, is possibly part of a Nigerian drug ring', said the spokesperson. "The 59-year-old Maria Krol-Hmelak, who has yet to be tried, would also have been drafted as a courier by a Nigerian drug ring'. The report also quoted Krol-Hmelak's estranged husband that he intended suing the CRI for publicly portraying her in this way and at such a crucial time in the fight for her life. Krol was also alleged in the report to have given the names of Nigerians to the American Drug Enforcement Agency, DEA, who were involved in smuggling drugs in 1989. Among those names were people who were worked for Kenrods Ltd. of Lagos - Krol- Hmelak's employer until he resigned. It was beginning to become a very murky case indeed. And it did not look good at all for Krol-Hmelak, a Kenrods' employee at the time of her arrest. Her 'I didn't know' defence is used in 90 per cent of all drug possession cases according to published records and usually carries no weight at all. It is too simple. But she was being condemned in her own country even before her trial began. In the statement she prepared for her legal team, Krol-Hmelak said her co-defendant, Johnson, came to her room one evening to take away one of the piston rings for examination. 'I gave him one', she said. 'I also reminded him to give me money to pay more deposit for my hotel and for my journey to Bangkok where I wanted to wind up things and finally return home to Nigeria. He said he would give me the money in the morning, then the evening. However, in the evening he did not call, so I called his room. There was no reply'. Krol-Hmelak tried again later when someone else answered her call. 'When I spoke to Mr Johnson, who was called to the phone, he told me he had been arrested. They had found heroin in 'these machines' and the police were with him'.

When the inevitable verdict was announced in van Damme's case, the Dutch media began speculating on her fate as well. 'Death Sentence Threatens Dutch Woman', De Telegraaf's front page blazed. The trials of Krol-Hmelak and Johnson, despite objections from her lawyers, were held jointly. The first session before Judge Lai Kew Chai began on 23 September 1993. They dragged on for six weeks with some lasting only a few hours with the two accused being shunted back and forth

from their cells. The pair maintained all along they had no idea large amounts of heroin had been packed inside the spare parts.

Following final submissions at the 28th session which began on 29 October, Judge Lai suddenly announced them both not guilty. Krol- Hmelak could hardly believe her ears. She was free. Completely stunned she burst into tears sobbing 'What's happening? What's happening?' She had been in jail for two and a half years expecting she would end up on the gallows. Instead she heard cries from embassy officials: 'You are free! You are free!' It was an extraordinary end to the case in which few believed she would not be found guilty and hanged. The 'I didn't know' plea had seemingly and perhaps miraculously worked for her but in Singapore funny things tend to happen on
the way to their courtrooms just as funny things happen when they arrive in a theatre to perform in a comedy show. However, in Singapore it has nothing to do with humour.

In fact, many believe that Krol-Hmelak was guilty. But to hang her following the uproar over van Damme's death sentence might not have been wise. So it was very likely a government verdict not a judicial one. Singapore's judiciary is not free to decide who should live and who should die when vital business, economic and diplomatic issues are at stake. In these circumstances, to have two Dutch citizens on death row at the same time and an elderly woman at that would have meant economic and diplomatic suicide. And if they could not hang Krol-Hmelak, they could not hang her lucky colleague Johnson either. Suppiah told me that he was able to persuade Judge Lai that, despite the circumstances of the case, this highly educated professional woman really didn't know she was in possession of a valuable consignment of heroin hidden in those engine parts. But he added: 'There was a lot of sympathy for her and I don't think Singapore wanted to hang a 57- year-old grandmother. The authorities made sure she received a very fair trial. Everyone was relieved, of course, when she was freed'. Her very rare successful 'I didn't know' defence might well have made the Guinness Book of Records had it been offered for consideration.

There was only one light moment during the grim and tedious 66- day trial of Krol-Hmelak and Johnson. It had the court rocking with laughter. Even the judge smiled. It happened when a Central Narcotics Bureau police officer was giving evidence about Johnson's attitude when
he was being questioned. Suddenly Johnson unzipped his pants, took out his penis and swore on his member that he was telling the truth. It was as though he was taking an oath on a holy book. If he were lying he would be prepared to have it cut off as part of his punishment and endure God's wrath. He said it was an old Nigerian custom still used in his home country. But many in the courtroom wondered if he was either brave or just stupid. For taking into account the mandatory death penalty and Singapore's questionable rules of evidence, it could mean that two heads would roll in Johnson's case.

Although Judge Lai, who died from stomach cancer in 2006, said at the end of the trial that he would produce a written judgment he did not do so. There was no appeal against his decision by the prosecution either. Lawnet.com, the renowned international legal recording service merely has the words 'No record' by her name. The only record of the trial is that which Suppiah prepared for himself. According to him, Judge Lai said in his summing up:

We have gone through 28 days of trial and at the appropriate time, I will be delivering a judgment in full, in writing. But very briefly, Mrs Krol, it is the finding of this court, having heard you under cross- examination, that more probably than not, you did not know that the pistons contained diamorphine. I believe you on your evidence when it comes to the crucial elements of the case. You have on occasions lied to the police officers, and even to this Court, but they did not undermine my belief in your evidence because your version was consistent from the beginning to the end in its essential element and you have discharged the burden of rebutting the evidence, the presumption against you. So you are acquitted of the charge and you may go free.

Then he asked Peter Johnson to stand up. Judge Lai said:

As for you, your evidence has been less satisfactory. Your different versions given to the CNB officers and your evidence in Court have shown that by nature you are quite a mendacious person. Between your evidence and that of Mrs Krol, I would accept her evidence rather than yours. Having said that, it is still the finding of this Court that it was Mrs Krol who handed you the piston ring. Mrs Krol said to this Court that you appeared surprised when she mentioned to you that Mr Oloo gave the piston to her in Bangkok. And it is her evidence, which I accept, that you collected the piston from her to go and find out about
cargoing. But for her evidence, I don't think you would have discharged your onus of proof. Mrs Krol has no reason to help you but she has given evidence which turned the case in your favour. I have therefore come to the conclusion that more probably than not, you also did not know that there was diamorphine in the pistons. You are also acquitted and discharged.

The DPP: "The exhibits, Your Honour?' Judge Lai: 'The exhibits are to be returned to the accused persons and the drugs to be forfeited'. Suppiah wrote an epilogue which he allowed me to copy. It said:

Under normal circumstances the First Accused must give evidence first who in this case was Peter Johnson. However, with leave of the Court, Maria Krol gave evidence first even though she was the Second Accused, followed by Johnson. The reason for this arrangement was to have a continuous picture of the events that took place, as it was Mrs Krol who brought the pistons from Bangkok to Singapore and gave one to Johnson. Nowhere in her evidence did Mrs Krol implicate him. She said Johnson did not know anything about the pistons and he was rather surprised when Mrs Krol told him about them. There has been unnecessary cross-examination of Mrs Krol by counsel for Johnson as can be seen from the trial notes. Why this was so it is difficult to fathom. The cross-examination was extensively towards attacking her credibility. At the end of the trial the judge accepted the version given by Mrs Krol and said this in relation to Johnson: 'But for her evidence I do not think you would have discharged your onus of proof' - that is of no knowledge as to what was inside the piston ring that was found in his room. The joint trial in fact benefited Johnson, leading to his acquittal on Krol's evidence. It would have been easier for Krol to discharge the burden of knowledge if she had been tried alone without Johnson, as it can be seen from his evidence that he has complicated matters for no apparent reason. After Johnson was acquitted, the US$50,000 was returned to him. He wanted to give some to Mrs Krol to settle her outstanding hotel bill which she rejected. There has been no written judgment on the case and there was no appeal against the Judge's decision.

As soon as she was declared innocent, Krol-Hmelak wanted to leave for home immediately. A seat had been reserved for her on the evening KLM flight to Amsterdam. But a last minute hitch brought new terror for her. All her friends and Dutch Embassy staff were waiting at Changi
airport to see her off. But instead she was reminded of a pending charge for the consumption of drugs due to be heard at the subordinate court the next day. She was permitted to stay the night at a hotel instead of being returned to the prison cell. The next morning the Attorney General formally withdrew the charge without further ado. Krol- Hmelak left for the Netherlands ten hours later. She has never returned to Singapore. The result, despite the uproar when Johannes van Damme
was hanged, meant business as usual between the two countries. No one wanted another demand, however frivolous, for Dutch warships to be sent to Singapore to spring this aging granny from the shadow of the gallows.