14 YEARS FOR $110M HEROIN

A MOTHER of six who organised a record shipment of heroin hidden inside
pineapple tins deserved to spend the rest of her life in jail, a judge said
yesterday.

The $14 million cargo imported from China by Thi Do Vo could have fetched
up to $110 million on the streets of Sydney. Instead the illegal delivery
yesterday earned the 47-year-old shopkeeper a 22-year jail sentence.

Judge Rod Howie told Parramatta District Court the Cabramatta woman had
lied during her trial and blamed others for her plight. But video evidence
clearly showed Vo directing the unloading of the heroin-filled tins looking
"casual, jovial and chatty".

"In my view the prisoner is no dupe of any other person," Judge Howie said.

"She has been successful in establishing a new life (in Australia) and
enjoyed the benefits of a new society.

"(But) because of her greed she has ignored those benefits and privileges
and turned her back on this society and placed it at great harm."

Vo, who listened to Judge Howie through a Vietnamese translator, sat calmly
as he described her part in the drug cartel as "important". "(She tried to)
bring into this country a very large quantity of a drug," Judge Howie said.

"A drug capable of bringing with it misery and death to a very large number
of the Australian population. She played such a role as to warrant a life
sentence."

Customs officials discovered 78kg of the drug inside tins labelled
"pineapple pieces in syrup" in April 1997.

Yesterday Judge Howie described Vo, who arrived as a Vietnamese refugee in
1977, as a "capable, intelligent businesswoman" blinded by greed.

He ordered Vo serve a minimum of 14 years' jail.