JUDGE DEPORTS TWO SPANISH DRUG COURIERS

Two Spanish women discovered with #200,000 worth of cannabis resin in a
Dublin hotel last January have been jailed for five years. Judge Kieran
O'Connor, at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court, ordered that the sentences be
suspended from next July and that they be deported. He also banned them
from re-entering the Republic.

Susana Hylander Impagliazzo (41) and Yolanda Jimena Herrero (29), both of
Torremolinos, pleaded guilty to having 20 kilograms of cannabis resin for
sale or supply. The proceedings were translated into Spanish for the
defendants, both of whom are the mothers of three children.

Garda Denise Paul told prosecuting counsel Ms Isobel Kennedy the women were
arrested in a bedroom at the Travelodge, Navan Road, Dublin, when a
suitcase containing the cannabis was found between their beds.

Neither woman had previous convictions.

Defence counsel, Mr George Birmingham (for Hylander), said his client had
been recruited by an Irishman in Malaga to act as a courier. She was
promised #1,000 to deliver the suitcase and agreed to make the run because
she was in financial difficulties.

Counsel said she came from a comfortable background but fell into
straitened circumstances when her marriage failed.

Mr Birmingham said that, in view of her extreme difficulties, the court
might consider an early suspension with a deportation order.

Mr Tom O'Connell (for Jimena) said she had two sons aged seven and eight
years from a failed marriage, as well as a baby son who was two months when
she came on this run.

Judge O'Connor said drugs sometimes killed people who abused them. The
defendants were assisting drug dealers by acting as couriers and had
committed a serious offence, which had to be marked by a heavy sentence.
"But considering it costs the taxpayer abut #50,000 to keep a person in
prison per year and in view of all the circumstances outlined by counsel, I
will suspend the sentences from July 6th next, deport you, and ban you both
from ever returning to Ireland."