Shut Up Michelle Leslie!

Michelle Leslie has threatened to tell all to clear her name. She claimed that the scions of very senior Indon officials, including a Minister's son, were there with her. The ecstasy pills were meant for them and came from their supplier, a Balinese man who was also in the car when Indon police found Leslie and the drugs.

As her story went, when the police stopped their cars, the passengers conducted some names dropping of who their dads were and the traditional pungli (pungutan liar or pickings sans authority). The police then agreed to release everyone except, strangely, only Leslie. They even created a false driver’s identity so that the rest would be untraceable. Wasn't it strange that after all the alleged corrupt coverup, the police and Leslie's friends, including her fellow model Mia or Siti Narima, left only Leslie to face the music and tell the tale – wait, Leslie said she was warned she would be assassinated if she spilled the beans. She also asserted that her positive blood and urine tests to ecstasy were ‘doctored’.

You know, I am acquainted with a very very young but smart boy who looked at me in disbelief when I told him the story. Leslie's tale is interesting enough to make it into a Walt Disney movie but its plausibility is truly so laughable.

What Leslie's camp told the media has been a situation of high drama where there were corrupt Indon police, Indon yuppies with powerful political connections, a false driver’s identity in the police report to prevent any subsequent tracing, and oh oh oh, don’t forget fellow model Siti Narima or Mia, all scooting off scot free, but leaving the Oz virgin princess, high profile Leslie, an orang asing (foreigner) to face the music with a sinister threat that she must obey the laws of the omerta.

Then it went on that money was passed around, something to the tune of $100,000, to be divided among police, judicial figures and others, and also to manufacture a story that could see Leslie released within three months.

Hmmm, rather convoluted and messy arrangement, don't one think so, when Leslie could have been released together with those Indon yuppies and her modelling pal, Siti Narima?

Yes indeed, if money was passed around by powerful politically connnected Indons, why not just take her along instead of leaving her behind to help police trace them and spill the beans? Why allow Siti Narima to escape but not Leslie? Why the fabrication of a "mysterious" Mia? Why the subsequent emergency need for a burqa?

Not surprising, some insiders scornfully dismissed her story, especially her claims that she was ignorant of the ecstasy pills in her handbag - afterall, didn’t she confess to the psychiatrist that she took ecstasy?

The Herald newspaper were informed that bribes were paid (but not by those Indon yuppies) to ensure Leslie's release, which has been confirmed by a source close to Leslie's legal team, but who refused to disclose the amounts. I guess that explained it all - a case of corrupt Indons versus the innocent Oz virgin princess. A Bali prosecutor, Suhadi, suggested that Leslie report the bribery allegations to the police. No such report has yet been made.

In Australia, former judge Marcus Einfeld beat me to it (dash it!) by warning Leslie to shut up and not say anything to humiliate the Indons just to repair her name, because the next Aussie who get into trouble in Indonesia would receive the full fury of the Indons.

I reckon in the Schapelle Corby’s case, the froth whipped up here by some irresponsible local media leading to threats against and harrassment of Indon Embassy officials in Canberra and Perth, and the public insults of President SBY by some hot-heads, might have contributed to her harsh sentence.

Judge Einfield also told the media to keep a low lid on Leslie's chameleon-like religious inclinations as it is a highly sensitve issue in Indonesia.

PM John Howard agrees, warning Leslie against jeopardising the cases of other Australians facing drugs charges by insulting the Indon legal and police system, and also against selling her story. Howard believes it would be wrong for her to profit financially from her crime, apart from the fact that there’s an Aussie law against that.