Cape Town – A South African woman, Ashley Oosthuizen, who is facing life imprisonment in Thailand after she unknowingly signed for a package containing the narcotic MDMA, has reportedly penned a letter to her friends and family back home.
Oosthuizen was working at a restaurant, Hot in the Buscuit, which was owned by her then-boyfriend, Tristan Nettles when she signed for the package.
According to freeashley.org, Oosthuizen was arrested and charged in Koh Samui, Thailand for a crime that Nettles and his friends committed.
Nettles was alleged to have been an international dark web drug dealer who worked as a high school science teacher at Panyadee International School in Koh Samui from 2017 until the summer of 2020.
He was reportedly an admitted drug dealer who had been caught selling drugs repeatedly since he was 12 years old.
“When Tristan met Ashley for the first time at a Halloween party in 2019, she was only 19 years old. He was 32,” the website said.
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Oosthuizen was arrested on October 8, 2020 and has been languishing in a Thai prison ever since.
According to IOL Oosthuizen recently penned a heartwarming letter to her friends and family, letting them know that she drew strength from knowing that her situation was not permanent.
“Perhaps for this very particular period of my life that causes me, at times, to only see the abyss and forget that this isn’t the picture in its entirety.
“To prevent myself from falling into that abyss, I’d very much like to step back, step out and come and take a fresh look at it. But in my confinement there is nowhere to step out to, and so I must turn inwards and look upwards. And I draw my strength from three simple words; nothing is permanent,” Oosthuizen was quoted as saying in the letter.
Oosthuizen managed to get her sentence in prison reduced to 33.4 years but has not ceased her bid to regain her freedom, lodging an appeal to the Thai Supreme Court.
The Saturday Star reported that Oosthuizen’s mother Linette Blignaut said: “Chances are extremely good for the SC (Supreme Court) to accept the appeal. We will, in due time, comment more on the appeal, etc.”
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Picture: Facebook/ A voice for Ashley Oosthuizen
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Compiled by Junaid Benjamin
