Family of Bella Culley, 19, paid £138,000 in deal that could result in a two-year sentence in former Soviet republic
The family of a pregnant British teenager being held on drug smuggling charges in Georgia have paid £138,000 in a plea bargain deal that could result in a two-year jail sentence.
It may mean that Bella Culley, a 19-year-old student nurse from Billingham, Teesside, will give birth while imprisoned in the former Soviet republic.
Culley had been travelling in south-east Asia and was reported missing in Pattaya, Thailand. In May she was arrested at Tbilisi airport after being stopped with, it is alleged, 14kg of cannabis worth £200,000 in a travel bag.
At a court hearing in Tbilisi on Tuesday Culley’s mother, Lyanne Kennedy, told reporters that the family had managed to raise 500,000 lari (£137,870) and were waiting for the funds to be credited to the relevant government account.
