Pubdate: Mon,  5 Jun 2000
Source: Express, Express on Sunday (UK)
Copyright: 2000 The Express
Contact:  +44-171-922-7794
Website: http://www.express.co.uk/
Forum: http://bbs.lineone.net/community/forums.html
Author: DAVID TAYLOR

PLEASE SAVE MY INNOCENT GIRL FROM YEARS IN CUBA DRUG JAIL

THE mother of a young British woman facing 15 years in a Cuban jail on 
drugs charges will today make an impassioned plea to Tony Blair to help 
bring her daughter home.

Rachel McGee has been refused leave to appeal by the Cuban authorities even 
though British diplomats are privately convinced she is innocent.

The 24-year-old secretary's mother Maureen and her brothers and sisters 
will go to 10 Downing Street today to deliver a letter written by Rachel 
from her squalid prison cell.

In it, she implores Mr Blair to appeal directly to Cuban leader Fidel 
Castro on her behalf.

Maureen told the Daily Express: "There is no evidence to say that Rachel 
has done anything wrong or been anywhere near any drugs. I just want to 
appeal to Mr Blair as a family man to use his influence to get her back home."

The Prime Minister has stepped in to support three other Britons imprisoned 
abroad and in each case secured their release.

Nurses Lucille McLauchlan and Deborah Parry were given a royal pardon by 
Saudi Arabia after Mr Blair appealed to King Fahd following their 
convictions for the murder of Australian colleague Yvonne Gifford.

And Karen Henderson was allowed to go home after 23 months in a Russian 
prison following her arrest at Moscow airport with a suitcase containing 
cocaine worth Pounds 500,000. Mr Blair discussed the case with then 
President Boris Yeltsin when the student was held even after her conviction 
had been quashed.

Lawyer Stephen Jakobi of the charity Fair Trials Abroad has taken up Rachel 
McGee's case because he believes that she has merely been found guilty by 
association with others who came to the attention of investigators.

Rachel, of east London, is in the Occidente women's prison near Havana, 
where she has just learned that her application for leave to appeal has 
been flatly rejected.

In her letter to the Prime Minister, Rachel writes: "I'm pleading with you 
Mr Blair to look into what's going on here, ask to see their so-called 
evidence and come to your own conclusion. It could be your son or daughter 
in a situation like I've found myself in."

Her troubles began after she accepted the offer of a cheap flight to Cuba 
in October 1998 from Karite Clacher, a friend of a man she had been dating. 
Rachel and Clacher spent much of the holiday in the company of two other 
Britons who had been on the same flight.

But on November 16 1998 she was arrested as part of a drugs sting involving 
four drug smugglers who arrived from Jamaica with 15 kilos of cocaine.

Clacher and his two acquaintances were arrested in a police raid on a 
hotel. Rachel, who was just leaving in a taxi to sort out her visa, saw 
police forcing Clacher against a wall, ran back and was arrested with him 
and the other pair. After more than 10 months in jail without trial, she 
was convicted with the others.
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