the innocents abroad

Thank you for publishing Katie Ritchie’s excellent Tech Talk article about older people being scammed by drug traffickers. Over the past few years about 20 elderly people were arrested in Hong Kong for being used as unsuspecting drug mules. Several of them are from the US. Some have been acquitted after long stints in prison. Almost every month an elderly person is arrested in Hong Kong for drug trafficking. They bring drugs from Sao Paulo or Johannesburg or Addis Ababa after being tricked and recruited by internet scammers. We have to keep up the publicity to alert the unsuspecting that they are being tricked into carrying illegal drugs for these smugglers and could be caught, convicted and sentenced to prison. I linked Katie’s article on my blog. You can read it at www.v2catholic.com . Other stories of victims of these scams:

• www.hkdrugblog.org/media/2015/2015-10-04SCMP-Elizabeth.jpg

• www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-crime/article/1876319/justice-last-six-vulnerable-defendants-freed-hong-kong

• www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-crime/article/1876431/wheels-justicemoved-too-slowly-accused-drug-mules-says

• www.aging.senate.gov/hearings/the-hearing-will-unveil-and-examine-a-newtroubling-scam-by-global-drug-traffickersperpetrated-against-our-nations-seniors May God bless you.

Chaplain John Wotherspoon Hong Kong Prison