Five years after Schapelle Corby was sent to jail, her anguished mum tells Glen Williams she wants to take her mentally disturbed daughter’s place.
A mother’s love knows no bounds, and Schapelle Corby’s mum, Rosleigh Rose, is no exception. As Schapelle sinks further into a quagmire of depression behind the bars of Indonesia’s Kerobokan Prison, Rosleigh has made a heartfelt plea to serve the rest of her daughter’s 20-year sentence for her.
“My daughter is innocent, I’m an innocent person too, so why shouldn’t I be able to take her place for a crime she never committed? I have asked the Indonesian and Australian authorities if I could take Schapelle’s place, because she is sick and I’m healthy and I’m strong,” Rosleigh tells Woman’s Day.
“Schapelle’s health, her mental health, is not getting any better, and it will not improve until I have my arms around her and I can nurture her back to new.”
It has been five years since Schapelle was arrested for smuggling 4.2 kilograms of cannabis into Bali, in her boogie board bag. Despite maintaining her innocence, Schapelle, now 32, has no further legal avenues at her disposal and is not expected to be released until, at the earliest, April 12, 2024.
Esteemed psychiatrist Dr Jonathan Phillips says Schapelle is “only hanging on by a thread”. That thread, claims Rosleigh, is becoming increasingly fragile as her daughter is being denied the correct care to keep her mentally balanced.
“Schapelle hasn’t been sane for a long time. We’re trying to get her medication stabilised and Schapelle stabilised, so she can monitor it and give it to herself,” she says.
“Some days she doesn’t take her medication at all, or her paranoia is such she thinks people are trying to poison her and she refuses to take her tablets. Other days she is given medication belonging to someone else.”
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