The next thing I knew, we were surrounded by crowds of samba-dancing locals, who had turned their grim favela into the site of a makeshift carnival. It would have been exactly how I pictured Brazil to be if it wasn't for the fact that all the partygoers looked like murderers. Their body language and facial expressions had an undercurrent of menace to them, as if they were waiting for an opportunity to kick off.
'¿Dónde puedo comprar cocaína?' Antonio asked a grizzled local.
'Não estou entendendo. Eu não falo espanhol,' the puzzled man replied. Nobody at the party could understand Spanish, only Portuguese. We didn't have a cat in hell's chance of getting any coke. Even if somebody did manage to pick up what we were saying, they would be unlikely to point out who the dealers were to the only gringos at the party. For all they knew, we could have been the world's worst undercover cops.
We eventually went home empty-handed, which forced me to raid the minibar to blot out my craving out with drink. I downed everything that they had before curling up under the covers and wishing I was back in Tenerife. Some holiday in the sun this was turning out to be. I would have been better off going to Skegness or Bognor. Salvador was the grimmest place that I had been to in my life and I couldn't wait until I got to leave.
Midway through the week, Antonio had a large sum of money wired across to him, which I assumed was from his wife to tide him over until our return flight. The bill for the minibar alone was now enormous so it was a godsend. The first things that he bought with his newfound wealth were two large suitcases. He had taken an old battered one across with him so I figured he wanted something a little smarter to travel back to Tenerife with… but why did he need more than one? This left me scratching my head for a while until I eventually decided that it was nothing to do with me. If he wanted to spend his cash on random suitcases then that was up to him.
By the end of the holiday, Antonio was broke again and had no money left for fags. Budgeting clearly wasn't his strong point. I wondered where the hell it had all gone because he hadn't spent a single penny on me. He didn't seem to have blown it on drugs either so it was a total mystery.
'Oh well,' I thought to myself. 'We'll be back home soon enough, where I can relax with a nice, big, bag of charlie and forget all about this idiot throwing his cash away.'
The fact that he was so bad with money should have made me question how sound his business sense was. Most people would have been wary of managing a club for somebody who seemed to spend everything that he earned within a matter of days, but I was in too much of a state to properly consider what I was getting myself into.
On the day of our return flight, I was anxious to get home so that I could resume my addiction. Going cold turkey for a week had been no fun at all. It was just a pity we had to travel via Gran Canaria.
I spent the first leg of our journey fast asleep. My dreams were the only place where I could escape the mental anguish that the lack of drugs was putting me through. I was woken up by the plane touching down on the runway and thought, 'Only one more flight to go then I can finally get high.'
As I dragged myself out of the cabin and set off to pick up my luggage, I felt as if I was going to collapse from exhaustion. Without cocaine, I had zero energy. The level to which I needed it was frightening. Drugs were my master and I was at their mercy. Seven days without bowing down to them had left me feeling mentally broken.
Travelling from Brazil to Spain isn't like travelling within Europe. Brazil shares its borders with Colombia and Bolivia, which means that every item of luggage needs to be thoroughly checked. This was no problem for me because if I had any drugs on me, I would have hoovered them up within the first two minutes of the flight. I handed over my bag without giving it a second thought.
Antonio's first suitcase got the all clear straightaway but his second had the customs officers in a right tizzy. From what I could make out, they seemed to think that one side of the case was heavier than the other. The next thing I knew, he had been frogmarched out of the room, leaving me standing there like a lemon. I was a bit taken aback but it still didn't even cross my mind that I was in any kind of trouble because whatever the officers suspected might be in the suitcase, had nothing to do with me. I was as surprised as anyone that they were kicking up such a stink.
A couple of minutes later, a burly Spanish policeman came bowling back into the room, grabbed hold of my arm and dragged me into a side room. In Spain, you have three tiers of police; there are the policía, who deal with the piddling little crimes; the Guardia Civil, who deal with drugs and organised crime; and the Centro Nacional de Inteligencia, who are the Spanish equivalent of MI5. This guy was a member of the Guardia Civil. The girls on Veronicas were always talking about how untrustworthy they were and how they were to be avoided at all costs. They had a reputation for police brutality so I thought it best not to complain about the fact he was so rough with me. The look in his eyes told me that I was in enough trouble as it was.
By this stage it seemed unlikely that I was going to be able to distance myself from whatever it was Antonio had done. The coppers must have known that I was totally oblivious to the coke; the minute they ripped the suitcase open, my jaw fell to the floor and I couldn't have looked more gobsmacked if I had tried. They really didn't give a monkey's, though. As far as they were concerned, I was with a drug smuggler so I was as good as a smuggler myself. The holiday from hell had ended in the worst possible way. Antonio had rowed us both into the middle of shit creek, thrown away the paddles and drilled holes in the boat. He had destroyed our futures for the sake of a couple of grand to blow on crack.
'Antonio, what were you thinking?' I asked as white powder flew around the room and the Guardia Civil shouted manically in Spanish. 'Does this mean I'm not going to be managing your club?'
Chapter 5
SALTO DEL NEGRO
'Tu amigo tiene una gran cantidad de cocaína. ¿Dónde lo conseguiste?'
There was that word again: 'cocaína'. By this stage I was getting sick of hearing it. Not only did it remind me what a mess I was in, but it also made my withdrawal symptoms ten times worse. I had no drugs in my suitcase and Antonio had already told the police that I knew nothing, so why on earth were they still bellowing? The entire situation was surreal. I was half expecting Jeremy Beadle to jump out from behind the Guardia Civil to tell me I'd been framed.
'Come,' said one of the officers. 'You follow me now.'
The heavy-set Spanish copper marched me over to a broom cupboard, shoved me inside and locked the door. The crazy thing was that I was still carrying my hand luggage. If I was such a big-time drug smuggler then why hadn't they torn it apart like they had done with Antonio's suitcase? It didn't make any sense.
By this stage, I was almost passing out from exhaustion so I opened up my bag to see if there was anything soft inside that I could use as a pillow. My teddy bear was fairly near the top so I got him out and curled up with my head on him. I take him everywhere with me; it's just something that I have always done. To be honest I don't think my brain had fully registered how much trouble I was in or I would have remained wide-awake, withdrawal or no withdrawal. I was still under the illusion that I was going to be released as soon as the police had finished their investigation.
As I drifted off, I remember thinking, 'This is all just a matter of routine. They're going to grill Antonio until they're sure I played no part in this and then I'm going home.'
Three hours later, I was rudely awoken by another Guardia Civil officer bellowing instructions at me. He was motioning towards the door so I forced my tired eyes open and stumbled to my feet. I was then walked through the airport to a small office, where I was greeted by a short, official-looking, Spanish lady.
'I am your translator,' she told me. 'You need tell police which suitcase yours is.'
Was this woman having a laugh? Translators are supposed to speak flawless English but she spoke with an almost incomprehensibly thick Spanish accent and didn't seem to have a strong
grasp of our grammar.
'The green one without the drugs in it,' I said.
'Why you travel with owner of suitcase with drugs?'
'He's my boss. I was going to manage a nightclub for him,' I explained.
The words left a lump in my throat. My week of purgatory in Brazil was meant to lead to a step up the career ladder, not a stretch inside. Fair enough, the main aim of trying to get the managerial role was to be able to afford to snort even more coke than before, but I still couldn't help but feel as if my hopes and dreams had just been shattered into a million, tiny pieces.
'You are going to be strip-searched by two female officers,' the translator told me.
Ordinarily I would have found the idea of a woman I had never met before, looking at my naked body utterly repulsive, but by this stage, I was so shell-shocked that it didn't even faze me. I felt nothing whatsoever as I was searched internally. The woman who was poking about down there could have been anyone for all I knew because she wasn't wearing a uniform and didn't show me any form of ID. It was very degrading but luckily my brain was in a state of total confusion and couldn't process it. Nothing but tiredness and craving would register.
Once the police were satisfied that I hadn't got packages of cocaine strapped all over my body, the translator told me that I was entitled to a phone call and advised me to ring home.
'I'm not ringing anyone,' I said. 'I don't want anyone to know.'
Mum would be absolutely devastated if she found out that her daughter had been arrested for smuggling cocaine. It didn't even bear thinking about.
'You at least need to notify British Consulate…'
The message didn't seem to be getting through to her. I wasn't going to talk to anybody who could possibly pass the message on to my family. Even picturing their reactions in my mind made me feel physically sick.
'I'm not ringing anyone,' I repeated. 'Nobody at all, not even the Consulate.'
'OK then, you have made your choice,' said the translator. 'We can't force you to do it.'
As I breathed a sigh of relief and tried to get the image of my weeping mother out of my head, a pair of handcuffs snapped shut around my wrists and a Guardia Civil officer draped a coat over my hands.
'Come. We go,' he told me.
The coat was intended to protect my dignity whilst he walked me through the main part of the airport but it might as well have not been there because it was blindingly obvious that I was cuffed up. My hands were clasped together and I had two coppers escorting me; it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what was going on.
I was escorted through the front entrance and ushered into a Guardia Civil bus. The bus looked like your regular, run-of-the-mill coach, but had a load of miniature cells in it. I was flung into one of the compartments and locked up whilst the police drove to the cop shop. It was a relatively short journey and I was soon transferred to a holding cell in the police station, which had no toilet and was full of everything that could possibly come out of a human body. Rats the size of cats ran around on the floor, which was covered in traces of urine and faeces. The second I entered the room, I started shaking uncontrollably and couldn't stop crying. Was this the type of place that I was going to be stuck in for God knows how long if I was found guilty of smuggling? I sincerely hoped not.
I eventually managed to calm myself down a bit and sprawled out on the hard, concrete bench in the corner of the cell to get some sleep. It was difficult to nod off in such a filthy, stinking dive but my exhaustion eventually got the better of me. A couple of hours later, I woke up desperately needing the toilet, which was a bit of a nightmare considering the fact that there wasn't one.
'Hello?' I shouted out, hoping that somebody would come to my aid before I was forced to make the cell even dirtier. 'Can somebody please help me?'
A short, seedy-looking bloke appeared at the window and asked me what I wanted.
'I need to go to the toilet,' I told him. 'Can you let me out of the cell?'
The door opened with a clank and he beckoned me towards him.
'Can't I have a female officer take me?' I asked.
The copper pretended not to understand, which was to be a regular occurrence whenever I was in the company of the Spanish Old Bill. There was definitely something unsavoury about this guy. He had a nasty look in his eyes and seemed as if he shouldn't be left alone with a cat, let alone a vulnerable, young girl. He led me to a room that had a filthy hole in the middle of the floor and pointed a bony figure at it as if to say, 'That's the best you're going to get'.
'I can't go in that,' I gasped. 'Isn't there anything else?'
'You no like?' he asked me. 'Come with me instead.'
He took me to the toilet used by the police, which saved me from peeing myself because there was no chance in hell that I would have ever done my business in the hole. The man then handed me a cigarette and shut me back up in the holding cell.
I was beginning to think that I had been too quick to judge my pint-sized Spanish friend when I heard the door creak open and saw him standing there with his flies undone. A wave of terror hit me like a ton of bricks and I started screaming at the top of my lungs. He advanced towards me with his manhood flopping about in front of him so I pushed him away whilst bawling my eyes out. This must have put the frighteners up him because he zipped his trousers up and started backing off. God knows what he would have done to me if I hadn't kicked up such a fuss. The thought of it still chills me to the bone.
I was kept in the cell until the following morning and spent the whole night worrying that the sleazebag cop would let himself in again. I didn't say a word to the officers who finally unlocked my cell because I didn't think that they would believe me. At the end of the day, it would have been the word of an alleged smuggler against a member of the Guardia Civil and I guessed whose side the coppers would have taken.
The officers escorted me out of the entrance and back into the transport bus. I was then driven to the local court to find out whether or not I was going to be remanded into custody. The courtroom was tiny and there was only me, Antonio, the judge and two duty solicitors in there. The duty solicitors both looked as if they were only present because they had to be and didn't even make eye contact with us. I had the feeling that they weren't going to be fighting our corner particularly vigorously.
The set-up wasn't how I expected a court case to be. For one thing, the judge didn't have a wig on and although she was quite smartly dressed, there was still nothing to distinguish her from the average office worker. She addressed the court in Spanish but luckily I managed to grasp the fact that she was giving me bail and denying it to Antonio. I was to be held at Salto del Negro prison in Las Palmas until the two-grand bail money was handed over to the authorities.
The entire hearing must have taken a maximum of ten minutes. The second it finished, Antonio and I were taken away and locked up in another holding cell. It was the first time I had been alone with him since our arrest at the airport so I took the opportunity to ask him what the hell was going on.
'I thought it would be easy money,' he told me, looking at the floor as he spoke. 'You seemed more respectable than the other girls and it's easier to get past customs if you're with a girl.'
'I'm not being funny with you Antonio but you're miles older than me and we look stupid together,' I set him straight. 'Who the bloody hell put you up to this and how much did they pay you?'
'You wouldn't believe me if I told you,' he mumbled.
'Try me,' I implored him. 'After everything that's happened today, I'm ready for anything.'
'OK it was two Guardia Civil officers and a judge. They were waiting just outside the airport to collect the drugs and I was meant to get 2,400,000 pesetas. I don't know what went wrong…'
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Two million four-hundred thousand pesetas is only about twelve grand in sterling. The Guardia Civil are rumoured to control the majority of the drug trade in Tenerife and nick anybody who sells on
their patch or poaches their customers. It was no surprise that they were involved, but the fact that a judge was in on it was another matter altogether. I had heard that Spanish society was corrupt but this was taking it to a whole new level.
Antonio told me that he had picked up the coke at a bus stop whilst I was in the hotel room asleep and that it had been smuggled across the border from Colombia. So we had risked our lives attempting to score drugs at a Brazilian slum party when all the while that idiot had a shipment coming in? I was so angry that I could hardly speak.
'Of all the people that you could have chosen to take with you, why did it have to be me?' I shouted, tears welling up in my eyes as I thought of everything that he had put me through for the sake of a measly twelve grand. It wasn't as if he would have invested the money in anything worthwhile either; the whole lot would have gone on crack the minute he got home.
'I am so sorry,' Antonio snivelled. 'I have told them that you have nothing to do with this and I will say the same in court. I would never implicate you in anything so there's no need to worry because you will be free soon.'
Passport To Hell: How I Survived Sadistic Prison Guards and Hardened Criminals in Spain's Toughest Prisons Page 5