Lino Neil claims he was forced to carry a suitcase containing cannabis from Thailand to Dublin
A Scottish teenager claims he has been locked up in a Qatari jail after being accused of being a drugs courier. Lino Neil spent Christmas in a cell along with 80 other men in Doha before being transferred to the city’s Central Prison.
The 18-year-old claims he was forced to carry a suitcase containing cannabis from Thailand to Dublin – but he was intercepted in Doha, where authorities have zero tolerance of drugs. His family, from Drymen, near Stirling, have told how he phoned home in a state of panic after realising he could be held for years in the Gulf state, the Daily Record reports.
News of his detention at Hamad International Airport on November 21 comes amid a huge rise in the use of drug mules from Thailand and other south east Asian countries.
Earlier this week, the Daily Record reported how Beki Wright, head of the National Crime Agency’s Borders Threat Team, warned that naïve young Brits were being lured in by gangs with promises of luxury getaways in return for transporting “packages”.
Lino’s mother Nicola, 49, said the youngster – a renowned salmon fisherman – appears to have been exploited by gangsters. Nicola said: “Lino has just turned 18 a month ago he’s totally distraught, which is the way we’re all feeling.
“They put him in the jail in Qatar Airport and he’s had so little food to eat that he’s lost a lot of weight. He is terrified. When I spoke to him the other day he was frantic and said he was going to take his own life and I can’t take the thought of that.”
She added: “Lino said that he was being controlled by a British man and that he was being told what to wear and what to eat. He said he was staying in a room with three other young guys and they were all in the same situation.
“I don’t know how he got into this mess but I know he was terrified and he phoned me a couple of weeks before he was due to fly home and told me he was terrified. He said they had a hold over him and he couldn’t get out of it. They said they would harm him and his family if he didn’t do as they said.“
Nicola said she hopes the Qatari authorities can see that he was forced to do it. She added: “He is just a teenage boy, a baby, and he has no contacts in Thailand and he’d have no way of setting up any kind of drug deal.
“It’s so obvious that he has been exploited and abused by gangsters and I really just want him home.”
The family face legal costs for a criminal trial in Doha running up to £40,000 and have already been forced to raise about £2500 to pay a lawyer in advance for his first court appearance.
Nicola said her own mental health had been wrecked by her son’s plight. She said: “I’ve been a mess and prescribed medication just to keep me from having a breakdown. I’ve hardly slept a wink I just need him home.”
Lino faces a court hearing on January 27, where he will claim that a British ex-pat forced him to take the large quantity of cannabis.
Lino’s brother Robbie, 28, said he had travelled out to Thailand for a holiday with his girlfriend after saving up cash. He said Lino was flying back via Dublin due to the cost and availability of flights.
He said: “He phoned me and I agreed to pick him up from Cairnryan to get him home for Christmas. But he never arrived off the plane and it was only later that I was told that he had been arrested.
“When he managed to get a phone and call me he said he’d been set up. I believe he’d been in Phuket and flow out via Bangkok, stopping in Doha. There had been no problem with his baggage getting from Thailand to Doha.
“He was taken into a room by police in Doha and they said they’d found stuff in his bag. They gave him the impression that he would not be detained, that they would just deport him. But that isn’t what panned out.
“He was put in a cell with 80 other guys at the airport and that was terrifying.” Robbie said that the British Embassy in Doha had been able to visit Lino on Wednesday after he’d ben transferred to the city’s Central Prison, where drugs couriers are generally held.
He said: “The new prison had a smaller cell, with him and just a couple of other guys, and I think that settled him down a bit because he’d been terrified where he was.”
Robbie admitted his brother had some convictions from home but it was ridiculous to think he could arrange a drug deal. He said: “He’s just a wee laddie who knows more about fishing than anything else. We just need to get him home.”
