Two drug mules from Northern Ireland and Scotland have been sentenced to six years and eight months in jail for smuggling cocaine in Peru.  The 20-year-olds had been held in custody in the South American country for the last five months after 11kg of cocaine worth an estimated £1.5m was found in their luggage at Lima airport.  Michaela McCollum and her Scottish friend Melissa Reid initially claimed that an armed gang in Spain had forced them to take the drugs to Peru. The pair, who have already served four months in custody, originally faced a maximum of 15 years in prison if found guilty. But they said they decided to plead guilty in the hope of getting a lighter sentence.  Reid has handed the Mail on Sunday her diary, in which she claims she and McCollum were kept in the back of a prison van in intolerable heat for a day without food, water or access to a toilet.  The diary said: "I have prepared myself for the worst … I think of how I will be in 15 years … and yes it does still scare me. I would really like to have this over with by Christmas because the fear of the unknown makes me more anxious. I've been waiting four months already and the delays and changes are annoying.  "'All this time the idea was I would be sentenced to six years eight months but then serve a third of that if I worked or studied [in prison] – so roughly two years three months – but now I will have to serve the full sentence."  The diary also revealed Reid was afraid of being separated from McCollum.
Michaela McCollum, of Northern Ireland, and Melissa Reid, of Scotland, sentenced after £1.5m of cocaine found in luggage