Cocaine accused faces months in jail before trial

Ezeiza Women's Prison in Argentina where Kiwi Sharon Armstrong is being held pending investigation of her case. Photo / Supplied

Sharon Armstrong faces at least eight years behind bars in Argentina regardless of whether she knew about her illicit cargo, a drug trafficking expert says.

Claudio Izaguirre, president of the Associacion Antidrogas de la Republica Argentina, said the jails were packed with cases of drug mules claiming they had been set up, and authorities usually showed little sympathy.

He said: "It doesn't matter whether she knew about the drugs or not in the eyes of the law. She says she didn't know about the drugs; she can tell that to God.

"She will serve eight years, minimum. It's a horrible place for someone used to a certain level of comfort. The conditions are Third World."

"If it is true that she really wasn't a mule then they have ruined her life."

Izaguirre said that under the "tortoise-like" Argentinian justice system, Armstrong could wait up to three years to learn her fate.

"Here, things move very slowly."

The initial investigation could take about eight months, then both sets of lawyers would contest the facts through a series of written and oral arguments before sentencing.

Yesterday, Armstrong said she was surviving "minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour, day-by-day".

She said she was looking forward to buying cigarettes and other personal items after receiving money in her prison "bank account".

"I'm just trying to stay focused. I am writing a journal, my family are ringing every day."

She said she was frustrated by media reports describing her as an international drug trafficker.

"I am concerned that the media have been given misinformation from the police, photos of me once I was arrested, information about what I carried. I'm not the person they are making me out to be."

The New Zealand Ambassador to Argentina, Darryl Dunn, said staff had been to see Armstrong but he was unable to say any more.

She is being held at Prison 31, a medium security prison.

Speaking at the New Zealand Embassy in Buenos Aires after attending an Anzac Day service, Mr Dunn said: "It is like a doctor-patient relationship, it's completely confidential."

Izaguirre, who has 30 years' experience working for drug Non-Governmental Organisation, warned New Zealanders to avoid all contact with drugs in South America.

He said: "It's a fantasy that people can leave from Argentina with cocaine as if they were leaving with a bottle of water.

"Anyone who is involved with drug trafficking has already signed their own death warrant. The only thing they are missing is the date."

Armstrong, 54, is awaiting her first appearance in court. She faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in jail for trying to board a flight from Buenos Aires to London on April 13 with 5kg of cocaine hidden in a false bottom of her suitcase.

Armstrong, a former deputy chief executive of the Maori Language Commission, says she was duped into taking the bag by a man she met online.

He asked her to divert to Argentina to collect some of his work documents, and gave her $1000 towards her flights.

Police confiscated her iPhone, passport, Farmers card and Argentinian, Australian and United States cash and her New Zealand, Australian and Cook Islands driver's licences.