Czech model acquitted in drug trafficking case

LAHORE: A two-member bench of the Lahore High Court on Monday set aside Czech model Teresa’s eight years and eight months conviction in a drug trafficking case and acquitted her of the charges.

Model Teresa Hluskova was arrested at the Lahore airport on January 10, 2018 on her way to the United Arab Emirates and drugs were recovered. According to Customs officials, more than eight and a half kilograms of heroin (worth Rs150 million in the international market) were recovered from Teresa.

The professional model was on a three-month family visit visa to Pakistan. An additional sessions judge of Lahore had sentenced Teresa to eight years and eight months in prison in March 2019. Her co-accused, Shoaib, was acquitted by trial court for lack of evidence.

Teresa's lawyer, Saif al-Muluk, argued that the drugs recovered from the accused could not be safely transferred to the laboratory. The lawyer objected that the trial court judge in his judgment did not mention anything about who delivered the drug samples to the laboratory. A two-member bench headed by Justice Ali Baqar Najafi, after hearing arguments, allowed the appeal against Teresa's sentence.