A Jamaican national who swallowed 89 pellets containing drugs was sentenced in Supreme Court on Friday.

Assistant Justice Archibald Warner said he was being fair when he sentenced Angela Maxine Porter, 44, to four years with custody taken into consideration after she was arrested on October 29, 2002.

After being searched and questioned at the Bermuda International Airport, Porter was conveyed to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital for an x-ray but before the examination she excreted some pellets. The woman was examined and it was discovered that she had carried 89 pellets in her abdomen, which it was later found to be 85.5 grams of free base cocaine and 517 grams of cannabis resin (hashish).

Crown counsel Cindy Clarke said the Jamaican farmer had wanted to come to Bermuda after her farm was demolished during a hurricane and was asked to bring drugs to the Island by a man named "Big Joe".

The single mother of five children pleaded with Mr. Warner to send her back home and said her children were going through a rough time since she had been in custody for almost a year.

Porter's lawyer, Mark Pettingill, told the court that his defendant was desperate and the message of Bermuda being a tough drug jurisdiction would not get back to the impoverished society Porter had come from.