Mother of four jailed for cocaine importation

By Natasha Reid

A 35-year-old mother of four, who ingested €63,653 worth of cocaine pellets for importation into Ireland, has been jailed for three years.

Bruna Alves De Campos was before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court, where she pleaded guilty to importing 109 pellets of cocaine on November 2, 2024 at Dublin Airport.

She told gardai that she had taken the job as a drug mule in order to pay for the care of her ill parents, and the court heard that her father had since passed away.

Garda Anthony Boyle told the court that when De Campos arrived into customs from her native Brazil, she immediately stood out, and it was suspected that she might have ingested cocaine pellets.

She had photographs of the pellets on her mobile phone, and admitted that she had ingested them. De Campos was taken to hospital where the pellets were found, and she was arrested.

“She told me that her parents were very ill and she was in financial difficulty,” he said. “She said she had been told to go to a particular hotel in the city centre until the drugs had been passed.”

He said she was to then hand them over to a person before returning to Brazil. De Campos had no previous convictions.

Under cross examination by the defence, Gda Boyle agreed that De Campos was a drug mule, who had cooperated fully with the gardaí, including giving them phone numbers and email addresses. However, De Campos did not name any individual, saying that she was in fear.

She told investigators that she was the only person earning anything in her household, and that she needed money to help with her parents’ care. Her father has passed away while she’s been in custody, the court heard.

While the eldest of her four children, a 15-year-old, now lives with her mother, she has not been able to enjoy any contact with her younger three children.

Defence counsel submitted that this had added and would add to the already difficult experience of a foreign national with little or no English in prison here.

“It’s a significant hardship she will continue to endure,” he said.

He submitted that the fact that De Campos had drawn considerable attention onto herself at the airport showed that ‘she was clearly out of her depth’ doing something she hadn’t done before.

He also pointed to the increased anxiety of knowing that the other person she was trying to assist, her mother, was now on her own and continued to have the same difficulties.

Judge Orla Crowe said that drug mules play a vital role in the importation of drugs, which she said caused utter misery and chaos in society.

“She is now incarcerated a very long way from home and is unlikely to have visits,” she said.

The judge imposed a three-year sentence, and said that it must be served in its entirety.