Pregnant British woman sentenced to life imprisonment for drugs returns to UK

LONDON — A pregnant Briton sentenced to life imprisonment in Laos for trafficking heroin has arrived back in Britain to serve the remainder of her sentence. Twenty-year-old Samantha Orobator was met by a prison van as she got off the flight from Laos at London’s Heathrow Airport on Friday morning.

Police say they found 1.5 pounds (680 grams) of heroin in 68 capsules on Orobator’s body when she was arrested in August 2008 as she traveled to Australia.

Orobator was sentenced in June after pleading guilty to drug trafficking. She became pregnant in prison.

Heroin trafficking is punishable by death in Laos. Orobator was spared because the law does not allow the execution of pregnant women. She is due to give birth in weeks.