Dutch grocery heir on Bali drugs charges
AAP on May 31, 2016, 10:15 pm
The heir to the Netherlands' largest supermarket chain is facing drug charges in Bali.
Djai Heijn was charged by authorities in January with trying to traffick marijuana into Indonesia after customs agents intercepted a package mailed to him from Spain.
The package contained 224 grams of cannabis was sent to his address in Bali, where he has lived since 2013.
When arrested, Heijn was also allegedly found to be in possession of 492g of crystal meth and 42g of the psychedelic drug dimethyltryptamine (DPT).
Heijn is a descendant of the Albert and Gerrit Heijn family which founded the leading Dutch supermarket chain and brand Ahold.
Prosecutors on May 2 decided not to push for the 25-year-old grocery store-chain heir to face the death penalty by firing squad, the fate met by at least eight foreign drug offenders in Bali last year, including Australians Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan.
Instead, if he is convicted he will serve 15 years in an Indonesian prison.
Heijn has denied any involvement in the marijuana shipment, which he neither signed for nor ever had in his possession, claiming it was an unwanted Christmas present, according to the Netherlands Times newspaper.
Since Indonesian President Joko Widodo took power in 2014, the government has cracked down on foreign drugs syndicates, coinciding with a capital punishment rate that nearly tripled from 2012 to 2014.
