December 16 2010
The daughter of a former British nuclear health physicist faces the mandatory death sentence in Malaysia for drugs trafficking after a police raid on a holiday resort there.
Shivaun
A Malaysian police chief said today that Shivaun Patra Orton from Bangor, Wales, already faces life imprisonment on cannabis, amphetamine and ecstasy charges after a raid on a resort on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia.
But the mother of two, whose father worked at the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment Aldermaston. could also face death if she is implicated in a haul of 225 grams of heroin found nearby.
Shivaun Orton, 41, was arrested along with her Malaysian husband Abdul Harris Fadilah, 46, at the Ranting Resort which the couple run in Cherating, on the border of Pahang and Terengganu states Malaysia during a raid by officers of the Malaysian Narcotics Criminal Investigation Department.
Today the couple, who have two sons aged 14 and 16, were being held in Kemaman police station in Terengganu state and have been remanded in custody until Sunday.
Ranting Resort
‘It has been the biggest bust in three years, said Chief Superintendent Roslan Abdul Wahid, head of the Terengganu State Narcotics Criminal Investigation Department. The value of the drugs haul was put at US$25,000.
‘Initial investigations show that the couple have been hard core addicts for almost 15 years. We believe they started distributing drugs the past 10 years,’ he said.
Police had received a tip off from a member of the public.
Shivaun, said police, had admitted the drugs found in her room but said the cannabis was only for personal consumption.
‘The cannabis plants alone carry a sentence of life imprisonment. If the heroin, after analysis, tests positive, then anything over 15 grams carries the death penalty.’
Drugs haul
Shivaun’s husband is reported to have said that the heroin is his and he got his wife hooked on drugs after she threatened to leave him and return to the UK.
Shivaun Orton’s father is Mike Orton who died in April 2009 after a lifetime working at the nuclear the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment in Aldermaston.
Shivaun’s mother Shirley, 67, said today: ‘I do not know what to do. The Foreign Office have not yet informed me. I have had no contact with my daughter for over five years. She had been taking drugs.
