8 Heinous Scottish Criminals - And Their Crimes
5. Melissa Reid
The "Peru Two" was the name given to Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum, two young women who were caught attempting to smuggle a substantial amount of cocaine out of the South American country. The twenty-year olds were found with the drugs inside of their luggage in August of of 2013 and convicted of drug smuggling, sentenced to more than six years in a Peruvian prison.
Why they were carrying such a large amount of the drug was initially murky as they claimed to have been forced into doing so by unnamed parties but pleaded guilty to drug smuggling. Melissa was released in 2016 after serving three years of her sentence while agreeing to be expelled from the country and returned to Scotland.
Her partner in crime, Michaella, cut a similar deal the same year and once back in Northern Island made the most of her new-found infamy. She wrote a book, took multiple interview opportunities and attempted to cultivate a celebrity lifestyle of sorts from her escapade. Melissa on the other hand has kept a low profile and has now even admitted that they both knew exactly what they were getting themselves in for, what was in the cases and the risks involved.