British drug-smuggling grandmother Lindsay Sandiford, 67, could be killed by firing squad on Indonesia’s ‘execution island’ if sentence is not overturned

British drug smuggling grandmother Lindsay Sandiford faces death by firing squad on Indonesia’s ‘execution island’ after more than a decade on death row – if her sentence is not overturned.

The 67-year-old was sentenced to death in 2013 after being convicted of smuggling £1.6 million worth of cocaine in her suitcase into Indonesia.

Sandiford is known as the Queen of Kerobokan Prison, the prison where she spent twelve years behind bars. During her time in prison, Sandiford enjoyed steak dinners and led knitting circles with her fellow inmates, her cellmate said.

But the treatment she can expect when brought to Nusa Kambangan – known as ‘Indonesian Alcatraz’ – is a far cry from the conditions she has become accustomed to.

Despite its picturesque white sand beaches and palm trees, the island is a notorious prison center, with four active prisons housing 2,000 of the country’s most dangerous criminals, including drug dealers and murderers.

The pensioner fears she will be ‘publicly humiliated’ before her death, and expects she will be transported across the country to the island and marched before the press before being executed by armed men.

If her death sentence goes ahead, Sandiford will have to endure a long journey to Nusa Kambangan, where she will be taken from her cell and flown to Yogyakarta before boarding a government ship to the island.

Like convicted drug smugglers before her, she would be taken from her prison cell at midnight, her hands and feet shackled. The mirror reports.

She would then be taken about two miles down a winding dirt road and marched through the forest to a ‘death zone’ known as Nirbaya.

Prisoners at this point are offered blindfolds and are dressed in a white apron with a red target on their chest.

They are asked if they have one last request before being lined up in front of a group of snipers.

The executioners would aim for the heart, but if the prisoner survives, they are shot in the head.

Sandiford revealed that she no longer fears death, but is more concerned about the process of facing her fate.

‘It won’t be difficult for me to face this anymore. “It’s not exactly a death I would choose, but I wouldn’t choose to die in agony from cancer either,” she told The Mirror.

‘I feel like I can deal with it. But if it happens, I don’t want my family to come. I don’t want any hassle at all. The only thing that is certain in life is that no one will come out alive.”

She continued, “I don’t care about dying. To be honest, I never thought I would last this long. What makes me uncomfortable is the public humiliation. You will be dragged halfway across the country and paraded in front of the press before you are executed and that will be the worst for me.

“My attitude is, ‘If you want to shoot me, shoot me.’ Get on with it.” “I did something terrible, I know, but the worst part is the ritual public humiliation they seem to enjoy.”

A glimmer of hope has emerged for Sandiford after it recently emerged that her sentence could be commuted to life imprisonment under a change in the law due to be introduced in January.

This is due to her good behavior behind bars for more than ten years.

Lawyers could argue for her to be returned to Britain, where she could potentially go free because of the time she has already served.

An inmate at Sandiford Prison told the Mirror: ‘If she can make it to 2025 she thinks she might be able to avoid the death penalty.’

Human rights lawyer Dr Felicity Gerry KC called for the grandmother to be returned to Britain.

“The death penalty, especially for women involved in drug trafficking, must be abolished,” the lawyer, who visited Sandiford in 2015, told the Mirror.

‘The (British) government should take active steps to facilitate Lindsay’s return to Britain, either to serve a sentence near her family or to consider her release.’

The grandmother of two is locked up in one of Indonesia’s toughest prisons and the site of many deadly riots, ironically known as Hotel K.

The drug mule was caught flying from Bangkok to Bali in 2012 with 10.16 pounds of cocaine.

The Yorkshire Briton, who has no previous convictions, claimed she was forced to smuggle cocaine from Thailand to Bali by a British-based drug syndicate through threats on the life of one of her two sons in Britain.

She was given a death sentence despite cooperating with police in an attempt to arrest people higher up in the syndicate, sparking outrage from human rights lawyers and former British prosecutor Ken Macdonald, who said she had been treated with “quite extraordinary severity.”

She will be transferred to Nusa Kambangan – known as Execution Island – and shot by a firing squad at midnight, along with a dozen other convicted prisoners, when and if her death penalty is carried out.

The British government has repeatedly refused to fund Sandiford’s appeal, despite a ruling by High Court judges in London who said “substantial mitigating factors” had been overlooked in her original trial.

The syndicate’s alleged leader, Julian Ponder, 50, from Brighton, was released from Kerobokan prison in late 2017 following rumors that more than £1 million in bribes had been paid to settle human trafficking charges against Ponder, his former partner Rachel Dougall and fellow Briton Paul Beales to withdraw.

Dougall served one year and Beales four years for involvement in the conspiracy.

Smugglers face harsh penalties in the country, as about 80 percent of the prison population is locked up on drug charges awaiting execution.

But the last execution in the country took place in July 2016, when three Nigerians and an Indonesian were shot dead for drug offenses.

Sandiford is said to have been friends with Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, who were executed in 2015 for their role in the Bali Nine human trafficking gang.