A mother-of-three who attempted to smuggle cannabis worth £750,000 through Birmingham Airport has been spared a prison sentence. Siobhan Osoem-Tulloch, 26, from Tottenham, was caught with over 26 kilograms of cannabis upon her return from Thailand in July 2024. She had travelled business class for the ten-day trip via India.
Court Proceedings
At Birmingham Crown Court, Osoem-Tulloch received a 12-month suspended sentence for two years after pleading guilty to fraudulent evasion of cannabis import prohibition. The court heard she had already spent 634 days on an electronically-tagged curfew. Recorder Justin Wigoder branded her claim of falling into the arrangement after meeting a man in Thailand as 'nonsense'. He said: "She is, it seems, what we used to call a mule."
Personal Circumstances
The defence revealed Osoem-Tulloch is five months pregnant and caring for one child while rebuilding relationships with her other two children who had been removed from her care. She is described as a care leaver with a difficult upbringing. Recorder Wigoder told her that in usual circumstances she would have faced two to two-and-a-half years in prison. He said: "I'm in no doubt you had your eyes turned by the promise of a luxury holiday."
Osoem-Tulloch also admitted breaching a previous suspended sentence for a public order offence but received only a nominal £5 fine.
