Top model pleads innocence

From: AAP
By Rob Taylor in Jakarta
August 22, 2005

AN Australian model facing possible drug charges in Bali has tearfully proclaimed her innocence, telling police that two suspected ecstasy tablets found in her handbag may have been planted there.In a defence that mirrors that of convicted drug smuggler Schapelle Corby, Indonesian police said today said Adelaide-born Michelle Leslie, 24, had suggested the tablets might have been planted in her handbag.

But Bali police spokesman Colonel A.S. Reniban later said Ms Leslie had told detectives she bought the tablets from a "young man" the day before she was arrested.

Ms Leslie was among a group of five people picked up in the early hours of Saturday morning during a police sweep at a Bali dance club – the GWK Cultural Park.

Police said further tests would be carried out on the two pink tablets tomorrow, to determine exactly the identity of the substance.

IK - like every other news source in the world, I am publishing this relatively insignificant (for me) news story, only because it gives me an opporunity to publish a photo of an Australian fashion model. Film at 11.