Newcastle tourist’s holiday hell after Tunisian police mistook him for a cigarette smuggler

NewcastleWorld

A British tourist has told of his holiday hell after he was arrested in Tunisia when bungling cops mistook him for a convicted cigarette smuggler.

Transcript

00:00Right, my name is James Collie. This is my wife Louise Collie, and we've recently returned from a holiday in Tunisia

00:07It was a holiday from hell. We arrived on the 2nd of August

00:14About nine o'clock at night

00:17And there was a problem with my passport

00:21Got detained in the airport for three and a half hours

00:24Then I was told I had an invitation to appear in court

00:31On as soon as possible, but nobody would tell why and nobody would tell what the problem was

00:37They kept on asking the same questions

00:39Had I been to Tunisia before and I said yes once in 2009 on my honeymoon. I gave them the dates

00:47Said no, you've been many times. I said no, I've only been the once they kept on asking us about your patient

00:53Same two questions over and over again

00:57But then after three and a half hours, they asked me to sign this document

01:01I said well, I'm not signing it. So they've got an English interpreter down and he says, oh, this is an invitation to appear in court

01:08The police said you must go to court. You must go to court. You go to court tomorrow and

01:13English interpreter said no, it's not open

01:16At the weekend you need to go on Monday. If you don't go you won't be allowed out of the country

01:23And so I had no option but to go ask where the court was. It was in Tunis

01:29We were staying in Madia, which was about a four-hour journey. Went into the court

01:34Handed the form in and they wanted my airline ticket

01:38Unfortunately, they don't have Wi-Fi in court in Tunisia

01:41So I had to go and find a cafe outside that had Wi-Fi. If I didn't show my airline ticket

01:47Then I wouldn't be able to get a court date

01:50Unfortunately, there was a print shot across the road. Managed to get it printed off. Went back to the police

01:55And they've produced this form. Can you sign this?

02:00The name on it was James Coyle spelled C-O-Y-L-E

02:05My name is James Colley spelled C-O-L-L-E-Y. So I refused to sign it

02:11So they took us into a room where I presume it was his superior and the superior goes, oh, so you're innocent then?

02:18Yes, I thought finally we're getting somewhere

02:21You still need to come to court on Thursday

02:25But you need to go to the police station tomorrow to hand

02:29this form in. So I went to the police station the next morning, handed this form in, had to wait until

02:3610 o'clock. Got my passport

02:39which is

02:41No paperwork. No paperwork. You come to court

02:44So

02:46goes back to

02:48Maria and

02:50We had the Wednesday free, but we also had to be up at

02:554 o'clock in the morning to come to court

02:57Came to court

02:59Met with this court official who took me into a little backstreet seedy cafe to exchange money

03:06exchange money and brown envelopes for the lawyer and

03:10her 100

03:11He showed us the charge sheet. It turned out this James Coyle lived in Renfrewshire, which is Scotland

03:17I believe Glasgow area since I've come back Googled

03:23Explained to the lawyer

03:27I'm not James Coyle. Never lived in Scotland

03:31It's not me. Different passport number. Different passport number, different address

03:36I showed him my driving license with my dress on

03:39I heard the lawyer stand up and say about 25 seconds, 30 seconds of words

03:46The judge looked at her, she waved her hand

03:50Policeman come and give us my passport, my driving license back and said that's it. No explanation. You're free. What's just happened? It's over

03:59So when we come out of the court house

04:02The translator asked the lawyer what actually happened

04:08Apparently it had been thrown out of court because it was over five years old. It was a cigarette smuggling charge from 2012

04:15We weren't even in the country in 2012

04:20It was mistaken identity, but they wouldn't take that for her

04:24This wouldn't listen

04:26So totally ruined, totally corrupt, totally ruined holiday

04:31We had to fork out for three times back and forth to Tunisia, Roya

04:37No receipts at all backhanders

04:41It's just, I just tore back and put people going off to Tunisia

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