Appeal launched against Nick's sentence (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Appeal launched against Nick's sentence

AN appeal to overturn Nick Baker's 14-year jail sentence for drug smuggling has started.

The Cotswold father was locked up in Japan after he was caught carrying a suitcase containing £1.4 million worth of drugs through Tokyo's Narita Airport.

Nick and his supporters have always maintained his innocence and claim he was set up by travelling companion James Prunier.

And last week Nick's lawyer, Shunji Miyake, visited the UK to outline his grounds for the appeal.

He says it is partly based on the fact that Prunier is facing similar drug trafficking charges in Belgium and partly down to the way the Japanese obtained Nick's statement.

Mr Miyake, who stayed with Nick's mother Iris at the family home in Oaksey during is visit, said: "This statement, made in Japanese, is not adequate and can not be identical to what he said.

"From the beginning, Mr Baker insisted that he did not have any knowledge about the contents of the suitcase and that the suitcase did not belong to him.

"He was arrested and detained for between 22 and 23 days. He was continuously interrogated by the police or prosecution and sometimes by customs officers."

More than 40,000 ecstasy tablets and 2lb of cocaine were found in the suitcase Nick was carrying.

But the former Cirencester chef says travelling companion Prunier engineered it so they would carry each other's cases through customs. Prunier strongly denies the claim, but he is facing trial in Belgium later this year for drug trafficking offences.

As well as the prison sentence, Nick was fined £25,000, and he has written to the Standard twice to protest his innocence and complain about the conditions he is being kept in.

Iris, along with Nick's partner Beverley and two-year-old son George, travelled to London recently to hand in a 1,000-name petition at Number 10 Downing Street.

Nick is also being supported by the international Fair Trials Abroad charity and MEP Baroness Sarah Ludford.

Iris said: "I want to get Nick a fair trial. He was held for 23 days without legal assistance and forced to sign statements that were in Japanese. "In my opinion they are also duty bound to request the information (about Prunier)."

She added that Nick is still being held in solitary confinement, in what have been described as "barbaric" conditions, but she hopes to fly out and see him in March.