French National Sentenced to 20 Months in Prison for Methamphetamine Possession

Mataram (ANTARA) - The Mataram District Court has sentenced a French national, Ludovic Roche, alias Ali, to 20 months in prison for possession of 0.27 grams of methamphetamine.

Judge Kelik Trimargo of the Mataram District Court read out the verdict on Wednesday in a hearing attended online by the defendant.

“The court rules, imposing upon the defendant Ludovic Roche, alias Ali, a prison sentence of one year and eight months,” the judge said.

The panel of judges also imposed a fine of Rp500 million, with the stipulation that failure to pay would be substituted with 140 days’ imprisonment.

The judges declared the defendant proven to have possessed or controlled methamphetamine as set out in the second indictment of the public prosecutor, in violation of Article 609 paragraph (1) letter a in conjunction with Article 20 letter c of Law Number 1 of 2023 on the Criminal Code in conjunction with Law Number 1 of 2026 on Penal Adjustments.

Earlier, the public prosecutor had sought a three-year prison sentence without a fine.

According to the indictment, the defendant was alleged to have controlled one packet of methamphetamine weighing 0.27 grams. The evidence was found when Ludovic Roche was arrested along with an individual with the initials MUB, a fisherman from Bayan District, North Lombok Regency.

The two were arrested by the North Lombok Police Narcotics Unit in the Bayan area whilst riding pillion on a motorcycle. One packet of methamphetamine was found tucked inside a mobile phone wrapper kept in the vehicle’s luggage compartment.

Although arrested with narcotics evidence, the results of a urine test showed that Ludovic Roche was negative for methamphetamine, the substance contained in the drug.