A Sydney woman is said to have a better than 50 per cent chance of escaping charges of carrying drugs into Malaysia, where the other outcome is death.
Maria Elvira Pinto Exposto, 51, was on Friday provisionally charged with carrying 1.5kg of crystal meth in Kuala Lumpur airport, which carries a mandatory death sentence if she's convicted.
Her lawyers say the suburban mum is an innocent victim, and her actions don't add up to that of a drug courier.
Despite the seriousness of her situation, Mrs Exposto, a mother of four adult sons, appeared calm in court, dressed in a white shirt and denim overalls.
Lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah told reporters her chance of acquittal was "more than 50 per cent" because of evidence she had no knowledge of the drugs in the bag.
The bag was handed to Mrs Exposto at the last minute as she was leaving Shanghai by a friend of her boyfriend, a US soldier serving in Afghanistan.
The Sydney woman was there to execute documents for her boyfriend's retirement from service, and was to return to Melbourne via Kuala Lumpur.
When she looked inside the bag she saw only clothes.
The drugs were stashed inside a secret compartment, and weren't heavy enough for her to notice a discrepancy, her lawyer said.
"She didn't have to put it through the scanner. If you have been through KLIA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport), not everybody is asked to put their bag (forward). Normally customs will select at random or on suspicion," Mr Shafee told reporters.
"She wasn't even asked.
"If she was a person conscious of the contents, she would ... probably put the bag that was without the drugs."
Mrs Exposto was extremely concerned about the charges she faced.
"Her remark to me was, 'but I'm innocent'," he said.
"Very clearly, she said 'I'm innocent', and she exhibited a very good demeanour of a responsible mother.
"And she told me one thing, she said, `I cannot be involved in this because I've told my children'. Even when they were growing up, if they ever got involved in drugs, she would personally kill them. She said that."
The lawyers had also received a petition from the woman's friends in East Timor, where she had worked for a group advocating against human trafficking.
The Sydney woman will be held in a women's remand centre before her next court appearance on January 23, when the charges will be formalised.
The last Australian to be executed in Malaysia for drug offences was Michael McAuliffe in 1993, however more high profile was the case of Kevin Barlow and Brian Chambers in 1986.
