BIKINI MODEL WALKS FREE AFTER PLEA DEAL

BIKINI model Raquel Yasmine Petit has walked free from drug trafficking charges after turning police informer.

The Gold Coast glamour girl had been accused of being part of an international steroid importation syndicate when she lived in Melbourne in the year to May 2016.

But Victoria’s County Court this week heard all the drug charges had been withdrawn in a deal with the prosecution to give evidence against her two co-accused.

Petit, 25, instead pleaded guilty to five lesser charges: using a false document and four counts of producing a false document to a reporting entity. The court heard she used a fake Queensland driver’s licence to set up eight post office boxes and make international money transfers between April 2015 and May 2016.

The mailboxes were intended for the importation of drugs, while Moneygram and Western Union Travelex facilities across Melbourne were used to transfer a total of $46,920 to China and Ukraine for payment of the drugs.

Defence counsel Amie Hancock said Petit was a “young, naive woman” who had been caught up in a controlling relationship with one of the co-accused. Her involvement ended, Ms Hancock said, in May 2016 when she left him and returned to the Gold Coast to get her life back on track, only to be charged 18 months later.

“The element of her offence is providing the false document,” Ms Hancock said, adding she made no financial gain from it.

But Judge Gavan Meredith said it was Petit’s involvement that allowed the more serious conduct of alleged drug importation to unfold.

Judge Meredith said he read the statement Petit made to police and agreed it was of “substantial value”. Taking it into account, he put her on a five-year recognisance order where she must be of good behaviour and continue to assist the prosecution. But he ignored her pleas to avoid a conviction.