Tyrone drug smuggler 29-yr-old Michaella McCollum celebrated the launch of her Netflix series on Instagram.
High: Confessions of an Ibiza Drug Mule premiered globally on Netflix over the weekend, but not in Ireland, at least not yet.
Irish users are currently unable to watch the series about the former drug smuggler, who was jailed for two years in Peru when she and Melissa Reid, nicknamed Peru Two, were found with €1.6m worth of cocaine in 2013.
The new Netflix star was only 19 years old when she was caught with 11 kg of drugs in Peru.
In the documentary, McCollum recalls how she went from “a normal girl in rural Northern Ireland” to a drug mule in a high-security prison in South America.
“This is the story of how I got myself into this mess – and how I managed to get myself out of it,” she said in the documentary, reports the Independent.
McCollum was working in a bar in Ibiza when she was convinced to trade almost €2 million worth of drugs in exchange for €5,000.
In the documentary, she recalls the phone call she made to her mother in Tyrone once she was captured.
“It was the worst phone call ever” said McCollum, from Aughnacloy, near Dungannon, reports Independent.
“So, then my mum says, ‘I thought you were dead’. “I was like ‘How am I going to tell her where I am?’ Then I get around to tell her ‘I’m in Peru, I’m in jail’. And she was like ‘what, what?”, reported Independent.
Michaella McCollum and Melissa Reid were arrested for drug trafficking in Peru in 2013
Mrs. McCollum says that the phone line was cut after learning that her mother had fainted.
“My brother told me later that she just went unconscious… She was just so overwhelmed and the anxiety and stress, she kind of passed out. I think she was just completely heartbroken,” reports Independent.
The BBC show reached the top of the Netflix charts in several countries, including Canada, South Africa, the Netherlands, Sweden, and others.
McCollum celebrated her release on her Instagram, looking a far cry from the viral shots of her and Reid being caught smuggling cocaine into South America.
“F***ing celebration cake!” the now blonde mother of two captioned the post: “Netflix worldwide weekend.”
When the five-part documentary series launched on the BBC last year, a spokesman for the channel said McCollum had not been paid for the part.
A BBC spokesman said: “Michaella McCollum did not receive a fee for her contribution to the documentary. Her story reveals the criminal enterprises behind the supply of drugs in Ibiza and the human cost,” reports Independent.
Michaella cried when she spoke to Matt Cooper on Today FM in 2019 and said that she always refused to do interviews and “make ridiculous amounts of money.”
“If I wanted to cash in on it I would have been making money a long time ago,” she said, talking about the release of her book she penned in a Peruvian prison. I thought this is a good way to just say I’m sorry, I know I’ve done something wrong but when I was offered things after that I thought well this isn’t what I want to do,” she said, reported Independent.
She told Today FM in 2019 that she didn’t think about the consequences until she saw the drugs.
According to Independent, she added: I hate that I was that stupid and that I didn’t know and I didn’t think how could I have done that and not thought ‘oh you’re going to go to prison or something really really bad is going to happen. They said that this was their line of work, they had people in the airport that worked for them and this is something that they do all the time, you know that they’ve connections there and everything will be fine, like they do this regularly.”
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