A local journalist was sentenced to 25 years in prison for drug trafficking yesterday after being arrested last year in the capital’s Meanchey district with about one kilogram of methamphetamine, Phnom Penh Municipal Court Judge Veng Huoth said.

The former chief of reporting at the capital’s Ta Promh Muk Buon newspaper, Lin Meng, 34, was charged with drug trafficking under article 40 of the Law on Drug Control. During his trial last month he pleaded innocent, saying the drugs seized belonged to an unidentified and still-at-large friend.

“Although he has denied he was the drug trafficker or involved or the owner of the drugs seized, he did not have any real evidence as such,” Judge Huoth said yesterday.

“Therefore, the court decided to sentence him to 25 years in prison and a fine of 50 million riel (about $12,500) to be put in the national budget,” he added.

Mr. Meng was arrested on the night of September 27 last year after being stopped on his motorcycle by police. After checking the storage space on the motorcycle, officers discovered about one kilogram of methamphetamine, which they seized along with two phones, the motorcycle and more than four million riel from Mr. Meng.

Captain Meng Vimean Dara, the deputy district police chief, said Mr. Meng was stopped at a routine traffic checkpoint in Stung Meanchey commune...
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