Final attempt to end a nightmare
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II Peter Hobbs and John Mills, the truck drivers sentenced to serve seven-and-a-half years in a Bulgarian jail for smuggling heroin, are waiting to hear whether a last-ditch attempt to end their nightmare has been successful.
The two Londoners have so far had two appeals against their sentences rejected by the Bulgarian Supreme Court.
Danneke Neale of the Driver's Family Helpline says they are now hoping to take advantage of a Bulgarian law which allows some prisoners to be released after serving half their sentences.
'We are all waiting to hear what the result of the Bulgarian authorities will be,' says Neale. "It's a complicated process but it is something the men feel they must try."
The two men have been in prison since June 1995 when
20.5kg of heroin was found inside an unlocked trailer locker.
• Hopes that the Foreign Office might bring jailed owner-driver Steven Bryant back to the UK from Morocco to serve his sentence here have been raised by Bryant's father, Peter.
"I understand the UK Government has secured a meeting wtth the Moroccan authorities looking into the possibility of signing a prisoner exchange treaty," he says.
The meeting is set for July.