U.S. citizen Yanira Maldonado was arrested on a bus last week, on her way back home from a funeral in Mexico, when Mexican officials stopped the bus and allege that Maldonado had weed under her seat.
Yanira Maldonado, who was traveling her husband Gary Maldonado, lives in Goodyear, AZ, and has been arrested at a military checkpoint near Hermosillo for smuggling marijuana.
"You hear all of these horror stories about Mexico and you think it's just something in the movies, right?" said Gary Maldonado's brother-in-law, Brandon Klippel, of the mom Mexican prison case. "You don't believe it's something that could happen to someone you know. But, when it happens to your brother and your sister - it's hard, it's tough to take."
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Yanira's family claim the mother of seven is innocent and that she's being held in the Mexican prison because she refused to pay a bribe to the judge. Her husband was supposedly told that he would have to pay $5,000 to secure her freedom regardless if she is innocent or guilty.
According to her husband Gary, witnesses saw the couple board the bus without packages. Gary told media outlets that he hopes the bus company has surveillance video to prove that his wife did not enter the bus with any packages.
"Can you imagine?" said an official, who did not want to be named, to CNN of the mom Mexican prison case. "A passenger by himself or herself would have been unable to carry almost six kilos of marijuana onto a bus without being noticed. She must've been framed."
Incidentally, Gary Maldonado was first arrested for the alleged crime, but then Mexican officials said they made a mistake and released Gary and arrested his wife.
"I know there's people out there saying or asking, 'Did she really do it?'" said their 21-year-old daughter, Anna Soto, to CBS 5 News. "'Are you sure?' And, you know, it hurts to see that. If you would've known my mom, if you would've met her - you would know she had nothing to do with it."
Gary was able to visit his wife and the family is remaining hopeful for her release.
"She had a rough night," said Gary. "Their interrogation included putting her in a non-air-conditioned room and waking her up several times in the middle of night - trying to get her to sign documents that she said she couldn't read."
On Tuesday a judge will decide the fate of the mom Mexican prison case and will determine if she'll be released. If she's not released, Maldonado will be kept in prison for another six months until her next hearing.
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