A look into the life of The Peru Two’s Michaella McCollum, 10 years after prison
More than ten years ago, on August 6, 2013, Michaella McCollum and Melissa Reid’s lives were turned upside down.
The two women, who were in their 20s at the time, were arrested at Jorge Chavez International Airport in Lima, Peru, after it was discovered that their suitcases together contained a shocking £1.5 million worth of cocaine.
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Before the incident, Michaella and Melissa were not friends and had flown in from Ibiza, Spain, where they were on holiday.
Like another woman, Kim Hall – who now faces a whopping 60 years behind bars after taking two suitcases of “cash” from Mexico – the duo initially claimed they had been coerced by an armed gang.
From that moment on, their lives would become forever intertwined – and the young girls would go on to win the international title of The Peru Two.
After pleading guilty to drug smuggling (in return for a financial reward), Michaella, from Northern Ireland, and Melissa, from Glasgow, were sentenced to more than six years and eight months in the infamous Ancon 2 prison.
Michaella, who worked abroad as a part-time model and nightclub hostess, and Melissa, a sales assistant, served for three years, during which they took up a coveted job in beauty therapy in an attempt to become hairstylists.
After her release, Melissa admitted that she knew what she was doing.
She confessed: “I made a conscious choice and no one forced me.”
Michaella also opened up and said she was “stupid” for being lured into just £5,000 and thought Peru was a Spanish city.
Michaella – who also became known for wearing a huge bun on top of her head – has also since released two books, one of which is: You will never see daylight againshe talked about her time behind bars.
The woman, now a mother of two, wrote: “Was I guilty? Yes.
”Did I know what I was doing? Sort of. Was I sidelined by a bunch of gangsters and the Peruvian justice system? Absolute.
‘Then why did I do it? Why did I risk everything and cause my beloved family untold grief for a few easy pounds?’
It’s been more than a decade since everything changed for Michaella, who is in her early 30s – and here is her life now, as a public speaker, wife, author and former drug mule, whose estimated net worth is reportedly astronomical. $1 million.
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‘Sexually active prisoners’ and a prisoner feeding her husband and their child in a stew
Unlike her accomplice Melissa, who is believed to be doing charity work in Scotland, Michaella has fully embraced the spotlight to share her story with the world.
Watching her Instagram accountwho has more than 100,000 followers, you wouldn’t be able to tell that the mother of twin boys had survived Peruvian prison.
Just ten years ago, Michaella was surrounded by fellow inmates who she described as “so sexually active” and ended up “sobbing” on her concrete block. she revealed in an exclusive BBC3 documentary.
”The whole place was just so toxic, everything was toxic, the majority of the people were toxic,” she said.
”The first thing I noticed about Ancon was that it was so manic, crazy and loud, it sounded like a zoo.
”It felt like you were in this madhouse. There was a woman…she had caught her husband having an affair and she had killed their child, and then she had fed it to her husband in a stew.”
Fast forward to 2024 and her lavish lifestyle is a far cry from her time behind bars, jet-setting to picturesque locations and soaking up the sun in Greece.
Speaker and mother of two children
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In addition to telling her story, Michaela, who has ditched her signature black hairstyle for a blonde mane, has also been busy raising her twin boys, Rafael Genie and Rio Addison.
The boys, now six, were born in May 2018 after a short relationship and although Michaella documented her pregnancy on social media, she has kept their father’s identity a secret.
Announcing the birth of her sons on Instagram, the proud mother shared a healthy video of herself in hospital cuddling them to her chest.
She wrote: “My little darlings, 1 week today.”
The trendy fashion lover is not with the father of the two boys, but says she knew she could raise her sons alone.
She said: “It’s nothing I planned, it’s not how I envisioned things.
“They are my children and I love them.”
While not much is known about who Rafael and Rio’s dad is – or her love life – a recent clip saw Michaella posing and exploring Germany with a guy named Paddy Mone.
The glamorous drug mule has not yet confirmed whether Paddy is a love interest or just a friend.
In September 2022, she announced her first public speaking engagement and commentators have revealed how inspiring her story is.
One wrote: “It’s interesting how certain chapters of our lives have to happen to help us reveal a version of ourselves that we wouldn’t have encountered otherwise.”
“I love how you changed your life for the better,” wrote another.
£250,000 book deal
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She rose to international fame as a young – and glamorous – drug mule, and Michelalla has certainly made the most of her infamous status as a criminal.
After serving three years in prison, Michaella – from the small town of Dungannon – wrote a book: You will never see daylight againand was offered an eye-watering £250,000 for the all-encompassing story.
In the memoir, Michaella described how she learned Spanish to better interact with other prison guards and inmates, some of whom she described as “psychotic” and violent.
The book, which contains details not revealed in the media, is just one of the ways the mother has used her story to raise a lot of money.
In 2017, sources confirmed that the former part-time model had signed a ‘six-figure deal’ for TV series in which she interviews international drug dealers.
While working on an episode in Liverpool, the then 24-year-old was spotted carrying a chic £1,000 designer handbag.
That same year, the prison officer would also cash in on her dubious fame with an appearance on Big Brother, but the Northern Irish girl was deemed ‘not famous enough’. Metro reported.
Her pitch is said to have been rejected by show toppers, with Channel 5 boss Ben Frow, when asked if she could become a housemate, saying: “I wouldn’t have thought that, Michaella has had no impact here at all.”
Celebrating Netflix worldwide
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Two years ago, in 2022, the ex-con also looked unrecognizable as she donned a glamorous make-up to celebrate a major global Netflix deal.
The mother-of-two posed in front of a Netflix logo cake and wrote: “F***ing party cake! Netflix global weekend.”
Michaella’s docuseries High: Confessions of an Ibiza Drug Mule – which aired on the BBC a year earlier – was released worldwide on Netflix and became a hit, landing at number six in Slovenia.
In the BBC documentary she said: ‘I heard the prison had its own beauty salon, more like a few chairs and mirrors and a concrete room, but to me it was heaven.
“I got a job and did various hair treatments: coloring and cutting, blow-drying, waxing, nails, massage.
“I had no real qualifications, I did it, but I was good at it. I had a lot of clients.”
She wrote a book about her time in prison and said that since her release she had received a huge number of TV offers willing to pay her ‘ridiculous’ sums in cash – but didn’t think she would make much money from her book.
“I would have made more money doing two TV interviews, so I did the book because I wanted to tell my story.
“If I wanted to make money from it, I would have made money a long time ago.”
