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Schapelle Corby a free woman

Jewel Topsfield

Bali: Schapelle Corby is a free woman.

In frenzied media scenes late on Saturday afternoon the former beauty student emerged from the Kuta villa that has been her home for three years, as a black, window-tinted car pulled up to transport her to freedom.

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Schapelle Corby leaves Bali villa

Schapelle Corby has left her Bali Villa amid tight security ahead of her return to Australia.

She wore dark glasses and carried a bag that said: "Where's William Tyrell?" referring to the Australian boy who disappeared from Kendall in NSW aged three years old.

Corby's fiercely protective sister Mercedes sought to protect her from the unrelenting glare of the media pack as they climbed into the car. Her sister's face was shielded with a grey scarf and she bent her head.

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Mercedes turned the lens back on the media, filming journalists using her smartphone from the back of the car.

Sirens screamed and horns sounded as the car - sandwiched between two armoured vehicles - headed for the parole office - a legal pitstop prior to her tightly-scripted deportation to Australia.

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At the Bali parole office Bali justice chief Kompyang Adnyana proclaimed: "She is now free."

So desperate were the media to capture every moment of this cultural phenomenon, one local journalist toppled off the wall surrounding the parole office with a sickening thud.  

As TV reporters reminisced live on air about the first time they heard of a Gold Coast beauty called Schapelle, Corby left for the airport. She was ushered into the airport through a gate usually reserved for the airforce.

Pictures obtained by Fairfax Media show a radiant looking Corby about to embark on the rest of her life. 

Earlier, Bali corrections chief Surung Pasaribu said if everyone worked calmly, Corby's escort would proceed calmly.

He said when Corby arrived at the parole office she needed only to sign some documents and then the papers would be handed over to the immigration chief at Bali's Ngurah Rai airport.

Mr Surung said Indonesians upheld human rights. "We do not hate any person, if we don't like a person then we pray for that person, that it won't happen again and they repent. God also wants a person who did wrong to return to the right path."

He said the parole office did not need to provide an escort but had received a request for assistance, including from the Australian Consulate to "save my citizen".

"If the family asked for help to secure their family member in Indonesia, for security from home, the parole office, and immigration, that's fair," he said

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Schapelle Corby arrives in Australia amid media frenzy

For weeks Bali officials had been insisting Corby was no one special and her long-awaited deportation back to Australia would be "SOP" - the acronym commonly used here for standard operating procedure.

But with 275 Denpasar and Kuta police officers deployed to shepherd the Australian locally known as the "Ganja queen" through a frenzied media pack, things were never going to be SOP.

Drones buzzed overhead as the Polisi vehicles drove past, blue lights flashing, in the narrow Denpasar street. 

While Corby had remained holed up in her Kuta villa on 'D-day', as it was known here, anticipation built to a fever pitch.

"Schapelle is holding up well, it's going to be a big day," Corby's fiercely protective sister Mercedes told Fairfax Media through a family friend.

Tiny mundanities had been blown up into headline news in recent days - an "exclusive" of Corby peeking through a gap, a bucket of soapy water thrown over the fence onto a channel seven camera man, the prison doctor conducting a final health check.

"Is Schapelle pregnant?" one reporter breathlessly asked Dr Agung Hartawan, who had not even checked her physically after Corby said she was "sehat", the Indonesian word for healthy.

Denpasar police spokesman Sugriwo said about 200 officers had been preparing for several days.

"We will have officers from traffic, mass control, intelligence officers in plain clothes, regular officers in uniform," he told Fairfax Media.

"We will anticipate the maximum, to ensure the process runs smoothly and we avoid any possible disturbances," he said.

Corby was accompanied by bodyguard to the stars John McLeod, who has provided security for Leonard Cohen, Roger Federer and the Dalai Lama.

Now 39, she arrived in Bali almost 13 years ago to celebrate her sister Mercedes' 30th birthday. But the celebrations turned to hell when she was arrested at Bali's international airport with 4.2 kilograms of marijuana.

She was sentenced to 20 years jail, but served only nine behind bars, after being granted remissions and had five years shaved off her sentence by former Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

She also became one of the few foreigners in Bali to be allowed to spend three years on parole, after the Balinese husband of her sister Mercedes agreed to act as guarantor.

She is understood to have misgivings about leaving Bali, especially as it will mean leaving behind her boyfriend, Sumatran paddle boarder Ben Panangian and her two dogs.

Mr Panangian, whom she met in Kerobokan jail,  has drug convictions and is unlikely to pass the character test required to get a visa to Australia.

Last month, Corby asked Bali corrections chief Surung Pasaribu when she could return to Indonesia.

Asked this question by reporters on Friday, Bali justice chief Kompyang Adnyana said she would be banned for six months after being deported.

He said whether this ban would be extended would be a decision to be taken later.

Corby is expected to fly home on an overnight flight to Brisbane. On Sunday she will be back on home turf. 

Originally published on The Sydney Morning Herald as Schapelle Corby a free woman.

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