Poppie Kudiersky’s holiday to Thailand provided the perfect backdrop for the sort of social media material the posing, pouting 22-year-old loves to post.
Sitting astride a jet ski, lounging poolside or bikini-clad on the bow of a traditional long-boat, no photo opportunity went to waste.
But as is so often the case in the modern world, the reality behind these carefully curated Instagram-ready images rarely matches the fantasy portrayed.
And how true that turned out to be in the case of Kudiersky.
After all, how was a single mum from Manchester living in social housing able to swap the grey skies of the North West for a two-week winter break in sun-kissed South East Asia?
The answer was to be found in the two suitcases she and a companion, Mohammed Jacfer, arrived with when flying home to Manchester Airport from Thailand in February 2024. Inside them was 28.5kg of cannabis with a street value of £285,000.
Arrested and charged with drug smuggling, Jacfer quickly admitted the crime and last year was sentenced to two years in prison.
Kudiersky made no comment to police, denied the charge and was due to face a trial but on the first day of the hearing she dramatically changed her plea.

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Single mother Poppie Kudiersky, 22, tried to smuggle £285,000 worth of cannabis into the UK

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A suitcase of cannabis seized at Heathrow – almost 27 tonnes of cannabis was seized from smugglers flying into UK airports in 2024

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At the same time, the extraordinary circumstances that she claimed led to her becoming involved in the drug plot were outlined at Manchester Crown Court.
Her version of events goes like this: In return for a free holiday, Kudiersky ‘reluctantly’ agreed with persons unknown to travel to Thailand to take part in a scam whereby she would bring back clothes bought using stolen credit cards.
But when she was given two suitcases, she says she realised they did not contain clothing and suspected that something was amiss. Kudiersky claimed she refused to transport the cases, only to then receive threats to herself and her family.
These included a photograph of menacing individuals outside her mother’s address where her five-year-old son was staying, alongside a warning it would be burnt down and her child killed unless she co-operated.
Despite the prosecuting authorities making it clear that ‘some aspects’ of her description of what happened were ‘entirely within the knowledge of the defendant’, Kudiersky was sentenced on that basis.
And in stark contrast with the treatment meted out to her co-accused, who is currently serving his sentence, she duly walked free from court with a two-year suspended sentence, something that even the judge accepted was ‘highly unusual’.
Kudiersky’s age, ‘naivety’ and ‘vulnerability’ were among the issues taken into account.
Unsurprisingly, the lenient approach to her crime has not gone unnoticed, after all, drug traffickers caught in Thailand can still face the death sentence.

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Kudiersky enjoys her time in Thailand, posting a series of glamourous pictures before her arrest

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She claimed she only transported the drugs because of threats to her and her family

Back on social media, responses to the story ranged from the amazed – ‘What message does this send out to other drug smugglers!’ – to the downright outraged – ‘You can get away with anything these days. It’s a joke.’
Equally unhappy are those who have had the misfortune to cross paths with Kudiersky. Far from being some innocent abroad, it can be revealed she has previous convictions for battery and possession of cannabis.
And those living near to her in Denton, Greater Manchester, say her presence has long blighted their lives.
‘We knew she was a nightmare neighbour but not a serious criminal,’ said one 68-year-old resident. ‘She’s causing a lot of problems here – there’s been loud parties. But this is another level, this is serious drug smuggling.
‘We’ve complained about her to the police and council but she’s still here. It’s devastating that she’s not been locked up.’
What also seems apparent is Kudiersky’s lack of remorse. Approached by a Daily Mail journalist at her modern, terraced house last week, when asked about her conviction Kudiersky replied: ‘And? It’s two years ago now.’
Telling the reporter to ‘get a life’, she then slammed the door on him.
As a family friend observed: ‘Being arrested and dragged through court hasn’t changed Poppie. She’s carried on causing mayhem. A lot of the family don’t want anything to do with her.
‘If anyone stands up to her she has meltdowns. Poppie does what she wants.’

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Kudiersky was able to walk free from court with a two-year suspended sentence

Recent activity on her Facebook page also suggests that Kudiersky remains remarkably unabashed by her ordeal.
In early December, she re-posted a comment from a third party that read: ‘Don’t ever open the door for police, if it’s important they will kick the door in.’
Following her sentencing, another Facebook user then commented below the post: ‘Especially when ya import big buds.’
Kudiersky responded to the reference to cannabis ‘buds’ by accusing the man of being a ‘melt’ and a ‘bitch boy’, before subsequently deleting the comments.
Other posts on her account refer to drugs. Back in July, while awaiting trial, an image was reposted from a Facebook user called We Love The Herb, featuring an image of the rapper Snoop Dogg draped with medals. The caption read: ‘Me if smoking weed was an Olympic sport.’
In February an image was reposted that read: ‘I can do without SEX . . . But that damn WEED a whole different story.’
No doubt they were intended as humorous content, but the reality is that the UK is facing an epidemic of drug smugglers like Kudiersky – something that was alluded to at her sentencing hearing at Manchester Crown Court on December 18 last year.
Figures presented to the court by the National Crime Agency show that the numbers of airline passengers caught smuggling cannabis into the UK has rocketed by almost 4,000 per cent in the past three years.
In 2022, just 20 air passengers were arrested for attempting to import cannabis into the UK. That grew to 134 in 2023 and 745 in 2024.
Last year was even worse. Figures to mid-November show that 800 couriers were arrested at UK airports. These included 530 arrests at Heathrow and 120 at Manchester Airport, where Kudiersky and her accomplice flew into. Like her, 80 per cent of all those arrested were travelling from Thailand.

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Posts on Kudiersky’s Facebook page suggest she is unabashed by her ordeal

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The mother has been described as a ‘nightmare neighbour’ by those who live near her

NCA experts say the use of British nationals to smuggle drugs is being fuelled by organised crime gangs who have access to cannabis grown overseas in locations where it is legal.
Cannabis was decriminalised in Thailand in 2022, making it easy to obtain cheaply. The gangs then recruit couriers to transport it to the UK where it can generate greater profit for them than growing the drugs themselves.
Many of those caught with drugs have reported being told by their recruiters that they were only risking a fine if caught.
However, the maximum sentence for cannabis importation in the UK is up to 14 years in prison.
The influx of illegal cannabis from Thailand has become such a problem that in February the NCA sent officers to Bangkok airport to intercept mules before they could board. In four weeks, the team stopped 65 couriers carrying two tonnes of cannabis, the value of which the Home Office estimated at £6 million.
Paul Pantry, the NCA’s senior manager of border vulnerabilities, said mules are recruited with the promise of ‘a free holiday, big cash, or a combination of both’.
‘We went from not seeing anyone from Thailand to seeing hundreds of people coming from Thailand,’ he said. ‘A big chunk of them are young people – men, women, all walks of life – but increasingly [they are] students, who might see the promise of quick money [or a] free holiday. That sort of Instagrammable trip; it’s a glamorous location.’
Exactly who was behind the plot Kudiersky was involved in is unclear, but it unravelled on February 2, 2024, when she and Jacfer, a 26-year-old Dutch national, arrived at Manchester Airport, on a flight from Thailand via Doha.
As Jacfer went to leave the airport he was stopped with two suitcases by a customs officer, the luggage tags of which were in the name of Kudiersky.

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One of the bags was X-rayed and found to contain 28.5kg of cannabis. Jacfer was detained on the spot. Three days later, police arrested Kudiersky at her home address, seizing a phone from her.
‘Her phone contained a conversation she had with an unidentified person in which she accepted the cases seized from Jacfer were in her name and that he had been there for her when she had “meltdowns” when they were away,’ Philip Hall, prosecuting, told the court.
‘That conversation became heated following the realisation that Jacfer had been arrested.
In another message, it is clear the defendant was trying to get a free holiday. Pictures on her phone suggest that she took full advantage of hotels and beaches and her mother questioned how she was funding the holiday.’
Those photos, which are still on her social media pages, include shots of her sunbathing and comments about how ‘blessed’ she is to have skin that tans easily.
Another shows a thigh tattoo which reads: ‘Don’t count the days make the days count’.
In court, Mr Hall continued: ‘The defendant then goes on to say “they” are turning on her and that she has to fly with some case. She also says she was told, “sh**’s gonna happen” and that some threat was made towards her family, which lends some credibility to her assertion set out in her basis of plea.’
Kudiersky’s guilty plea was made on the basis that she had joined the plot as a result of ‘pressure, coercion, intimidation and/or grooming and because she was naive and exploited’.
Alluding to the exponential rise in drug smuggling cases highlighted to the court by the NCA, Judge Hilary Manley indicated that had Kudiersky committed the crime more recently, she would have been locked up.
‘Because of how this sort of offending has become much more common, and much more prevalent, it is very important for all people to understand that those people who allow themselves to get involved with importation of drugs in this way will receive deterrent sentences of immediate imprisonment,’ she said.
‘The sentence I am going to impose on you today in this particular case is a sentence that is highly unusual.
‘If this offence had been committed in more recent months, the sentence would have been one of immediate custody regardless of vulnerability and youth.
‘Because it was early 2024 when the defendant committed the offence and the National Crime Agency were just beginning to see an increase which since then has developed very rapidly indeed, I emphasise why I am taking a particularly exceptional course today in the sentence I am imposing.’
The judge also took into account the fact that Kudiersky had been on a 7pm to 7am curfew while on bail since her arrest in February 2024.
Because of the ‘exceptional circumstances’ of the case, the judge sentenced her to two years in prison, suspended for two years and ordered her to take part in 15 days of rehabilitation activity and to do 150 hours of unpaid work.
Meaning that, if nothing else, Kudiersky will be spending this January in altogether less Instagram-worthy surroundings than those she enjoyed two years ago.