Michaella McCollum has finally found television success with Celeb SAS and has successfully turned her life around since her days as one of the infamous Peru Two
It’s been a bumpy road to television success for Celeb SAS star Michaella McCollum, who first became known to the public as part of the Peru Two more than a decade ago. At just 19 years old, she and Melissa Reid were caught and arrested at Lima airport, Peru.
The duo had tried to conceal the drugs in sachets of porridge and jelly, in the hopes of disguising the smell, but she has completely turned her life around since those dark days. The 31-year-old, who is a native of Dungannon in Northern Ireland, was initially sentenced to six years and eight months behind bars for her crime and was detained at the notorious Ancon 2.
But in early 2016, she applied for parole and was eventually released on the provision of residing in Peru for up to six years, although she was able to return home that April. Now, she’s set to open up about her ordeal Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins – and it comes after news that Rebecca Loos faces brutal Beckham grilling on Celebrity SAS over ‘mistakes’.
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Viewers will see Michaella be unveiled as recruit number three on Channel 4’s latest series of Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins on Sunday night. The tough military programme is fronted by Mark ‘Billy’ Billingham, Jason ‘Foxy’ Fox, Rudy Reyes, and Chris Oliver, and she has joined a line up with the likes of S Club’s Hannah Spearritt, Love Island contestant Tasha Ghouri and Traitors winner Harry Clark amongst a host of others.
She’s set to be put through her paces from the outset, with one of her first tasks being labelled an “epic fail” by one of the commanders. Before her stint on SAS, Michaella made headlines as part of the Peru Two over 12 years ago.
In 2013, Michaella had enjoyed a holiday in Ibiza and opted to stay longer while she sought bar work. Eventually, she accepted an offer to carry 11kg of cocaine – worth £1.5 million – out of the country but, along with her accomplice, was caught at Jorge Chávez International Airport.
Michaella confessed to being under the influence of drugs before committing her crime, as she told Good Morning Britain earlier this year. She explained: “I went to Ibiza when I was 19, it was the first time I’d left the UK, it was my first holiday there. I had no friends, I went completely alone and I didn’t know anybody.
“Within two weeks, I started making friendships and relationships’, I made a friendship with a group of people who ended up luring me into trafficking drugs. The initial friendship, everybody in Ibiza at that time, was consuming a lot of drugs. I, as well, was consuming a lot of drugs and drinking a lot of alcohol.”
Explaining that her young age allowed her to be ‘manipulated’ into the situation, she added: “I had this safe group of people who didn’t take drugs or drink alcohol so I was inclined to spend time with them. They were good people, they didn’t do anything, they didn’t party. That’s what they do, these organisations, they have people who are pickers. Their job is mainly to pick people to become mules, and they target your vulnerabilities. Your vulnerability might be your age, at 19 or 20, you’re incredibly naïve and easy to manipulate.”
She believed the people she was spending time with were safe because they didn’t drink or take drugs. This led to her “trusting them” and thinking they were “good people” because they “didn’t party”, which helped them to “lure” her into becoming a drug trafficker.
At the time, members of Michaella’s family thought she had gone missing on the Spanish island and flooded social media with pleas for her information of her whereabouts but it later emerged that she had been caught smuggling drugs. She and Melissa became known as the Peru Two as their story became known around the world.
The pair initially claimed that they had been coerced into going through with the plan by a gang, however they both pleaded guilty to drug smuggling and were sentenced to over six years’ imprisonment in the Ancon 2 jail. During her time in Ancon, Michaella took up a place on a beauty therapy course and began training to be a hairdresser. What’s more, she also taught herself Spanish in under a year to give herself a better chance of survival in prison.
Michaella was granted parole on March 31, 2016, after serving half of her sentence. Her friend Melissa was also freed that same year, on June 21, after Peruvian authorities agreed to “expel” her from the country. While Melissa has chosen to stay out of the public eye, Melissa has spent the last decade carving out a successful career as an author, public speaker and appeared in her own Netflix series detailing the events of her past.
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In 2019, she published her memoir You’ll Never See Daylight Again, and, at the time, she hit back at critics who suggested she would be making a lot of money from the book deal. She told Lorraine during an appearance on her eponymous chat show: “My family have got themselves into so much debt from this whole process. If I do make money from this, my intentions were never, I was never driven to make money from this, but if I do make some money, then my family would be my priority. Obviously, if I do get a bit extra, then I’d like to help them give back in a way.”
But Michaella came under fire from Piers Morgan during an appearance on Good Morning Britain to promote her book, where the broadcaster accused her of profiting from her own crime. Piers refused to accept her statement that she was using the book to raise awareness and prevent others from making her mistakes.
In fact he believed she must have been hoping for some financial gain, before hitting out at her for suggesting media portrayal of her at the time of the incident wasn’t fair. He also didn’t appear to believe her claims over being naïve when she carried the drugs aged 20.
These days, Michaella, who is also a single mother-of-two to twin boys, has become a successful Instagram influencer and boasts more than 100,000 followers on Instagram. Just last month, she impressed followers with two “stunning” photos captured on holiday at a beautiful location.
And fans were quick to rush to the comments section to not only compliment her on her appearance, but also on her journey over the last 12 years. One person said: “Just finished your audiobook! Found it to be an inspirational read, quite heartwarming actually, which wasn’t expected.
“Your honesty about the situation came across really well. Well done and good luck with your future endeavours”. Another added: “Stunning photos and you look absolutely gorgeous in that dress”.
Opening up about why she chose to accept the offer to star on television’s toughest reality series, she said: “I was hesitant at the start. And then I thought, you know what, when in life are you going to be faced with those types of challenges? You’re not! I was at the point in my life where I was just stuck in my comfort zone, and I thought this is a good way to break those barriers and do the things that scare me, and maybe that will help me in the future with decisions and just different things in life. I need to be okay with taking risks and stepping outside of my comfort zone. So I thought, for me personally, it would be a good challenge to test myself. So that was the main reason.”
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