Schapelle Corby’s awkward prison encounter with Kate Langbroek
Schapelle Corby (right) said Kate Langbroek set off her 'bulls**** radar'. Photo: Getty
Popular radio host Kate Langbroek has recalled her strange meet-and-greet with Australian convicted drug trafficker Schapelle Corby in Bali’s Kerobokan Prison in 2005.
The Kiis FM host and her friend, Georgie, were travelling in the area when they decided to pay a visit to Corby, who was at the time serving a nine-year prison sentence for smuggling cannabis into Indonesia.
But Langbroek’s recollection of the meeting differed greatly from Corby’s retelling of events.
During a Wednesday broadcast, Langbroek’s co-host Dave Hughes read aloud an excerpt from Corby’s 2013 memoir in which she accused Langbroek of “using her” for publicity.
Corby recalled a guard asking her to meet with two Australian women, and speculated he must have been “slung a bit of cash” because she usually didn’t accept visits from strangers.
“I was feeling a bit blue but they were right there and I didn’t want to be rude,” Corby wrote in her memoir.
She said while she couldn’t quite place her, she knew Langbroek was familiar, referring to her in the book as “the larger” of the two women.
“‘The larger’ – that’s passive aggressive,” Langbroek said on air with a laugh.
Corby claimed her “bulls*** radar” went off straight away when Langbroek said her brother was a politician and had sent her to check on Corby.
“I couldn’t get away fast enough,” Corby claimed.
“But it left me with a nagging sense that I knew her [Langbroek].”
Corby later realised who Langbroek was when the radio personality started talking about the meeting on TV.
“She milked our brief chat for her own publicity, she went on Rove talking about how she’d met Schapelle Corby … she even had the insensitivity to make a big deal about my pimples,” Corby wrote.
“It was insulting, why couldn’t she have simply been honest with me? Did she think I wouldn’t find out about her exploits or did she just not care how I felt?”
On air, Langbroek and Georgie strongly refuted Corby’s story, with Georgie describing it as “a crock”.
“For starters we did not pay anyone to see her,” Langbroek said, adding that they met with Corby in a “lovely lounge” area.
“She had the vibe that she ran that joint,” Langbroek recalled.
Langbroek recounted how Corby asked them for a hug and was “very pleasant”, accepting the gifts that she had brought for her.
“At that stage everyone thought she was innocent – we were worried about her,” Langbroek said.
“She asked us for a hug,” Georgie added.
Langbroek said Corby even cracked a joke, telling the two women: “People always send me tampons, maybe they’re hoping I’ll bleed to death.”
In the end, Langbroek had the final word, dismissing Corby’s claims there were ill intentions behind the visit.
“I didn’t hide [where I worked]… it didn’t come up,” Langbroek said.
“When I was on the Rove show he raised it, I didn’t go on the show to talk about her.
“I only mentioned her pimples because I was trying to point out she was looking quite stressed. But she got me back by referring to me as ‘the larger’,” Langbroek laughed.
Corby, who was released from prison on parole in 2014, will return to Australia this weekend for the first time since she was caught with 4.1 kilograms of marijuana in her boogie board bag in October 2004.