New series. The story of Scott White, whose party lifestyle as a young man in Kuwait during the late 1980s saw him using his wealthy father's money to illegally brew alcohol and purchase hashish. He was eventually arrested for drug dealing and sentenced to half a decade in prison, but he was able to escape amid the confusion caused when Saddam Hussein invaded the country two years after his incarceration

The story of Russell Thoresen, who moved from Tennessee to the Florida Keys when he was 20 years old and fell in love with a cocaine addict who asked him to smuggle the drug from the Peruvian capital Lima to Miami. Although he initially refused, gang members threatened to kill him if he did not transport the drug, and he ended up being caught and sent to the South American country's notorious Callao prison

The story of Lia McCord from Texas, who travelled to Bangladesh in 1992 as a promising 18-year-old student with dreams of attending business school. She was offered $20,000 to deliver a consignment of heroin and, despite her attempts to pull out at the last minute, she was forced to carry the drug. She was caught and sentenced to life in prison, but the intervention of congressman Bill Richardson saw her released after four years

The story of British reporter Amardeep Bassey, who arrived in Pakistan on a professional and personal journey to tell the stories of Afghan people in the wake of the US-led attack on the Taliban. However, his journey turned into a nightmare when passport control discovered he did not have a valid visa and declared him to be an Indian spy. The journalist was given a 15-year prison sentence, but was released after 28 days

The story of Sarah Jackson from Milton Keynes, who agreed to become a drugs courier to pay off a £3,000 debt. Jackson, along with a friend she had duped into helping her smuggle cocaine from Peru to the UK, was seized by police at Lima airport and the pair were sent to different jails to await trial - one an easy-going women's prison, the other an overcrowded all-male prison

The story of South African military attache Colonel McGill Alexander who was taken hostage with his wife and three children in 1997 by Chen Chin-hsing, one of Taiwan's most notorious criminals. Chen's demands included the release of an accomplice and safe passage out of the country. Following a gun battle with police, McGill and his daughter were freed and further negotiations took place over several days, eventually leading to the release of the remaining hostages.

The story of Daniel Van De Zande, a student who moved to Miami after the death of his father in 1995, embarking on a hedonistic lifestyle in the city. To free himself from mounting debt, Daniel began smuggling drugs, but was convicted of drug trafficking after his second assignment, spending three years in the squalid conditions of an Ecuadorian jail

The story of Cullen Thomas, a university graduate from New York who was caught smuggling drugs into South Korea when he visited the country for a short stint as a teacher. He was sentenced to three and a half years, and had to endure the atrocious conditions of two Korean prisons, including a cell so small he could not extend his arms above his head and a toilet that did not flush