A DAY after Schapelle Corby broke down with relief at hearing there was sensational new evidence to clear her of Bali drug charges, the Australian Federal Police Commissioner has dismissed the testimony of a prison inmate as "highly improbable".

Mick Keelty intervened yesterday to question claims the 4.1kg of marijuana found in Ms Corby's boogie board bag was planted without her knowledge at Brisbane airport last October.

He also described the word of a prisoner who overheard another inmate admitting to the botched deal as "hearsay", and criticised Ms Corby's legal team for publicising its defence.

"To actually transfer drugs from one part of a country to another, from state to state, and end up overseas, is a big leap," Mr Keelty said.

"Then to connect it to a person coming off a plane, it's very wild. There are a lot of things to have gone wrong for that to have happened like that."

If she is found guilty, the 27-year-old beauty therapy student faces the death penalty.

On hearing about the new evidence on Wednesday, Ms Corby broke down. Her legal team was given a week-long adjournment in the Denpasar District Court to examine it.

"I can't even talk, I feel numb," Ms Corby told reporters from a court holding cell. "I don't want to get my hopes up, just in case." Ms Corby's lawyers claim she was the victim of a failed trafficking attempt when a drug-running operative in Sydney failed to intercept the marijuana which another operative had planted in her bag in Brisbane. The bag continued to Bali, where Ms Corby was arrested.

Ms Corby's lawyers have a sworn statement from an informant who identifies three airport baggage handlers he claims were involved in the drug-running attempt.

Gold Coast businessman Ron Bakir, who is organising Ms Corby's defence efforts, claimed on Wednesday that the AFP had ignored repeated attempts by the informant to contact them.

But Mr Keelty said there was "absolutely no record" of the informant trying to contact the AFP.

Mr Keelty was also scornful of the statement, revealing it was made by a Brisbane prison inmate who claimed to have overheard a conversation between other inmates.

"It contains no direct evidence," Mr Keelty said.

"At best, a person is giving hearsay evidence about what other parties supposedly said. It is very light-on."

Mr Keelty said he believed Ms Corby's legal team was undermining her case by publicising its defence.

"A lot has been said by the legal team for Ms Corby and this cannot be doing any good for her in my view," he said.

"I would have thought the best way to defend a person is to prepare your case to run before the court. You don't want to run your case in the media and have it shot down at first base."

AFP officers interviewed the informant late yesterday.

Mr Bakir said his legal team had plenty of evidence showing how easy it was to move drugs in airport baggage. "It is the simplest thing in the world for a baggage handler to do it."

Mr Keelty dismissed the claim that it proved Corby, 27, was the unwitting victim of a drug-trafficking ring.

"There is no direct evidence in the material that has come forward. At best, it is hearsay on hearsay," he said at a press conference in Brisbane yesterday. "There's no truth in most of the stuff they're claiming to have occurred," he later said.

On Wednesday, Gold Coast businessman Ron Bakir - who has come to Corby's aid by funding her legal defence - said an unnamed person had provided a statement that revealed "who, when and how" Corby had been used without her knowledge to carry drugs into Bali.

Corby is facing the death penalty if found guilty of smuggling 4.1 kilograms of cannabis into Bali's Denpasar Airport in her boogie board bag last October.

Corby, in a Denpasar District Court holding cell, reportedly clutched her sister Mercedes' hand and said "Oh my God", when told of the affidavit.

Mr Keelty confirmed the statement was a prisoner's account of a conversation between at least two other prisoners in which Corby's case was mentioned. The drugs, according to the statement, were supposedly placed in the wrong bag or on the wrong flight.

Participants in the discussion were identified in the statement only by their first names and will take "some time" to locate, Mr Keelty said. "It is very light-on at best," he said of the statement. "It is a bit of a long shot here that it's connected to the Corby case in any event."

Federal police are interviewing the prisoner.

Asked about Mr Bakir's claim of baggage handlers running an organised drug-trafficking network at Brisbane airport, Mr Keelty said federal police had no information about such a network. Corby boarded at Brisbane and flew to Sydney before taking an international flight to Bali. "There is no specific intelligence saying that Brisbane airport is the centre of drug activity," Mr Keelty said.

Mr Bakir, who founded the Mad Ron's chain of mobile phone stores 10 years ago, said federal police were reluctant to give the evidence credibility because to do so would amount to an admission of lax security at airports.

"I think that Commissioner Keelty should be looking at this matter on a much more serious basis," Mr Bakir said. "The information in this document names people and tells you who has admitted what and who did what. At the end of the day, it is a statement that could free Schapelle Corby."

Mr Keelty questioned the motives of the prisoner in coming forward - months after Corby's arrest - and raised the prospect that the man might only have done so for his own benefit.

Mr Keelty dismissed suggestions the man had made several attempts over the past three months to tell his story, and criticised Corby's legal team for "parading" the new evidence before the media.

"I'm not a practising barrister or solicitor, but I would have thought the best way to defend a person is to prepare your case and allow the case to run before the court," he said.

"You don't want to run it in the media and have it shot down in flames before you even get it to first base."

TONY JONES: Now to the case of Schapelle Corby, the Gold Coast woman who has been held in a Bali prison on drugs charges and the new evidence she hopes will set her free. Even before that evidence has been heard in court, there has been doubt cast on it. The Australian Federal Police today questioned the claims that Australian airport staff used Schapelle Corby's bags to smuggle drugs interstate and they say her lawyers should have saved their revelation for the trial. Kirstin Murray reports.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: Schapelle Corby's legal team hopes a sworn affidavit from an Australian prisoner will be her 'get out of jail' card.

LELY LUBIS, DEFENCE LAWYER: If it is true, yeah, we come home.

SCHAPELLE CORBY: Yeah, of course I'm happy.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: Her Australian-based lawyers say they have a statement which proves she's innocent and when the case resumes in Bali next week, they'll argue corrupt airport baggage handlers are responsible for the four kilograms of marijuana found in her bag.

VASU RASIAH, GOLD COAST LAWYER: We have got some information and it conclusively says Schapelle is not involved. She's an innocent person who went into the airport and somebody planted.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: But legal representatives in Bali told the court they know who did it and want to summons a man currently serving a sentence in Australia to the Denpasar court. They say the information comes from a letter drafted by another prison inmate, who names several people who were allegedly trying to smuggle drugs from Brisbane to Sydney. But Federal Police are questioning the motives of the author and say the information is hearsay.

MICK KEELTY, FEDERAL POLICE COMMISSIONER: It does mention Corby, but only in the sense that the prisoner made the conclusion that is was connected to the Corby case and overheard other prisoners talking about the Corby case.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: But officers are taking allegations of an interstate drug smuggling network seriously, questioning the prisoner this afternoon. The union representing Qantas baggage handlers says while it's feasible, it should first be proven.

HUGHIE WILLIAMS, TRANSPORT WORKERS UNION STATE SECRETARY: I think it is very serious allegations and we certainly don't like all our members coming under that sort of spotlight.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: The Federal Police Commissioner says the defence team has done Ms Corby no favours.

MICK KEELTY: To parade any evidence in Australia beforehand doesn't serve her any justice but can have the opposite impact.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: Her Gold Coast lawyer says the informant hadn't been taken seriously by police and he had no other choice but to go public.

VASU RASIAH: And instead of finding fault with the letter, finding fault with the witness, finding fault with the weather and everything else, why don't they get off the chair and do something?

HASSAN WIRAJUDA, INDONESIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: The governments cannot interfere with the legal process.

KIRSTEN MURRAY: Schapelle Corby's legal team hopes to fly their new witness to Bali when the case resumes next Thursday.
Kirstin Murray, Lateline.