She Slipped Cyanide into Her Friend’s Iced Coffee, Killing Her in Minutes: Here’s What She Said Recently on TV

Jessica Wongso, who was found guilty of dosing her friend’s iced coffee with cyanide and has since been released from an Indonesian prison, recently spoke to Australian television about her alleged crime.

Wongso, dubbed the “Iced Coffee Killer,” was convicted of the premeditated murder of her 27-year-old friend Mirna Salihin in 2018. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison but was released in 2024 after eight years behind bars, ABC Australia reported.

At a press conference after her prison release, Wongso, who has maintained her innocence, told reporters that she had “forgiven everyone who wronged” her, according to ABC Australia.

Wongso was accused of slipping cyanide into the friend’s iced Vietnamese coffee at an upscale café in Jan. 2016 in Jakarta, Indonesia, per the New York Times.

“This deed was vile and sadistic, committed against her own friend,” said the chief judge, according to the Times.

Video footage allegedly showed Wongso arriving first at the café, ordering drinks for Salihin — who she met at a design college in Sydney — and another friend before placing shopping bags on the table to allegedly obstruct the view of closed-circuit television footage, the Times reported.

Soon after, Salihin arrived, took a sip of the coffee and then immediately collapsed, according to the Times. She was taken to the hospital where she soon died.

During trial, prosecutors argued that Wongso killed Salihin because Salihin had suggested she should break up with a former boyfriend and was jealous that Salihin recently got married, according to the Times.  

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE’s free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.

In an interview on 7News Spotlight, Wongso denied that she was close friends with Salihin.  

“We weren’t close at all,” she told journalist Liam Bartlett. “We came from the same country. We weren’t best friends or anything. After graduation she went back to Indonesia for good and I stayed in Australia.”

Asked by Bartlett why she placed the three bags on the table, Wongso responded: “Oh, it’s just me being me,” she said. “Like I just put it there and it’s like shuffle it and play with it. And it’s like me just, you know, being bored, it really doesn’t mean anything at all. Like if I have to be honest with you.”

About the moment when Salihin took a sip, Wongso said: “I think she just took a sip and after that she was saying something like, it tastes really weird and stuff, and after that she got really sick. And that’s it. That’s pretty much all I remember.”

When asked about her friend’s death by cyanide, Wongso responded, that “There’s a lot of things that I’m not allowed to say, like in public, including stating things like I didn’t do what people think that I did.”

“But if you didn’t do it, somebody else did. Right?,” asked Bartlett.

“Maybe. I could only say, maybe,” she replied.

As a condition of parole, Wongso is required to stay in Jakarta until 2032, per ABC Australia.