Julie Hamp
Julie Hamp

Julie Hamp, who resigned her position as chief communications officer of Toyota in 2015 after being arrested in Japan on suspicion of drug charges, has returned to the automaker.

Japanese officials said Hamp allegedly had her father mail her more than 50 oxycodone pills to her hotel in Tokyo after she arrived to take the top PR spot at Toyota’s headquarters.

The painkiller is tightly controlled in Japan. The package was labeled as containing a necklace.

That arrest came two weeks after Hamp was named the first woman to lead Toyota’s worldwide communications.

Previously, she headed Toyota’s North America PR operations and served as senior VP-CCO at PepsiCo and VP-communications in Europe for General Motors.

She rebounds to Toyota North America to support CEO Akio Toyoda and advise the company on global media relations, sustainability and governance issues.

In a statement to the Associated Press, Toyota noted that Hamp was never prosecuted and believes the “incident in 2015 will not hinder her career going forward.”