Everlee had a conviction for possession of marijuana that had been dealt with more than 10 years ago.<\/p>\n
Betty told RNZ\u2019s Mata she was terrified for her 37-year-old daughter, who was sharing a room with 46 others.<\/p>\n
They were confined to the room for 22 hours a day, one side of the room was bunks and the other side was tables. She said they ate and slept in the same room.<\/p>\n
Everlee believed she was the only person there with a green card.<\/p>\n
Everlee Wihongi, pictured with wh\u0101nau. Photo \/ Supplied<\/p>\n
Betty said there had been a lack of support from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) and she wanted Peters to intervene.<\/p>\n
\u201cStep up and do more,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne, do something about Everlee, there has to be something the New Zealand Government can do, and two, train your people\u2026 because the help we are getting is not the best.\u201d<\/p>\n
When contacted by Mata, the office of Peters said, \u201cthis is a consular matter and the ministry is dealing with it. The minister is being kept updated on those efforts\u201d.<\/p>\n
When asked if Peters would respond directly to Betty\u2019s appeal, the office said \u201cthe message had been relayed\u201d but said it must go through consular channels.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson said \u201cthe minister is being kept informed and trusts the professionalism and effort that our embassy\/consular staff are providing\u201d.<\/p>\n
But Betty said there was little support. No one had visited Everlee in detention, they had not received any support in finding a lawyer and when her daughter finally got through on the phone, she claimed the staffer asked her \u201cwhat do you want me to do about this?\u201d.<\/p>\n
The spokesperson for Peters said there were aspects of the case that could not be shared for privacy reasons.<\/p>\n
– RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Everlee had a conviction for possession of marijuana that had been dealt with more than 10 years ago.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4727,5972,38711,207102,11163,2082,11551,2027,78,185,424,13840,34438,23998,117,111,43,139,69,810,6923,207103,35111],"class_list":["post-401443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-4727","tag-day","tag-detained","tag-everlee","tag-facility","tag-for","tag-hours","tag-ice","tag-in","tag-is","tag-life","tag-like","tag-locked","tag-mata","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-up","tag-what","tag-wihongi","tag-zealander"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}