Kiwis offer home out of jail for Colombians

Two Colombians arrested after entering the country illegally could be out of jail in a week, thanks to the offers of kind-hearted Kiwi families.

Maria Oliva Rosas Peralta, 64, and John Gerardo Medina Fuentes, 33, were arrested in June after using fake passports to come to New Zealand.

Rosas Peralta was scrubbing floors to fund an operation for her 10-year-old son, who cannot walk properly because he has a deformed leg, her lawyer Kevin Smith said.

She was told New Zealand was "the land of milk and honey".

Last week, both Colombians were sentenced to nine months' jail for possessing and using fake passports, and were due to spend half that time in prison before being deported.

If a suitable home were found, they could be granted home detention and would have to spend only about two weeks here before deportation could be organised.

Several families from Lower Hutt to Auckland contacted The Dominion Post after reading about Rosas Peralta's story.

Other families contacted Mr Smith directly and he said yesterday that a family in Upper Hutt had offered to take in Medina Fuentes as well.

Today he will make an application to have the two prisoners released to the Upper Hutt family's residence. He hopes his client and Medina Fuentes could be out of prison in about a week.

Mr Smith said he had been surprised by the response to Saturday's story. "I had been doing the rounds asking for help. They've got nothing, just the clothes they stand up in."

For Lower Hutt couple Maree and Kevin Crighton, reading about Rosas Peralta's plight reminded them of their own experiences in Bogota, the Colombian capital. Their son has lived there for four years with his girlfriend and the Crightons said Colombians had always shown them kindness. "They just embrace people, you know – when we were staying with the girlfriend's family, we were treated like part of the family."

Mrs Crighton said it was "a pretty sad crime" that Rosas Peralta had committed. "I can't understand why she thought she could find work when she didn't speak English. It's such a long way to travel."

Mr Smith told the district court last week his client could not speak English, and had spent her time in Tawa's Arohata Prison in self-imposed solitary confinement, depressed and suffering from kidney stones.

Whanganui woman Joy Clark said reading Rosas Peralta's story gave her nightmares. Ms Clark has a son with special needs who is the same age as Rosas Peralta's son who needs a leg operation, and she could not bear the thought of her not being able to contact her family. Whether or not Rosas Peralta came to stay with her, Ms Clark planned to offer assistance any way she could.