LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: Perth grandmother Donna Nelson was a pillar of her community … a mother of five daughters who spent a lifetime working in social justice and Indigenous leadership roles.
A few years ago, Donna finally had some space for herself and so she dipped a toe in the waters of online dating, meeting a man she thought could become her husband.
What happened next was a nightmare, and it set Donna’s five daughters on a mission they could never have imagined.
NEWS REPORT: Australian grandmother on trial in Japan will take to the stand today as her desperate family pleads for her freedom.
NEWS REPORT: With their mother facing the force of Japan’s justice system, the daughters of Donna Nelson are putting on a brave face.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: There’s no real handbook in how you navigate all of this.
And nobody can really give you advice on what to do.
Just breathe, everyone. We’re okay. Let’s breathe.
This is the first time, collectively, that my sisters and I have been able to see mum in almost two years, and it’s inside a courtroom.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: Donna has five incredible daughters trying really hard to get their mum home.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: She thought she was coming to Japan for her love story, she didn’t have any other intention other than that.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: She was caught in a very sophisticated operation. It’s quite next level. And people like Donna just become sort of collateral damage.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Thank you.
ASHLEE CHARLES, DAUGHTER: It just seems like a bad movie or something, or even a bad dream. We need to just keep fighting, keep pushing. We’ve just got to make sure the truth is able to come out.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Mum always sees the good in people and I think it makes her more vulnerable to just see everyone as good, honest, loving.
It’s really hard not having mum home here, because my four sisters and I as well as mum, were just like, one unit, and we would speak every single day.
Mum’s this outgoing, kind, friendly, very generous, giving person.
Mum is so involved as a mother and so, so involved as a grandmother.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Mum’s been in solitary confinement for 22 months. She’s confined to her cell for 23.5 hours a day. She has to eat in her cell. She isn’t allowed to, like, talk loudly. She’s not allowed to sing. She’s not allowed to talk to other people who are detained.
DONNA NELSON, CONVICTED GRANDMOTHER: Merry Christmas
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER:Yeah, it’s just so unfair.
RIE NISHIDA, JAPANESE LAWYER: Being isolated from the family member and cannot speak with anyone except for the lawyers, are the hardest part for Donna. She actually told me like she is suicidal at certain point. She she told me like, she almost forget how to speak.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: There’s nanny with all her school friends. And that’s in Merredin. She went to school in Merredin. Mum’s a strong Nyaki Nyaki woman. She was born on the reserve. her family worked for rations.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Mum and Dad, they met when they were about 15 years of age. My mum had Kristal. And then I came along a year later then JANELLE, DAUGHTER:, then Taylor, and then mum and dad split up when my mum was pregnant with my baby sister Shontaye. Her breakup with my dad it really messed with her head and her confidence a lot. She had been with him for over 20 years. Yeah, I definitely think it did scar her.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Mum’s life was her work and her community. She worked with a lot of young people and really focused on their mental health and suicide prevention. Mum was the chairperson for Derbarl Yerrigan Health Services. She was also running for the Greens. So there was no such thing as holidays, weekends.
TAYLOR KICKETT, DAUGHTER: I think she felt like we were all growing up so she was ready to have some time for herself, be happy, and, finally be with someone.
NEWS REPORTER: Perth woman and First Nations leader Donna Nelson has been held in solitary confinement in a Japanese cell for 23 and a half hours a day. Donna’s family is hopeful of an acquittal.
JANELLE MORGAN, DAUGHTER: So it’s been, um, 22 months, just over 22 months of not seeing her. We just haven’t seen or spoken to her because there’s a communication ban in place.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: Japan has an interesting and quite different legal system. They place fairly what I would describe as draconian conditions on the individual who is is alleged to have committed a crime.
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: Watching her in court as soon as she walked out, she instantly started crying when she saw us. But it was like a beautiful moment, hey? I forgot all about the handcuffs I was just staring at her face. When she got up onto the witness stand yesterday and they asked her for her name, I was just craving to hear that voice.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: It didn’t feel real like that she was just there, like that if I put my hand out that I could touch her.
NEWS REPORTER: Donna believed that she was being flown to Japan to meet Kelly…
NEWS REPORTER: The man known as Kelly is not part of the case. His true identity and whereabouts are unknown.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Mum met Kelly on Afro Introductions which is a dating site. I think she wanted to use it to meet someone of colour, because she can relate to someone who’s been through the same kind of obstacles in life, I guess. Mum would have started talking to Kelly around the COVID times. He wasn’t he wasn’t, breathtaking to look at. He just seemed like an ordinary guy. He said he was from Nigeria. He was a businessman. He lived in Japan.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: I remember she told me he had three sons.
SHONTAYE KICKETT, DAUGHTER: They talked like every day. She’d be eating breakfast and I’d hear her on the phone to him or she would call him after we had lunch. And before she’d go to bed they’d say like their little ‘good nights’. I saw him, like multiple times.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I remember mum saying he has a really big heart, and he’s a really nice person. He said he just wanted to look after her.
And I thought, oh, this time, like, mum can be looked after. This will be different.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: People like Kelly, who I’d suggest isn’t his real name, they’re not sole operators. They work as part of a network. She wouldn’t have been the only person he would have been communicating with. They know exactly where people’s vulnerabilities are. They’re very, very skilled at manipulating people.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: I remember her telling me that they were they were going to get married and
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: Have a traditional Nigerian wedding.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: And all of us kids were going to go to Nigeria.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I was happy for her, but I just wanted her to meet him first, see how everything goes. Hopefully one day I come across his profile. I’d want to find out where he is, who he is, and stop him from doing this to other people.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: With these scams, these romance scams people’s usual reaction is, how could you be so stupid? But it really lacks an appreciation for how sophisticated these scammers are, and the level of attention to detail and building that trust. It’s this person’s job. That’s what they do. They do it every day.
And the human loss is of zero concern to these people.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: He said he was a couture designer and she showed me, like, all the dresses that he would make. He was going to be getting into the suitcase business so, he wanted to have a specific type of suitcase. So she went looking for one, thinking that that was going to help him.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: She kept sending him photos saying is this one okay? And he’d be like, ‘oh no too big or too small’.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: So he’s introduced this idea of a particular suitcase months and months before. It’s been talked about. There’s a backstory to it. It’s very convincing.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: They were talking for like nearly two years before she decided to head over.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: It would have been around mid-December 2022. Mum was going to travel overseas to meet Kelly for the first time. I got very nervous about it and anxious. So I thought, okay, I’m just going to pelt her with questions. I told her don’t send him any personal details, don’t send him money. And I told her that the next time she has a video call with him to take a screenshot of his face and send it to me. She sent me a copy of his residence card for Japan and it seemed to match what I’d seen on Google.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I think mum started to feel like Ash was putting obstacles between mum and her finding love. She had so much trust in this person and so much belief in their relationship that they had been building.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: Kelly booked her a flight to Laos first, then to Japan saying ‘treat yourself. Have a few days by the pool in Laos.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: We were like, ‘oh, wow. Yes. Now you’re getting what you deserve. you should be happy’.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: She’s never been overseas on her own. I got her to download the tracking app so I can know what her location is at all times. So, I felt like she was quite safe that way. Mum was told by Kelly that he would arrange everything and when mum arrived at the Crowne Plaza in Laos, she found out that it hadn’t been booked. So, she would have been very stressed. Mum rang and she told me that she wasn’t feeling well, and she said she wanted to come home. I went online and tried to book her a flight and for some reason, it wouldn’t ah go through. It said booking failed. She obviously told Kelly that she wanted to come home, and then Kelly had asked to speak with one of mum’s daughters and I thought that he sounded quite concerned and worried about her. He sounded genuine, to be honest. Kelly then arranged for his business partner to come to give her $1,500 to pay for the hotel. Mum asked me what do you think? And I said, ‘oh, he seems nice, he seems to really care about you too.’ And then she ended up continuing on with her trip.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: Fifteen minutes before she has to leave for the airport she gets a call from Kelly saying there’s this associate of Kelly coming to bring a particular suitcase that he wanted to stock in his boutique. That is the culmination of the scam.
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: He pretty much said, if you bring it over and I have a look at it, then I can bring some more over, ship it over from Laos.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: She saw that there were clothes in there. So she called Kelly to ask, ‘why are there clothes in here?’ And he said they were samples for his shop. And she then had a look through the clothes to check that they were all okay. And it looks like there’s nothing in there other than those clothes which she saw looked fine. And then she’s put her clothing in, zipped it up and rushed off down to the taxi.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: I think the clothing samples were deliberately placed in the suitcase to distract her from where her focus should have been. She was confident that things were going to go fine and she was going to have this new potential husband, um, who she was going to live happily ever after with.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Around 6am, she let us know that she’d just landed and that it was minus four degrees.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: That pretty much was the last time we even heard from her.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: Ashlee texted and she said, ‘ has anyone heard from mum?’ We were all like, ‘no, we actually haven’t.’ So that’s when we all started to, like, panic.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: It wasn’t until about 2pm that we all started to worry.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: I looked at the tracking app and saw that she was still at the airport, and I was kind of like, okay, what’s going on here?
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I think it was three days, but it honestly felt like weeks that we didn’t know where she was. We couldn’t eat. We couldn’t sleep. Um, yeah. It was just a really sick feeling for days.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: I just had a weird feeling that something bad had happened and that he was the cause of it. So I immediately went to my computer and I just thought I need to document everything. We got into her email and we printed off my messages with my mum, her itinerary, the “ID card” that he had sent to her. And then I went down to my local police station and I told them something was definitely wrong. A few hours later, we received the call from the consular emergency centre. Makes me … take, takes me back a bit. Mum was arrested at Narita Airport for drug smuggling. I just froze because I didn’t know, I didn’t know how it happened. I was just like, what?
RIE NISHIDA, JAPANESE LAWYER: Her suitcase was x-rayed. The suitcase was very well made and like, um, there’s actually a double lining beneath the cover. And under that lining, there’s a drug hidden.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: The Japanese customs officer who inspected the bag said to the untrained eye, there was nothing unusual about it. The street value of what Donna was carrying, which was about 2 kilograms of methamphetamine, would be worth around $600,000 Australian dollars.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Apparently, she collapsed and was crying like she was just hysterical. It’s sad to think of that. How heartbroken she would have been when she realised that Kelly wasn’t actually wanting to marry her and live happily ever after. It was all a game to him.
RIE NISHIDA, JAPANESE LAWYER: Importing drug from outside is very strictly prohibited and also strictly punished. Like the maximum sentence could be like life without parole. She firstly believed like if she explained the story, possibly they’re going to understand. I explained to her like the conviction rate is over 99%.
NEWS REPORTER: Donna Nelson has listened carefully this week as prosecutors laid out their case. Today, she used her own words to fight for her freedom. Miss Nelson testified ‘at no point did I feel like Kelly was scamming me.’
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: So the prosecution’s argument would be that mum knew what she was doing and that she was going to profit from it in some way financially.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: This would go against everything she believes in. A lot of the kids that she worked with were affected by drug abuse so why would she want to be someone who contributes to that destruction?
RIE NISHIDA, JAPANESE LAWYER: I believe she’s innocent based on the evidence first. She’s been communicating with Kelly like, over like almost like two years, and there’s no talk regarding drug at all.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: I feel like mom’s lawyers are doing good so far.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I think the lawyers did a really good job at planting that seed of doubt. They don’t feel certain that no, mum was aware.
RIE NISHIDA, JAPANESE LAWYER: So our main argument was she didn’t recognise the possibility there is a drug inside the suitcase. Because the suitcase was very well made. And also Kelly successfully built the trust and love up until that moment. So it’s difficult for her to recognise that there’s a possibility that her, like her loved one is using her as a drug mule.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: Even though I knew what we were up against, I still felt confident. You can’t be guilty of something you didn’t know and didn’t have intention of doing.
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: And I think tomorrow is going to be an emotional day because Ash gets on the stand. But I think Ash, if any of the daughters had to testify, it would be her.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: She won’t fumble.
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: Yeah
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: She’s very firm.
CLANCY CHARLES, SON-IN-LAW: It’s been a long, hard road, but we’re confident that she’ll be found innocent. And that she’ll be home with us soon. Yeah. And I’m just worried about my wife. She’s a strong woman.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Don’t get emotional because you’ll make me emotional.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Walking straight past my mum and going to the stand, that was hard. When I talked about how I tried to warn her and she didn’t take me seriously and I could hear her, I could hear her whispering, ‘I’m sorry’ and crying. But then I felt like, I felt like I failed her. Because even I felt like he was genuine with what he was saying.
NEWS REPORTER: This is the last day in court for many of you here. You’ve been here a week, I guess. How do you feel the week has gone?
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: I think it’s gone really well. We’re feeling quite happy today. Especially because if court finishes on time, we get to visit mum at the Chiba Detention Centre.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: I was originally sad this morning thinking that we were leaving without seeing her before we go. But now I feel good.
NEWS REPORTER: The family of Perth woman Donna Nelson has been allowed to visit her in a Japanese prison for the first time since she was arrested on drugs charges almost two years ago.
NEWS REPORTER: How was it?
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: It was really good. We felt bad leaving, um, because it just feels like 20 minutes isn’t long enough to talk to after two years.
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: Just sad leaving her, that’s all. Goodbyes are always the hardest.
NEWS REPORTER: Is she feeling optimistic about the case given everything that’s happened this week?
JANELLE, DAUGHTER: She did. She mentioned that she thought it went well. We thought it went well too. So when we were like, saying goodbye, we said hopefully we’ll be seeing you soon. So we’re quite confident we should be seeing her soon. Hey?
TAYLOR, DAUGHTER: Yep.
In Perth:
ASHLEE, DAUGHER: That scent is like mum’s favourite scent. I was getting a few things here and there for her room. So we wanted to make sure that a room was ready for her.
SHONTAYE, DAUGHTER: We were so excited for the verdict. Like we thought, oh my gosh, we’re going to finally get the news that we’ve been waiting for for so long. And then it was like, whoa, what?
NEWS REPORTER: Now to some breaking news, a court in Japan has found Australian grandmother Donna Nelson guilty. Ms Nelson has been sentenced to six years in jail.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I remember mum, she just had her head down on the desk and was crying. I just said to her, don’t worry, mum, like we’re going to fight for you to be home just don’t worry you’re going to be home soon. Yeah her mouth was shaking and she just said, ‘But my grandkids’.
NEWS REPORTER: The judges said that they believed she had been deceived by a love scammer but she ought to have known there was something dangerous in that case.
NEWS REPORTER: The judges ruled that there were too many doubts that she overlooked and therefore she was guilty of this crime.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: It’s such a different system. They admit that she was a victim of a romance scam but they still convicted her.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: It’s kind of confusing to me because I think it’s contradictory. So even if she was suspicious and she looked, being that she’s got that untrained eye, there would have been no way to determine whether the bag had drugs in it. On the facts that I have, I don’t think a prosecution would have proceeded in Australia. It’s pretty obvious that Donna was not a perpetrator, she’s a victim.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: So where are we at the moment? Where are we at?
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: Mum’s appealed the conviction. She wants to fight.
We started talking with a lawyer named Luke McMahon, pro bono lawyer because he had been through this situation with another client.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: There’s other factors as well.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: The appeal, it might be close to a year. It might even be longer than a year.
LUKE MCMAHON, PRO BONO LAWYER: Yeah, it’s not a great situation to be in.
The only other option for Donna is to waive her right to appeal, um, and make an application through the Australian Commonwealth Government, um, for a prisoner transfer.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: I’ve reached out to DFAT…
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: I’d never give up on my mum. So if I’ve got to continue fighting until we bring her home, then that’s exactly what’s going to happen.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: (Reads letter from Donna) I’m doing okay, so you all don’t need to stress or worry about me. Just enjoy your lives and have fun, but stay safe.
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: She gets to write five pages for a letter a week, and that’s it. And I guess it’s, you know, you have to take your blessings, you got to see the positives.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER, READING LETTER: I hope and pray you’ve found some comfort going to church…
ASHLEE, DAUGHTER: She said I just want you guys to get on with your lives. I’m thinking how? We can’t do that.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER, READING LETTER: We’re just trying to see if we can smell mum and does seem like we can, on the inner edges, like the inner pages, smell, smell her.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I feel really sad as the kids grow because she’s missing out.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER, READING LETTER: Love always, mum, nanny, nan.
KRISTAL, DAUGHTER: I can’t be at peace until she’s back where she belongs and yeah, I would just be at true happiness again when she finally is home.
CAPTION:
Both Japanese and Australian police have confirmed they are not investigating “Kelly” or the drug syndicate.
The Department of Foreign Affairs has told Ashlee a prisoner transfer agreement could take a number of years to finalise.
