The daughters of an Australian grandmother who they believe has been duped or forced into carrying drugs into Japan by a complex romance scam say she does not deserve what she's going through and they just want her home.
Ballardong Njaki-Njaki woman Donna Nelson is a prominent member of Western Australia's Aboriginal community and ran as a candidate for the Greens in last year's federal election.
The much-loved grandmother has been detained for weeks in Japan with no direct contact with her immediate family.
"We just really miss her, her grandchildren really miss her," Ms Nelson's eldest daughter Kristal Hilaire said.
"It's just very difficult trying to process that she's not here with us right now."
Ms Nelson's daughters say she met a man online and had been talking to him for months before agreeing to meet him in Japan in early January.
The family say the scam contained elaborate elements, including sending Ms Nelson an image of a document he claimed was his Japanese residency.
He also claimed to be the owner of a couture brand.
Her daughters witnessed some of her video calls with the man and said his appearance did not raise any red flags.
"He appeared to be of Mum's age group or older, it wasn't like some young, beach body guy," Mrs Hilaire said.
"He always had glasses on, a shaved head. Looked fairly neat, I'd say."
Overseas trip had family worried
Despite these details, Mrs Nelson's blossoming romance worried her family.
"We'd always said to her if anyone asks to borrow money or anything like that never, ever send money to anybody," Mrs Hilaire said.
"Don't ever give your bank details, I guess my worries were always that sort of angle.
"Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that Mum would be a target for something more sinister."
Her daughters said their mother did ask questions but the man always had answers.
When they raised concerns about the trip, he offered to fly one or two of them over as well at the same time — something all five women declined due to work and family commitments.
He even offered to pay her youngest daughter's wages for a month.
Layover in Laos to take luggage
Ms Nelson's daughters say the man offered to pay for her flights but told her because it was such a busy time of year, she would have to transit through other countries, including Laos.
Ms Nelson spent a few days on a layover in Laos, video-calling her daughters from her hotel room where she appeared happy and relaxed.
Her daughters later learned Ms Nelson told her lawyer a person claiming to be a business associate of the man she was travelling to meet had come to her hotel and asked her to carry some luggage on to Japan.
She last spoke to her family on January 3, and they have not heard directly from her since, communicating through a lawyer and consular officials.
Her former partner Justin Kickett said he believed she had been caught up by some type of organisation that included multiple operatives.
"She's an everyday person, [an] everyday grandmother that was searching for love and got caught up in something left-field to her," he said.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) have confirmed it was providing assistance to an Australian woman, understood to be Ms Nelson, in Japan.
Her daughters have praised DFAT's work in providing Ms Nelson assistance and supporting the family.
'An amazing leader'
They say their mother had spent her life helping the community, and she did no deserve what has happened to her.
She is the director of a charity, Pioneers Aboriginal Corporation, which between 2019 and 2022 received a $1.65 million grant to support their work engaging young people with basketball opportunities.
She was until this week the chair of Derbarl Yerrigan Health Service, where she remains on the board.
Derbarl Yerrigan told the ABC it had relieved her of that duty as it was unable to carry out some functions with her return uncertain, with both its chair and deputy chair required to approve banking, funding agreements and contract variations.
Greens Senator Dorinda Cox spoke on Wednesday of Ms Nelson's standing in the community.
"Donna is an amazing leader, she's an amazing advocate," Senator Cox said.
"It's unfortunate circumstances and I don't have all the details, but what I will say is that when one of our leaders is impacted we're all impacted."
Nervous wait for tight-knit family
Ms Nelson's children said she had spent countless hours helping Indigenous community members who had children taken into care, and had opened her home to young people travelling from the Kimberley to Perth for sporting opportunities.
"She takes disadvantaged young people under her wing," daughter Ashlee Charles said.
"She has always fought for what's right and for people who don't have the capacity to fight for themselves."
They also said despite her high profile, she was not widely travelled and this was her first trip to Asia.
Her ongoing detention has left the family distraught.
"We are such a tight-knit family, we speak every single day, even numerous times a day," Mrs Charles said.
"We're really feeling the fact that we can't just go and visit our Mum, and we can't speak to her and ask her how she is."
"And [we're] just worrying about how she must be feeling being so far from us, so alone," Mrs Hilaire added.
Editor's note 26/01/2023: This story initially stated that while in Laos, Ms Nelson told her daughters a person approached her and asked her to carry luggage to Japan. In fact, they learned of this through Ms Nelson's lawyer some time after she had been detained. We have corrected the story to reflect this.
