A woman at the centre of one of Australia’s worst child abuse cases is fighting deportation to New Zealand.
The woman, known as “Betty Colt” in court documents, left this country as a child and is now in her late 40s.
Colt, who has 13 children, was released from prison in Australia in August, after serving nine months of a 12-month sentence for trying to kidnap two of her sons from state care.
She is in immigration detention at Villawood in Sydney and was about to be deported when she lodged an appeal.
A Sydney Morning Herald reporter, Anne Davies, said in 2013 Colt was living on a remote New South Wales farm with about 40 people, including malnourished, neglected children.
The police removed 12 of the children, and DNA tests revealed their parents were a mix of close relatives.
