KEY POINTS:
A High Court hearing into the dispute over a Carterton woman's body, taken by her father from a Lower Hutt funeral home, was deferred today, while family negotiations take place.
An order was earlier issued to dig up the body of a Carterton woman taken from a funeral home and buried on ancestral land.
Wairarapa MP John Hayes has been issued with the exhumation order, on behalf of the family, by the Ministry of Health.
Ms Marshall-McMenamin, a 25-year-old mother of two, died in Masterton Hospital last Monday of a suspected drug overdose.
Her father, Eugene McMenamin, allegedly took his daughter's coffin from the Lower Hutt funeral home on Tuesday night against the wishes of her maternal family. She was buried on private land near Ruatoria, on the East Coast, on Wednesday.
Her maternal family, her fiance Darryl Cox, and his family, say they are intent on bringing her body back while the McMenamins have said they will fight any court orders.
Today, a hearing was scheduled to allow Mr McMenamin to appeal the injunction issued against him, but a lawyer for Mr Cox said the court had effectively "stepped back" from the process, in order to allow the families time to try to settle the matter out of court.
Lawyer Daniel Vincent said he was not taking an active part in the family negotiations, but said it was a good sign they had not felt they needed to appear in court today.
"Hopefully we'll reach an amicable resolution," he said.
MP John Hayes said the families were talking and hopefully there would be a resolution.
"The best thing we can all do is throw the whole bloody thing down because if this becomes an argument through the media then this girl will never get home."
Mr Hayes said the family wanted to be left alone and if the issue was "wound up in the media" then both sides would be annoyed.
Ruatoria police Sergeant Hone Herewini said the ministry had told police the order had been issued and it was now a case of "wait and see" when it would arrive.
It was not expected police would be part of the exhumation, other than to be there in a peacekeeping capacity, Mr Herewini said.
- Edward Gay, NZPA
