KEY POINTS:
A drug-addled mother who left her baby in the bush to die has been kept in prison after the Parole Board over-ruled a Corrections report stating she was a low security risk.
Natasha Dawn Petersen, 32, was sentenced last December to 2 years jail for the manslaughter of her daughter Cheyenne Petersen, whom she
abandoned during a methamphetamine-induced psychosis. The Parole Board panel said the Corrections report was "surprising" given Petersen's decade-long drug problem.
"This offending occurred when she obviously was under the haze of drugs and reasons for abandoning the child, ultimately resulting in its death, [are] rather bizarre to say the least," the Parold Board said in its decision.
Baby Cheyenne was abandoned in thick Whangarei bush in March last year and found face down in a shallow pond the following day.
Petersen believed she was being chased by armed gunmen and had left her daughter in a "safe pair of hands".
At the hearing, it was suggested she attend a Salvation Army Bridge
Programme on release from prison to combat her drug problem.
But the Parole Board was "strongly" of the view she needed a rehabilitation programme of "greater intensity" before she was let out.
Since being sentenced, Petersen has attended grief counselling and a parenting course, but not a drug programme. Corrections rules mean
she is not allowed to finish such a programme as she is considered a low risk of re-offending.
The Board urged prison officials to override that policy "given her long
association with drugs and the gravity of her present offending".
The three-member panel, led by Judge Avinash Deobhakta, recommended Petersen be placed in a prison intensive drug treatment unit by January or, failing that, in one-on-one psychological counselling. They ordered another hearing in six months.
