Vicki Letele's family is considering taking legal action against the Department of Corrections.
A scathing report into her care while she was dying in prison has found Corrections failed to act on her symptoms.
Letele was freed in late 2016 on compassionate grounds because she had terminal cancer. She died six months later, and now the Health and Disability Commissioner has found her healthcare in prison was inadequate.
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Her mother Tui has another word for it.
"Torture is what they've done to my daughter," she told Newshub on Tuesday.
Letele was diagnosed with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) before she was jailed for fraud in early 2016.
A few months after she arrived at Wiri Prison, she went to see medical staff with a burning throat, a sore right ear, an inability to hold down food and light-headedness. She was diagnosed with an inner ear infection.
Even though she went back to see nurses and two different doctors a number of times, it took seven weeks for someone to question that diagnosis.
"She was spewing up black bile, which was actually faeces," brother David says.
"When she complained to the medical staff, they told her to put her mattress up against the wall and sleep upright."
In fact, Letele had stomach cancer.
"People need to be held accountable and things need to change," David says.
Corrections National Commissioner Rachel Leota told Newshub changes have already been made.
"We've got increased medical hours for doctors in this particular facility, and training and increased support services."
She's offered her apologies to the family, but Tui says it's come two years too late - and they're considering legal action.
"I've got fight left to go to the last round."
She says she doesn't want any other families to go through what they've had to.
Newshub.
