Results for From the Courts

The Tongan noble Lasike appeared in the Nuku‘alofa Magistrate's Court today at the beginning of a preliminary inquiry on a charge of rape of an employee at a motel he has ownership in.

Tongan nobleman Hon. Lasike appeared in the Nuku'alofa Magistrate's Court today charged with the crime of rape.

A jury trial of two men charged with importing 14kg of marijuana to Tonga was stopped this week, after the defence counsel objected to a damaging testimony given by a Crown witness.

Siosifa Fatafehi Fuatakifolaha, the former holder of the noble title Veikune, was reprimanded and fined $20,000 this morning by the Chief Justice in the Nuku'alofa Supreme Court, after being found guilty by a jury on January 25 of the offence of attempting to evade customs import duties on 600 cartons of over proof Bounty rum, and for bribery of a customs officer.

A party of excessive drinking resulted in a man getting so drunk that he killed his cousin, the Nuku'alofa Supreme Court heard.

‘Aisea To‘a appeared for his trial in the Nuku‘alofa Supreme Court yesterday January 26, charged with two counts of bribery of a Government servant and attempting to evade import duties on a container holding 600 cartons of Bounty Rum imported to Tonga from Fiji.

Final submissions of the defence for the Hon. Veikune and his co-accused, ‘Amini Tu'ivai were completed at the Nuku'alofa Supreme Court this afternoon, in a trial over charges relating to alleged bribery of customs officers by Tonga's Speaker and others.

Although a murder committed during a drunken fight was a horrible one, the death penalty was not appropriate in this case, Tonga's Chief Justice has decided in sentencing Tevita Siale Vola (27).

A young man has been found guilty of murder at the Nuku‘alofa Supreme Court last week, after a four day trial by jury, for the murder of Salesi Taufalele who died after being hit on the head with an iron bar.