Witness in 16/11 trial saw safe flung out of store onto truck [1]
Tuesday, March 6, 2007 - 18:28. Updated on Monday, July 20, 2015 - 11:58.
The preliminary inquiry hearing of Tonga's 16/11 riot cases started at the Nuku'alofa Magistrate's Court today, March 6.
The first to appear were seven men: five were charged with housebreaking and the theft of a safe from the Jones Industries Ltd. store at Poutaha on the evening of November 16, 2006; and one was charged with theft and also together with the seventh accused were charged with knowingly accepting stolen cash. All of the accused are from the village of Tofoa, Tongatapu. An eighth accused did not turn up in court today.
Police Magistrate Salesi Mafi read out the charges. The five that were charged with housebreaking and the theft of a safe containing over $20,000 worth of cheques and cash from Jones Industries Ltd. were Tekitoa Malafu, Pita Mahina, Saia Malafu, Toni Paseka, Samiu Paseka; and the two who were charged with accepting stolen cash were Peni Sitanilei and Faiva Talakai. The accused ranged in ages from 17 to 40 years.
During the morning's hearing Police Prosecutor Mema Latu called three witnesses to give evidence.
The first witness was Vaiangina Tafea the General Manager of the Jones Industries Ltd. shop. Vaiangina testified that on the evening of November 16, 2006 he was the last one to leave the shop because one of his primary duties was to make sure everything from the safe to the shop was locked and secured before he departed the shop at 5:15pm. When he left work he heard that the Shoreline building had been set on fire, but he continued on the road to pick up his family at the Westpac Bank of Tonga then headed for home.
He said that later that night one of his workers rang and informed him that the Jones Industries store was going up in smoke, "so I went back around 10:30pm to check it out but when I got there the whole place was on fire."
Vaiangina told the court that it was not until the next morning after the fire was put out that he realized that the safe, which contained over $20,000 pa'anga was missing and two of their trucks were also missing, so he reported it to the Police.
He said that he was sure that the safe contained over $20,000 pa'anga because he checked the cashier's receipt entry of the earnings that day before putting it in the safe and he confirmed that the cash amounted to not less than $18,000 pa'anga in cash and the rest were payments made out in cheques to the company.
During the cross examination of the witness by defence lawyer Mana Kaufusi he was asked whether it would have been possible for the cashier to take some of the money because he didn't personally count it and only estimated the amount printed on the receipts, the witness replied no because he trusted his workers completely and such an incident had never happened in work before.
The second witness to give evidence was Pasepa Sitani an eyewitness to the incident who lived behind the Jones Industries shop at the Mata ki 'Eua Road. Pasepa told the court that on the evening of November 16 she went to watch the looting of the Jones Industries and she saw the safe flung out of the shop and loaded into a blue truck.
"I didn't see who flung out the safe because there were so many people there but I did see Tekitoa and Saia sitting on top of the safe when the truck took off," explained Pasepa.
A third witness Motuliki Sitani who, apart from being one of the accused charged for the 16/11 riots, was also an eyewitness to the incident on this particular evening.
He told the court that he did not see who took the safe but he heard from the people that he was standing with that the accused Tekitoa was on the truck but he didn't personally see the accused in the truck. He did however confirm that the truck that took the safe was blue and the safe was taken from the shop before it was set on fire.
The hearing will continue this week, and the prosecution will call five more witnesses who are all police officers to give evidence.