By Linny Folau

A former police officer, Pita Vakalahi (28), was sentenced to two-years and six-months' imprisonment for demanding $640 pa'anga from a driver in a traffic offence case he worked on in 2019.

In April this year, he was found guilty of demanding money as an inducement to refrain from doing an act in the execution of his duty as a member of the Tonga Police. His employment has since been terminated.

Hon. Justice P. Tupou KC sentenced him on 3 October at the Supreme Court in Nuku’alofa.

The court was told that on 26 October 2019 the defendant and another police officer attended the site of an accident, where Sinai Lefai Mafile'o had driven into the fence of the Teacher's Training School at Pahu, Nuku'alofa. 

The police took her to the central police station. She was positively tested for alcohol and was kept in custody for the night. 

The next morning, the defendant interviewed Ms. Mafile'o and during a "smoke" break she asked him if her case would go to court. 

The defendant said that it would go to court, but there was a way for her to avoid it. He said he would help if she paid him $540 for the drunk driving and $100 for driving without a license. 

She agreed and was then given two "tickets" for drunk driving and driving without a licence, she recalled, that one ticket was pink and the other was yellow, both without a court date recorded on it. The defendant wrote his phone number on the "ticket".

She told him that when she got the money she would pay him and return the "tickets".

The payment was delayed as Ms. Mafile'o was fixing the damaged fence. But from 28 October, 2019 to 6 November, 2019 Ms. Mafile'o and the defendant were in constant contact.

Court rejected defences

The judge said over those 10-days, Ms. Mafile'o had sent the defendant 75 text messages and vice versa 36 texts.Those exchanges were about the delay in Ms. Mafile'o paying the money paid to the defendant. 

The defendant challenged the charges at trial on the basis that Ms. Mafile'o was an accomplice and therefore her evidence required corroboration and, secondly, that he did charge Ms. Mafile'o and therefore had not "refrained" from exercising his duties. 

“The Court rejected those defences and found that Ms. Mafile'o was not an accomplice and that the defendant had held on to the files instead of forwarding it to the prosecution division for the charges to be formalised.”

At the same time, former Mr. Justice Niu who convicted the defendant of this offence rejected his claim that he was too busy with other cases because the telephone records in evidence showed he was in constant contact with Ms. Mafile'o, during the relevant period.

The judge here then took into account of the fact that the defendant was a police officer at the time of the offence, the need for the public to see that condign punishment will be visited on police officers who betray the trust reposed in them and do not live up to the high standards of the police service and set a starting point of three-years. 

"I do not accept the defendant's description of his conduct here as a small incident for the above reasons. He simply should have known better. The loss of his job means there is no opportunity of re-offending under the same circumstances.

The judge then sentenced Vakalahi to two-years six-months imprisonment but with the final 12-months suspended on conditions.