A couple from Ha'akame who pleaded guilty to charges of obtaining a $3,000 pa'anga loan from the Westpac Bank of Tonga by false pretences received a suspended sentence today.

Motekiai and Kalolaine Toutai appeared at the Nuku'alofa Supreme Court: the husband charged with obtaining money through false pretences while the wife appeared for abetment to the crime.

Chief Justice Anthony Ford imposed a one-year imprisonment sentence for each accused.

But after considering their guilty plea and being first time offenders he said they seem to be decent people, with three young children, who are remorseful in what they did, he then suspended the whole sentence for two years given the couple complete 80 hours voluntary work.

The Chief Justice also told the court that the couple applied for a loan from the Westpac Bank of Tonga where they deceived the bank by submitting that the husband had a job but he never did.

They got caught but the bank did not lose any money because they made an early repayment of the loan.

Silly action

"This was a silly action on your part as you were bound to get caught," said the Chief Justice.

The court also accepted that a friend of the couple who worked at the bank encouraged them to do this and when finding out that they were caught she quickly left Tonga.

When the couple first appeared for their jury trial in January, they initially pleaded not guilty to over ten charges of forgery and abetment.

During its course, the trial took an unusual turn when both accused were given the chance that if they pleaded guilty to obtaining money through false pretences and abetment, the remaining charges would be dropped because of insufficient evidence to support some elements of the forgery charges. They took up the offer.

The incident took place in January 2005 where Motekiai applied for and was granted a $3,000 loan from the Westpac Bank of Tonga, by submitting false documents claiming he was a librarian at the LDS Middle School.

He repaid it and applied for a second loan in the same way, but he was caught and charged.