Results for Lord Chief Justice Bishop

A 42-year-old man was sentenced to five years and eight months imprisonment for serious housebreaking and theft, after a late-night home invasion at Sopu, where the victim was threatened with a knife and robbed around $6,000 paʻanga in cash and valuables. His sentence included drugs offences.

After the non-appearance of a key prosecution witness, charges were dropped by the prosecution in the trial of Johnny Grattan Vaea Taione.

A Supreme Court judge has convicted a man of arranging the transport of more than five kilograms of methamphetamine, while acquitting his co-accused, in a case involving the evidence of police informants in Nuku'alofa.

‘Aminiasi Fonua Liku will spend two and a half years behind bars for breaking into the home of an elderly woman in Nukunuku and stealing goods worth $16,490 — including valuable Tongan handicrafts.

A 51-year-old woman suffered a fractured skull and permanent damage to her arm, while her daughter’s nursing studies were disrupted, after a violent machete attack that the Lord Chief Justice described as intolerable domestic brutality.

Pita Lolohea is serving 18 months in prison for counts that included the theft of electronics valued at around  $14,756 pa'anga and serious wilful damage when he broke into the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in March last year.

Rodney Tomasi (41) was found guilty on possession of 3,547.86 grams of methamphetamine concealed in a sack of sugar that was imported in a barrel from the United States last year. Shots were fired by Police in pursuit of accused, after he took possession of the drugs. He is expected to be sentenced in January, next year.

Penisoni Tu’ifua Angilau (37) is serving 10 years in prison for four charges that included supplying 534.53 grams of methamphetamine to his second cousin to pack the illicit drug at her residence in Lomaiviti, Tongatapu, in March last year. Police seized cash totalling $90,125 and a Ford Ranger Vehicle, which the court forfeited to the Crown.

Viliami Tukumoe’atu (28) is serving one year imprisonment for reckless driving under the influence of alcohol, causing the death of his father in Makaunga in January this year. The accused was driving at up to 140 kilometres per hour, when he struck an oncoming vehicle, lost control and crashed into an electric pole. “In passing sentence, you do not need me to tell you what this tragedy has unfolded,” the Lord Chief Justice said in passing sentence.