From the outside looking in, Manu Vatuvei seemed to be leading a charmed life in 2019.
The Auckland-based rugby league star had retired from the Warriors two years earlier after a lengthy run as one of the team's most recognisable names and had parlayed that celebrity status into a successful run on TV series Dancing with the Stars.
But what few outside his inner circle knew was that his life had fallen into disarray, a judge acknowledged on Wednesday as Vatuvei was sent to prison for his role in a methamphetamine importation scheme that saw the drug shipped to New Zealand from around the world in innocuous-seeming items such as jump ropes.
Vatuvei said nothing as he was led out of the Manukau District Court to begin serving his three years and seven months' sentence, but Judge Jonathan Moses offered him some words of encouragement.
"Your fall from grace is a punishment in itself," Moses acknowledged, pointing out that until recently Vatuvei had been a role model to many - especially Pasifika youth.
"Your final legacy in this community does not have to be defined by what has happened today. When you are released, you will still have a lot of your life to live."
Although it wouldn't be known until a year-and-a-half later due to a lengthy name suppression battle, Vatuvei was one of four people arrested in November 2019 following a joint police and Customs investigation dubbed Operation Clydesdale.
Vatuvei was described by authorities as second-in-command under his older brother, 49-year-old Lopini Lautau Mafi. Also appearing before Judge Moses on Wednesday, Mafi received a sentence of seven years and two months - twice that of his brother.
Lawyers for both brothers agreed Mafi was the leader of the operation, but they downplayed its significance as "amateurish".
"Frankly ... the syndicate was not sophisticated whatsoever," Steven Lack told the judge, explaining that his client Mafi used addresses and phone numbers that were easily traced back to him and communicated via WhatsApp texts, which authorities were able to easily retrieve.
Lack also referred to a video recovered by police that showed both brothers unpackaging methamphetamine packets hidden among hair accessories in a package from India. The video was kept on Mafi's phone and the two made no attempts to mask their identity, he pointed out, noting that multiple packages were intercepted by Customs.
"There was no evidence of significant financial gain on Mr Mafi's behalf," Lack said.
Judge Moses partially agreed. While the operation was relatively unsophisticated, it was by no means minor, he said, pointing out that the crew was able to import at least 2kg of methamphetamine, and likely "a great deal more" that wasn't ever recovered.
Both brothers faced a maximum possible sentence of life in prison for the charges they pleaded guilty to.
By the time Vatuvei joined the operation, he was staying in the home he had bought for his parents - "self-medicating" with drugs and alcohol, lawyer Vivienne Feyen said, as his marriage was on the rocks.
For the first time, the recent setbacks in his life - an injury resulting in the end of his stellar league career, a brain cyst that ended his attempt at a post-Warriors boxing career after just one fight, marriage troubles and malaise about what to do with the rest of his life - had started to mount, she said.
"We have a situation where from 2002 upwards to 2017 he'd spent his life in a very structured environment," she said of his Warriors career, adding that Vatuvei had received "guidance and support" from the team since the age of 16.
"It is apparent that he was ill-equipped to make these fundamental life transitions [after retirement]. That goes to the heart of his decision-making process, his reasoning."
Fifteen prior years of good judgment and avoidance of drugs had given way to a "calamity of events and emotional trauma" that resulted in him being "in a very black spot", she said, adding that it impaired his reasoning.
That is the context, she said, in which he decided to step in and help out his brother - who also lived in their parents' house - with his criminal enterprise.
It was a feeling of familial obligation, not profit, that led him down the wrong path, she suggested.
Prosecutors said Vatuvei first became involved in August and September 2019, when his brother spent time in jail on an unrelated charge. He continued to play a role after his brother was hospitalised.
Mafi, meanwhile, was described in reports provided to the judge as having been addicted to methamphetamine before he started importing it. The addiction reportedly started, the judge noted, after a surgery that left him in significant pain and discomfort.
"It does appear that your upbringing had been marred by both physical and other abuse," the judge noted, adding that Mafi "took solace in gangs at a young age" and later turned to drugs.
Moses noted that Vatuvei had long looked up to his older brother.
"I am prepared to accept that your primary motivation was to assist your brother, who was in hospital at the time," he said.
But Vatuvei likely would have known the scale of the importation operation and he would have expected financial gain at some point, Moses said.
"I accept that [recent life setbacks] had left you in a dark place," the judge also said.
Court documents state Vatuvei was directly involved in two of the imports - including a package labelled "sporting kits" that instead contained 487g of methamphetamine concealed inside skipping rope handles.
The other package, authorities said, wasn't ever intercepted.
Documents also outline other instances in which the sporting star was mentioned.
One such shipment, labelled "import 4", involved 1.7kg of methamphetamine concealed inside a suitcase sent from South Africa. It was intercepted on October 9, 2019.
Vatuvei called DHL from his own mobile phone inquiring about the package, and at one point his brother also came on the line, authorities alleged.
"Import 7", from Africa, was delivered two weeks later to a Manurewa address that Vatuvei "has links to", with his mobile phone data showing he visited a neighbouring home nine days earlier, documents state.
Less than an hour before the delivery, Vatuvei had been on the phone with another co-defendant, authorities reported. After talking for just over one minute, Vatuvei texted him the address where the package would soon arrive.
"Take home don't open k let me know when your there," he texted immediately thereafter.
After confirming the package was retrieved, Vatuvei typed: "Lesssgooooo once I'm done here I'll come down and then we can open it up sweet."
The co-defendant typed back: "Nothing moves without you."
In a text to another associate late that night, Vatuvei wrote: "just packed some stuff up but yeah you want me to bring you that bad stuff to check it properly".
But it was "import 8" - the skipping ropes from India - that eventually resulted in the brothers' arrests.
The package was set to be delivered to a Papatoetoe home neighbouring where Vatuvei and Mafi lived with their parents. Customs intercepted the package and removed most of the 487g of methamphetamine, replacing it with a look-alike, before conducting an undercover sting on November 28.
Officers added a "chemical marking powder" that would show up on anyone who handled the package, then a Customs officer posing as a delivery driver took it to the marked address.
Mafi met the courier driver outside and signed for it, and he along with Vatuvei opened the package just a few minutes later, according to the court documents.
Authorities executed a search warrant within 15 minutes of the delivery, and both brothers were arrested. Both were found to have tracking powder on their clothes and hands.
Vatuvei exercised his right to remain silent.
Vatuvei wasn't the leader of the small syndicate but he did play "an operational and management role", Crown prosecutor Jessica Pridgeon said, adding that the celebrity's significant amount of "mana given his career" played a part in at least one of the alleged underlings participating in the scheme.
She asked that both brothers' sentences serve as a deterrent and a denunciation.
"There are very few crimes that carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment," she said. "That's because of the significant social harm this crime causes to our society.
Lawyers for both brothers emphasised their clients' remorse to Judge Moses.
Vatvuvei's lawyer acknowledged the stark difference between his days as a beloved celebrity and now.
"Disgrace, I think, is an appropriate word," Feyen. "He has fallen from grace - not a little but a long way."
Mafi looked down at his lap for much of his sentencing, including when his lawyer acknowledged it was him who played the leading role in the syndicate. But the older brother, who attended via an audio-video feed due to Covid-19 restrictions at the courthouse, could be seen pacing after Judge Moses began discussing how much prison time Vatuvei should serve.
"It's no secret that Mr Mafi is very regretful for the position he has put his family in - particularly his brother," his lawyer said. "That is something he will have to deal with for the rest of his life."
The convicted drug dealer was a friend of murdered Outlaws president Peter Lui.