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Home / New Zealand

Money laundering trial: Wife of drug dealer accused of banking and spending dirty cash

Kelly Makiha
By Kelly Makiha
Multimedia Journalist·Rotorua Daily Post·
4 Nov, 2021 04:00 PM5 mins to read

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Paula Toleafoa is on trial in the Rotorua District Court. Photo / Andrew Warner

Paula Toleafoa is on trial in the Rotorua District Court. Photo / Andrew Warner

Trips to Thailand, Fiji and Samoa, a business, several hotel stays, skincare, a $900 birthday cake, handbags and sunglasses.

Those are just some of the things Paula Toleafoa spent money on while using thousands in cash derived from her husband's methamphetamine dealing in Rotorua, the Crown alleges.

The 47-year-old is on trial in the Rotorua District Court after pleading not guilty to 78 charges of money laundering.

The offending relates to $449,000 in cash deposits put into bank accounts belonging to Paula and her husband, Luther Toleafoa.

Luther Toleafoa appeared at a previous court appearance via audiovisual link in the Rotorua District Court. Photo / Andrew Warner
Luther Toleafoa appeared at a previous court appearance via audiovisual link in the Rotorua District Court. Photo / Andrew Warner
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The jury heard Luther Toleafoa was this year convicted of large-scale methamphetamine dealing and money laundering.

The charges came after police terminated Operation Janzy - a major undercover methamphetamine operation centred in Rotorua.

The jury heard the Toleafoas' Frank St home in Rotorua was searched by police in December 2018 and inside they found 255g (9 ounces) of methamphetamine valued at $72,000 and $21,000 in cash.

A subsequent investigation into their earnings and spending between April 2015 and December 2018 resulted in the money-laundering charges.

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Giving her opening address to the jury yesterday, Crown prosecutor Anna McConachy said the cash was the proceeds of drug dealing and Paula Toleafoa had a shared intention with her husband to launder the money.

The Crown will call experts from several different banks linked to the pair's 31 bank accounts, either in their individual or joint names or under names of their companies.

McConachy said more than $524,000 in cash was deposited into the Toleafoas' various bank accounts between April 2015 and December 2018. However, the Crown accepts some of that money came from legitimate income - either a house-washing business called Mr House Wash and Paint that Luther Toleafoa ran or Paula Toleafoa's property management business, First Class Properties.

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Fourteen of the charges related to cash deposits of $449,000 of the $524,000, which the Crown says were proceeds from drug dealing.

The remaining 63 charges related to money laundering where large amounts of cash were spent on a variety of purchases.

Among the items Paula Toleafoa bought with cash was her property management business, which she paid $10,000 in cash for, McConachy said.

A Flight Centre witness will tell the jury that Paula Toleafoa bought several holiday packages to Fiji, Samoa and Thailand and each time paid in cash, in amounts of up to $11,976. In total she paid Flight Centre more than $23,000 in cash.

There was also thousands in cash spent on hotel bookings in Rotorua, including $14,000 at Rydges Rotorua and more than $13,000 at Regal Palms.

Paula Toleafoa also paid cash for her husband's 40th birthday party at Rydges Rotorua, spending just under $4000 with an event company and $900 on a birthday cake.

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Police searched the Toleafoas' Auckland house and found receipts documenting cash spending including for handbags, sunglasses, furniture, jewellery and skincare.

"Effectively the Crown case is that that cash spending was all the proceeds of crime using cash derived from Luther Toleafoa's methamphetamine dealing."

She said the jury could draw an interference from where that cash had come from because they knew Luther Toleafoa was dealing methamphetamine.

The Crown would be calling a forensic accountant employed by the police who had analysed four years' worth of the Toleafoas' bank accounts and he considered there must have been another source of cash income that existed to support the cash deposits and cash spending.

She said his investigation included comparing income declared to the Inland Revenue Department from their legitimate businesses against the other unexplained large cash deposits.

She said while the house-washing company might have started in 2015 as a legitimate business, from 2016 onwards it changed to a company that was receiving almost exclusively cash deposits.

Paula Toleafoa's lawyer, Steven Lack, gave a brief opening address to the jury and said Luther Toleafoa went to great lengths to conceal his drug-dealing offending - including concealing it from his wife.

"It was all hidden away from plain sight and away from the prying eyes of the police and the wider public but it was also hidden away from the eyes of his wife."

He warned the jury they needed to be careful about jumping to the conclusion the source of the funds was from drug dealing and that she knew it was from drug dealing.

Lack said the Toleafoas' relationship was one marred by violence.

"There were long periods of time when they didn't even live in the same house let alone the same city."

He said in those circumstances, Luther Toleafoa might not have been upfront with his wife about what he was up to - including his drug dealing, his spending and the success of his business.

He said Paula Toleafoa was working hard to build up her own business, she employed staff and she was able to make a genuine and legitimate income from that business.

He said Luther Toleafoa had contracts to waterblast and clean guttering for properties in Auckland and it was the type of business where it was not unusual to be paid in cash.

"There is no reason not to think that this was the reason for the funds."

The trial is before Judge Phillip Cooper and is set down for two weeks.

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