Moeaia Tuai, a Samoan chief, was found guilty of slavery and sexual offences against two victims. Photo / RNZ, Gill Bonnett
By Gill Bonnett of RNZ
Warning: this story contains details that may disturb some readers.
Moeaia Tuai will be sentenced next month for enslaving a young woman who he forced to work and sexually abused. Two victims broke free from the Auckland man’s control in harrowing echoes of New Zealand’s most infamous slavery trial, but such prosecutions remain rare. Gill Bonnett reports.
Slavemaster Moeaia Tuai is a Samoan chief or matai, who took possession of his victims’ lives and raped one victim, who had been forced to pay him her wages for four years.
At the 63-year-old’s trial, his own diaries were used to document the hours the young woman worked, her pay and when she was punished with beatings.
“Treating a person as if they were owned” was the legal description given to the jury.
“Restricting freedom of movement – where a person can go, restricting freedom of association – who they can spend time with, restricting freedom of communication – who they can contact and talk to – using actual or threatened violence for breach of rules, retaining income and denying access to money, threatening consequences such as deportation to ensure compliance, restricting access to education to maintain control.”
Only one of those elements was needed, but the prosecution said Tuai had done the lot.
He put them to work, restricted their movements and communication, and controlled their money, paying them very little for their work. He kept their passports, bank cards and wages, assaulted them and threatened both with deportation if they spoke out.
The young male victim dreamt of finishing school, before he was put to work for 50 to 60 hours a week. He was paid $100-$150, $2 or $3 an hour.
He escaped after four years in 2020, including time in Australia. When the woman raised the alarm four years later that Tuai had raped her, police also discovered the slavery both had suffered at Tuai’s hands.
Within that time the two young victims – who cannot be identified – were starting out in life, but having to hand over their incomes to Tuai – estimated to be $78,000 or more for one victim alone.
He denied all the charges, but the jury was unanimous in finding him guilty of 19 charges: two of slavery as well as a slew of sexual offending against the female victim.
Tuai did not allow the victims to talk to each other, even when they were eating at the same table. He did not allow them to talk to other people. He threatened to kill the female victim if she told anyone he’d sexually assaulted her, and both of them with deportation.
The jury heard the call Tuai made to Internal Affairs the day after she ran away – and his disappointment as he realised he could not carry out his threat.
The Aucklander was a matai, or Samoan chief. So too was Joseph Matamata, who in 2020 became the first New Zealander convicted of both slavery and human trafficking.
Thirteen of Matamata’s victims in Hastings – one just 12 years old – were held behind a tall wire fence and put to work.
Tuai also guarded his second victim after the first ran away – driving her to and from work at a laundrette and factory, and even refusing permission for her to attend a daytime work function.
He coerced her to make a false allegation of rape against another man who she had started to see, said the Crown.
But she took her chance to escape, contacting a relative, laying a false trail of where she had gone and then contacting police.
Investigation and prosecution numbers are hard to track down, but Tuai’s slave dealing convictions are believed to be the fifth in New Zealand history.
In a 1991 case, a Thai man sold a woman to an undercover police officer as a slave for $3000. She had been working in a massage parlour and a go-go bar, and the evidence suggested he had brought a succession of girls and young women from Thailand to live off their earnings.
More recently, Fijian woman Kasmeer Lata forced her underage daughter into prostitution in Auckland – the first time on her 15th birthday.
She was sentenced to more than 10 years’ imprisonment for dealing in slaves and dealing in a person under 18 for sexual exploitation, while Lata’s partner Avneesh Sehgal sentenced to four years and eight months in prison for his part in the offending.
In cases not prosecuted as slavery, debt bondage or immigration-related promises or threats have been used against workers to exploit them in slavery-like conditions.
A ministerial advisory group set up to deal with cross-border and serious crime reported that nearly four times the number of migrant exploitation complaints had been made in 2024 compared with the previous year.
“It is highly likely that serious migrant exploitation, such as people-trafficking, forced labour and sexual exploitation, is under-reported and growing within New Zealand.”
University of Auckland’s Centre for Research on Modern Slavery director Christina Stringer said the small numbers of slavery prosecutions, as well as human trafficking, may suggest they are rare – but she strongly disagrees.
“Successful prosecutions often rely heavily on victim testimony, and many migrant workers may be unwilling to come forward – or may not even recognise themselves as victims.”
Tuai will find out his fate in February and will be remanded in custody until then. The maximum sentence for slavery is currently 14 years, and 20 years for rape.