With the earlier matters still before the courts, they remain off-limits as conversation pieces, but what we can talk about is the background of this 28-year police veteran whose tenacity has earned him the title of "super sleuth''.
He loathes it, just as he does a recent Sunday newspaper naming him in a list of the country's hottest stars "for bringing runaway millionaires and monsters to justice''. Time and again throughout our chat, he emphasises that he's no one-man band, that no cases would be solved without team work.
"I'm just part of a team trying to do our best for Rotorua and the Bay of Plenty.
"As officer-in-charge, it's my job to front the media but I'm the figurehead, there's always this really great team behind me."
Should we not have got the message, he later reiterates in a post-interview email that it's the team effort that's the key to cracking cases.
That he's so good at fronting the media takes us back to where we began ... that his first job was in television.
At 17, he applied to become a sound recordist with a Rotorua-based crew "because I was sick of school and it sounded exciting''. Being at the cutting edge of news and current affairs had classroom tedium licked.
Covering events as various as the Queen's 1977 visit and White Island in full eruption were sure-fire boredom busters, but it was being in the midst of an explosion in the Rangipo hydro tunnel-to-be that sends his memory of his sound man days into overdrive.
"We went in to film drilling work and watch them preparing explosives in the shaft wall when the whole thing blew. I guess that was the highlight of a pretty amazing 12 months.''
Readers will have noticed the reference to Mark Loper's "first'' adult job. Rotorua born and bred, he'd been a workforce regular since schooldays, plying the Owhata-Holdens Bay run when milk still came in bottles and was delivered to the gate.
It is, however, the Christmas holidays he spent on the back of council rubbish trucks for which he retains unadulterated affection.
"It was hard, physical work but I loved it. I'd come home absolutely stinking but it was huge fun, experiencing the enormous camaraderie between these really fabulous blokes and, for a teenager, there was the added attraction of earning money.''
Later came the realisation that qualifications of some sort were imperative if his financial situation was to pass the pocket-money stage. Television work had been a diversion but not exactly lucrative.
Door knocking took him to Mills Tui Trailers and a fitter-welder's apprenticeship. It was the early 1980s and the company was churning out fire engines and logging trucks by the score, an ideal training ground for a good keen young man, the more so when he discovered joining the Territorials would let him qualify earlier.
"With three months at Waiouru I did it [his apprenticeship] in 21/212 years instead of three. Waiouru was great, even going for a run in the snow at 5am in the middle of winter.''
With his trade certificate secured, travel topped the young Loper's list of life's must-dos. The US was his first port of call, circumventing the country solo in an LA-bought van. He didn't find it the slightest bit lonely. To the contrary it was, he enthuses, "awesome''.
"I gained a lot of knowledge travelling on my own, you meet a lot more people when you're by yourself.''
Home and working for Road Runner Trailers, his feet continued to itch.
A few months' "look see'' around Melbourne and Adelaide couldn't cure the affliction. In what was to be a life-changing move, he joined one of those ubiquitous Contiki European tours, his extending into the UK and Ireland. The life-changing bit was meeting Aussie wife-to-be, Narelle.
He followed her to her New South Wales hometown of Griffiths where they married, spending a year there working as a cellarman cum bar manager.
"Then the realisation came it was time to settle down so I came home [Rotorua] and joined the police.''
Narelle crossed the Tasman when his course ended.
Policing was no spur-of-the-moment decision. Mark's dad, Bill, had been a police officer before becoming Rotorua's first harbourmaster and an uncle was a dog handler.
"As a teenager I'd go out on the lakes with Dad when he was looking for bodies and I was into scuba diving with the Rotorua Underwater Club. We'd also look for people who'd drowned, find firearms and the like, so I guess it gave me a taste for it [policing] but it was the idea of tracking down the bad guys that I was interested in.''
We must be honest here ... we've misquoted Mark Loper slightly. The word he uses is "persons'' not "people'' we've translated it into.
He admits "persons'' is a word deeply entrenched in the police vocabulary. However, we let him off. It's the only word he uses throughout our long chat that has him digressing into the jargon of his peers.
Detective Inspector Loper isn't that kind of cop. He's the kind who doesn't hide behind "police speak''. He's a cop who gives it to you straight.
His policing began in Rotorua in the traditional "feet on the beat'' way. His first arrest remains memorable.
"Two guys were breaking into Sam's Surplus Store, complete with this kit bag of tools ... it was a fun night.''
After two years, he joined the Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB) working across the squads, vice included.
He was part of the Rotorua team seconded to Auckland to investigate one of the country's biggest vice cases, the Peter Plumley-Walker affair. The body of the former cricket umpire with a fetish for bondage had been found tied up at the foot of Huka Falls.
"We were doing general inquiries around the victim and suspects trying to find out as much as possible about the persons [that word again] involved. I loved that investigative aspect, I still do.''
Later drugs claimed his attention. There was no P then but a lot of LSD.
"One of our bigger cases was a Ngongotaha couple bringing regular quantities into the country. It was the country's fifth biggest importation bust.''
In 1996, Detective Loper became Detective Sergeant Loper, promoted to lead the Tokoroa CIB. For four years, he commuted before returning to his home town station, initially as a uniformed senior sergeant, then returning to the CIB as officer in charge.
In mid-2010, he assumed his detective inspector's role with that grandiose crime management title.
He bridles when we tease him that with so many recent big "busts'' to his credit he's well on his way to becoming commissioner, insisting instead it's not ambition that drives him.
"I've never been one to climb the ladder to the top. I like what I do, the investigations, they are why I've sat the exams.''
If he's not ambitious what, then, is Mark Loper's own analysis of himself?
"I guess I am a lateral and analytical thinker with the ability to build effective teams around me.''
Who can say fairer than that?
***
Mark Loper
Born: Rotorua, 1959
Education: Lynmore and Owhata Primaries, Rotorua Intermediate, Lakes High
Family: Wife Narelle, daughter Nicole, sons Scott and Shaun. The elder two have university degrees, Nicole a BSc, Scott a Bachelor of Management Studies. Shaun's at Western Heights High and musical, performing in the school's Dixie band and up-and-coming heavy metal group Aftershock.
Interests: Family, fishing, travel. ``We've done a great deal of that and plan more.''
Homicides: As of this week, he has led 18 murder inquiries including the Nia Glassie case and an eight-month-long successful investigation into the death of Stephen Gorge, whose badly charred body was found in a burned-out Atiamuri house.
On solving cold cases: "Basically it's good basic police work, dogged determination and tenacity, changes to the way courts hear evidence and the advancement of DNA analysis that resolves them.''
On psychics: "They're probably well-meaning but they can cause a lot of damage. I've never known one to locate a body in New Zealand. They just give families false hopes.''
On the media: "It's changed a lot since I was involved, more sensational, but they remain a useful tool for the police and the police a useful tool for the media.''
Personal philosophy: "Be yourself.''
