Inspector Lou Alofa talks with media in September 2015. Photo / Greg Bowker
A formerly high-profile police inspector turned lawyer has avoided prison but will spend the next nine months on home detention for a violent New Year’s Eve argument with his then-partner that resulted in her strangulation.
Lui “Lou” Alofa, 59, was found guilty of two charges following a judge-alone trial in Auckland District Court earlier this year.
He faced up to seven years imprisonment today for the strangulation charge and up to two years for assaulting a person in a family relationship.
“Physical injuries are only part of it,” Judge Stephen Bonnar said of the strangulation, which occurred in the early morning hours of Jan 1, 2020, after Alofa and his partner got into an argument as they left a New Year’s Eve gathering. “It is an offence which involves control of another person and the infliction of terror on another person.
“That is why it is treated so severely by the courts.”
As duty operations commander for the 50-person police northern communications unit, Alofa was frequently seen in front of media cameras in the years prior to his 2015 departure from the police force.
His nearly 25-year policing career also saw him take on roles including senior sergeant in charge of the Glen Innes station in 2005, strategic advisor in the Māori Pacific Ethnic Services Group at Wellington’s Police National Headquarters in 2007 and duty operations commander for the Auckland metro area in 2010.
He later obtained a law degree and was working as online safety advocacy group Netsafe’s in-house legal counsel when the family violence incident occurred. He currently works part-time for an immigration law firm, the court was told today.
On the morning of the attack, Alofa and his partner had got into an argument inside an Ola ride-share car after a night of drinking and his partner had asked the driver to pull over so she could get out, according to Judge Bonnar’s findings following the trial. Alofa then continued on in the car to his partner’s house and waited for her.
After demanding his phone back and receiving it, he prevented her from leaving her bedroom and acted in a threatening manner by waving his fist in front of her face.
“You grabbed her by the hair and you forced her to the ground,” the judge noted today. “You placed your hands on her neck and throat and you strangled her.”
As he did so, he told the victim: “Are you going to calm down?” and “Are you going to shut up?”
The woman suffered bruising and abrasions to her neck, elbows, legs and back. She ran to a neighbour’s home barefoot, at which point the witness observed red marks on her neck that looked like finger impressions.
After the incident, he coerced his then-partner into sending texts to police and filing a false affidavit in a failed effort to have the charges dropped, the judge noted today. When that didn’t work, he took the case to trial and subjected the victim to cross-examination - a strategy that also ultimately failed.
The woman said during a victim impact statement today that she wised up after catching the defendant in bed with another woman.
“You chose not to tell the truth and continued to lie right to the end,” she said. “I still remember that night, and parts of it still haunt me. I can’t even begin to describe the feelings of terror I felt.
“...You left incredible destruction in your wake... I have survived you and your devious nature.”
Police prosecutor Margo Duhamel, whose job Alofa also previously had, asked the judge today for a sentence of either imprisonment or home detention. Community detention, she argued, wouldn’t be enough to meet the principles of deterrence or denunciation.
Defence lawyer Susan Gray conceded that community detention probably wasn’t appropriate for her client but sought home detention so that Alofa could keep his current job and enrol in rehabilitation programmes such as anger management.
While all cases of strangulation are serious, the incident in question “was not in itself severe or sustained”, she said, explaining that her client “released his grip very quickly”.
Alofa no longer consumes alcohol and has given a $3500 emotional reparation payment. Although his accountability comes fairly “late in the piece”, he is “on the right pathway now to turn his life around,” Gray added.
“Mr Alofa is in all other respects a contributing member of society,” she said.
While announcing his decision today, Judge Bonnar chastised the defendant for telling a pre-sentence report writer that he had forgiven the victim while emphasising the negative impacts the case has had on his own family.
“If there is to be any forgiveness in this case, it would be from [the victim] towards you,” the judge said, commending the victim for her bravery in coming to court.
Ultimately, the judge said, Alofa needs ongoing rehabilitation that may not be available in prison. He ordered Alofa to take any courses assigned by his probation officer during the nine months he is on home detention and for six months after the sentence concludes.
At the victim’s request, the judge also imposed a protection order.
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.