Associated Press
PAGO PAGO, American Samoa — A former American Samoa elementary school teacher must serve more than two years in prison for having a sexual relationship with a 13-year-old student he impregnated.
The High Court of American Samoa on Wednesday sentenced Tone Pulou to 28 months and ordered him to register as a sex offender. Pulou pleaded guilty last month to rape under a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Associate Justice Lyle Richmond said Pulou can apply for work release at any time during his jail term. Once he’s employed, Pulou must pay $100 a month in child support for his son.
“The defendant had a promising future,” Richmond said. “However, he made a terrible and a serious mistake.”
Pulou, 26, originally was also charged with first-degree sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child. Both charges were dropped under the plea deal. He admitted that on a date between September 2009 and February 2010, while a teacher at Alofau Elementary, he had sexual intercourse with the girl.
According to court documents, hospital staff contacted Child Protective Services in mid-2010 about a pregnant minor after the girl and her mother went to LBJ Medical Center to see an obstetrician. The girl told police she and Pulou had sex in his pickup truck.
Pulou was arrested at a Honolulu McDonald’s restaurant last year, five days after officials said he arrived on Oahu and was staying with friends in Waianae. During a phone interview while in custody in Honolulu in October, he told The Associated Press the relationship was consensual and that he wanted to go home to fight the charges.
He was extradited to Pago Pago shortly afterward.
At his sentencing, Pulou was ordered not to have contact with the girl and her family. He also must take an HIV test and reimburse the territorial government $5,600 for the cost of his extradition.
Pulou apologized in court last week, the Samoa News reported. He pleaded to be allowed to go home and provide for his son.
Assistant Public Defender Michael White noted the victim in the case is blameless and Pulou “understands that from this day forward he’ll be a convicted sex offender.”
“This is a mantle that he has inflicted upon himself, and he knows that there are consequences,” White said.
Pulou abused his position of authority, Deputy Attorney General Mitzie Jessop Folau said Thursday.
“As Samoans we trust our teachers to treat our children like they would our own,” she said. “Instead, this defendant preyed on the young students in his school. I wish the court had been harsher and gave the defendant a longer detention term, but I understand the court’s position and the balancing of all the factors involved.”
