February 16
ZIMBABWE:
Granny killer sentenced to death
A BEITBRIDGE man, who waylaid a 65-year-old flea market trader in the driveway
of her house in the border town before fatally stabbing the woman and robbing
her of 2 cellphones, was yesterday sentenced to death by hanging.
Maxwell Chadiwa (25) of Dulivhadzimu suburb pounced on Ms Muchaziva Gonorashe
while she was about to leave her house in Dulivhadzimu suburb for Musina, South
Africa, in the early hours and stabbed her with an okapi knife.
He was arrested after police tracked the victim’s stolen mobile phone to
another person who subsequently led detectives to the accused person.
Bulawayo High Court judge Justice Maxwell Takuva convicted Chadiwa of murder
with actual intent.
In his judgment, Justice Takuva ruled that the murder was committed in
aggravating circumstances.
“It is clear that the accused person acted with an actual intent. Looking at
the depth of the wound it is evident that excessive force was used. We are
satisfied that the murder was committed in aggravating circumstances,” said the
judge.
Justice Takuva said the courts have a duty to protect the sanctity of human
life.
“Serious crimes call for the courts to be retributive in passing sentences as
opposed to taking a rehabilitative approach. Lenience in such circumstances
would not reflect the core principles of sentencing as the courts have a duty
to uphold the sanctity of human life,” he said.
In passing a sentence, Justice Takuva said Chadiwa’s conduct was motivated by
greed.
“What is aggravating is that you stabbed an innocent and helpless 65 year-old
woman who intended to go to South Africa to buy wares for resale back home.
“If such an old woman can wake up in the early hours to work what would prevent
you, a 24-year-old person, from doing that? Instead you chose to waylay the
woman and rob her of her cellphones after refusing to disclose where she kept
her money. It shows you are a cruel and wicked person who allowed greed to
overpower you,” he said.
Justice Takuva said those who disregard other people’s lives deserve to be
permanently removed from society.
“The court is in agreement with the State that death is the most appropriate
sentence for you. We would have betrayed society if we are swayed into passing
a sentence other than a death penalty. Those who don’t respect other people’s
lives should also have their lives terminated and the sentence of this court is
that you be returned to custody and that the sentence of death executed upon
you according to the law,” ruled the judge.
On being asked why a death penalty should not be imposed on him, Chadiwa who
appeared unfazed said: “There is nothing that I can say since I have already
been convicted of a charge of murder, which I did not commit. However, I wish
to tell this court that it is only God who knows that I am being sacrificed for
the sins that I did not commit because my hands are not dripping with blood.”
Justice Takuva reminded Chadiwa of his automatic right of appeal against both
conviction and sentence at the Supreme Court. Prosecuting, Mr Nqobizitha Ndlovu
said on January 11 this year, the deceased woke up at around 3.30AM intending
to travel to South Africa for shopping using her car, a Toyota Aphard.
She drove out of the yard, left the engine running and went back to close the
gate.
“The deceased, who intended to go to Musina drove her car out of the yard and
stopped at the driveway to close the gate behind her when the accused person,
who was armed with a knife, pounced on her,” said Mr Ndlovu. Chadiwa pulled out
an Okapi knife and stabbed Ms Gonorashe on the left collarbone and she
collapsed and died. Chadiwa went to the car, searched it and took a handbag
containing 2 cellphones, a Samsung Galaxy S4 and a Blackberry. He emptied the
bag before he threw it away. The woman’s body was discovered by 2 other tenants
who heard dogs barking in the yard.
They reported the matter to the police who recovered an empty handbag and a
blood stained knife near the woman’s body. The body was later taken to
Beitbridge District Hospital mortuary. Shortly after committing the murder,
Chadiwa sold the woman’s cellphone to another resident.
The cellphone was tracked and it was recovered from a person who had bought it
and he led detectives to Chadiwa’s place leading to his arrest.
Chadiwa, in his defence, through his lawyer, Mr Arnold Ncube of R Ndlovu and
Company, said he bought the cellphones from a suspected border jumper who was
desperately in need of money to pay people to assist him illegally cross the
border to South Africa.
(source: chronicle.co.zw)
BOTSWANA:
4 CONVICTED MURDERERS TO HANG
The Court of Appeal on 8 February 2019 confirmed the death sentences of four
men convicted of killing a cab driver in Gaborone and a Gantsi farm owner
respectively.
The killers, Matshidiso Tshidi Boikanyo and Moabi Seabelo Mabiletsa were
convicted in 2017 for the brutal murder of cab driver, Vincent Mopipi, stabbing
him 44 times with a knife.
Tshiamo Kgalalelo and Mmika Mpe, the former Gantsi farm workers, were also
convicted in 2017 for brutally killing and burning their employer, Reinette
Vorster.
Kgalalelo, 33, and Mpe, 29, were convicted of attacking their employer stealing
her Toyota Hilux valued at P300, 000, 2 cellphones and cash amounting to P11,
000.
(source: Hands off Cain is an international league of citizens and
parliamentarians for the abolition of the death penalty in the world. It is a
non-profit, non-violent, transnational and trans-national Partito Radicale
founded in Brussels in 1993 and recognized in 2005 by the Italian Ministry of
Foreign Affairs as a development co-operation NGO)
PAKISTAN:
PHC sets aside death sentence to woman, uncle in murder case
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) has set aside death sentence awarded to a woman
and her uncle in a murder case of her husband about 4 years ago.
A division bench comprising Justice Ghazanfar Khan and Justice Arshad Ali
allowed the appeals of the convicts Palwasha and her uncle Ghazi Akbar. The
bench observed that it was not a valid ground for the trial court to award
capital punishment mere on the assumption that the accused Ghazi Akbar remained
till last time with the deceased Gulab Sher.
Sahibzada Asadullah, counsel for the convicts, submitted before the bench that
on October 10, 2014, Izzat Sher had charged his sister-in-law Palwasha and her
uncle Ghazi Akbar at Khwazakhela Police Station in Swat district with the
murder of his brother Gulab Sher.
In the first information report, the lawyer argued, the complainant claimed
that his sister-in-law and her uncle had axed his brother to death for some
gains and the trial court then awarded them the death sentence.
He submitted that the relationship between the convicts was so close, which
cannot be blamed for killing the man for having some relations as mentioned by
the complainant in the report. The lawyer told the bench that the police did
not properly investigate the case. However, counsel for the complainant and
state lawyer failed to clarify the questions and legal points raised by the
lawyer of the convicts during arguments.
(source: thenews.com.pk)
SRI LANKA:
Sri Lanka Seeks Executioner With ‘Excellent Moral Character’
Sri Lanka, intent on reviving the death penalty after a 42-year moratorium,
first has to find a hangman.
To that end, the government has placed advertisements in local newspapers,
seeking male candidates between 18 and 45 years old with “excellent moral
character” and “a very good mind and mental strength.”
The recently intensified search comes as President Maithripala Sirisena has
vowed to re-establish hangings for drug traffickers as part of a broader
antidrug push. Mr. Sirisena, who is seeking re-election this year, told
Parliament recently that the hangings would resume within months.
The president’s antidrug overtures have proved popular, but critics have
expressed concern about what could come next. During a state visit to the
Philippines in January, Mr. Sirisena hailed President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal
war on drugs there, which has left thousands dead at the hands of the police
and vigilantes, calling it an “example to the world.”
Historically in Sri Lanka, the job of executioner has been difficult to fill.
Since 1976, when the government placed its moratorium on executions, the
government has regularly advertised the hangman job, hoping to have a candidate
trained and ready in case executions resumed. Before then, the post of hangman
passed from father to son.
But since the moratorium, just 3 men have held the post, and all of them
abandoned it before carrying out a single execution.
The last one, P.S.U. Premasinghe, 45, landed the job 5 years ago but resigned
in shock at the first sight of the gallows at the main prison in the capital,
Colombo, days after he began training. The prison authorities gave him a month
to reconsider; he did not. The position has remained open since.
After Mr. Sirisena’s announcement this month that hangings would resume, prison
officials began compiling lists of drug offenders on death row. And the
Ministry of Justice and Prison Reforms decided this week to import a new noose;
the one at the gallows now was brought in from Pakistan 12 years ago and has
never been used in an execution.
Despite the 1976 moratorium, judges in this majority-Buddhist country have
continued to hand down death sentences, none of which have been carried out.
About 1,300 people are on death row, 48 of whom were convicted of drug crimes.
Under Sri Lankan law, murder and drug trafficking carry possible death
sentences. Possession of more than 2 grams of pure heroin, known as
diacetylmorphine, is punishable by death.
A few days after Mr. Sirisena’s visit, the Philippine government pledged to
send a team of “specialists” to provide technical expertise for Sri Lanka’s
battle against drugs.
Death penalty opponents saw the recent advertisements for an executioner as a
distressing development.
“This is one job advert that should never have been put out,” Biraj Patnaik,
Amnesty International’s regional director for South Asia, who lives in Colombo,
said in a Twitter post. “There is no place for the death penalty in a civilized
society.”
C.T. Jansz, a commissioner general of prisons in the 1950s, oversaw some
executions during his tenure. He said even prison officials found them gory and
gut-wrenching, and the environment inside the prison would become oppressive
afterward.
“The whole prison mourns,” he said.
(source: New York Times)
************************
Catholic Bishop's Conference in Sri Lanka condemns implementation of the death
penalty
The members of the Catholic Bishop's Conference in Sri Lanka have issued a
statement has condemned the implementation of the death penalty.
The statement said that "consequent to the churches teachings in light of the
teachings in the light of the Gospel, that the death penalty is inadmissable
because it is an attack on the inviolability and the diginity of the person and
she works with determination for its abolition worldwide."
Further, the Catholic Bishop's Conference called on civiol society groups, the
judicary, legislative and the executive to take preventive measures and design
effective rehabilitation of victims with a supportive social system.
(source: sundaytimes.lk)
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