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Yeukai Karengezeka
Court Correspondent
Another murder suspect involved in the assault of a suspected thief who died hours later at a house in New Tafara while trying to seek refuge, appeared in court last week.
Anymore Gora (26) appeared before Harare Magistrate Mrs Munashe Chibindi facing a murder charge and was denied bail. His accomplices Fradreck Nhata (41) and Forget Zhakata (26) were earlier this month remanded in custody to July 28.
The State alleged that on May 12 at around 12:30 am, at New Tafara stands Gora, Nhata and Zhakata in the company of two others who are still at large, assaulted the suspected thief all over his body using a baton and sjamboks, accusing him of being a thief.
They left him on a footpath and he was taken to a nearby house. The person living there discovered the deceased’s body at 6am on the verandah and reported the matter to police.
Legally members of the public can arrest a suspected thief, but have to use minimum force and are not allowed to beat or punish the thief. They must promptly hand over the person to the police and leave the courts to try and sentence the person.
The court heard that on May 16, a postmortem was conducted and the pathologist concluded that the cause of death was traumatic shock and extensive subcutaneous and intra-muscular haemorrhage due to assault.
Detectives from CID Homicide Harare received information linking the accused persons to the offence leading to their arrest on June 6.
Upon arrest, Nhata led detectives to the recovery of a baton from his residence and Zhakata led to the recovery of the sjambok from his residence.
Gora led the police to the recovery of an electric cable from his residence.
Mr Zororai Nkomo prosecuted.
Online Reporter