Council officials’ theft charge withdrawn

Dube (33), Memory Moyo (25) and Nthuseni Mulagisi (37) appeared before regional magistrate Mr Joseph Mabeza on charges of contravening a section of the Criminal Law (Reform and Codification) Act (armed robbery).
The charges were, however, withdrawn after plea after the State failed to secure enough evidence linking the three to the offence.
Prior to that, the trio was in the interim remanded out of custody on US$100 bail each granted by the High Court.
Allegations against the three council employees were that they connived with the suspects who are still at large during which they allegedly supplied them with information that there was a huge amount of money kept at the local authority’s strong room.
The court heard that on 30 August at about 3am, the suspects acting on that information armed themselves with a pistol and went to the Beitbridge RDC offices.
On arrival the armed robbers approached the security guard manning the premises and allegedly assaulted him before they blindfolded him after which they then handcuffed him.
Soon after that the three men broke into the strong room where they destroyed the safe using grinders and went away with US$200 000 from the cashbox.
They drove off using a maroon gate away vehicle allegedly belonging to Dube.
A report was made to the police leading to the arrest of the three council employees and the three armed robbers are still at large.
Mr David Mhiribidi of Phulu and Ncube Legal Practitioners represented the three while Mr Johannes Tlou appeared for the State.