admin
Tendai Rupapa Senior Court Reporter
A Harare couple has been jailed three years for neglecting their three-year-old child who was attacked by their employer’s dogs and later died from injuries. Paul Kanoyeredza (41) and Juliet Dawu (30) failed to take the boy to hospital, resulting in his death. Dawu was a stepmother to the deceased boy. Regional magistrate Ms Fadzai Mthombeni had no kind words for the couple saying they acted cruelly.
Kanoyeredza and Dawu were convicted of culpable homicide. They were facing an alternative charge of neglecting a child. “The three-year-old suffered for days due to your gross negligence. As the guardians, you had the legal duty to protect and ensure that the child got medical care,” she said
“You did not give due care and acted cruelly, as such, the child lost his life.” Of the four years, Ms Mthombeni set aside one year on condition of good behaviour and effected three years.
Prosecutor Miss Rudo Chasi said if the couple did not want to take the baby to hospital, they should have at least contacted his biological mother. “Your Worship, what they did was so cruel, they could have contacted the child’s mother since she is alive so that she could take the child to hospital, but they chose to keep the child in the house with unattended injuries,” she said.
“Kanoyeredza’s employer, who is also their landlord and stays at the same premises, is a registered medical practitioner whom they could have approached for the much-needed medical attention but still they did not consult him.”
On the alternative charge, Miss Chasi said: “Although the act highlights a level 7 fine or imprisonment, the State is praying for imprisonment due to the seriousness of the offence and to send out a message to the society that children are important and they ought to be protected and that guardians should always act in the best interest of children.”
On February 13 at around midday, Dawu was in the house when she saw the boy being chased by their employer’s dogs. As the boy was running for safety, he fell on top of a gas stove which was inside the bedroom.
Dawu lifted up the boy, who was lying on the floor. She saw that the boy was injured from dog bites and had also lost three front teeth. Dawu advised her husband about the incident.
The husband examined the boy and saw the injuries. The couple did not take the baby to hospital until February 17 when they found him lying on his stomach in the toilet bleeding through the mouth. The couple subsequently took the boy to the hospital but he died on the way.
Online Reporter