Duo gets 48 years for forging court papers

orders after being paid by their relatives have been sentenced to a total of 48 years in jail.
George Simbi (30) and David Mwanjeya (29) pleaded not guilty to eight counts of forgery when they appeared before Harare magistrate Mr Lazarus Murendo who convicted them because of overwhelming evidence.
Last Friday, Mr Murendo sentenced the pair to 24 years apiece.
However, Simbi, who is the mastermind, will serve an effective 20 years after four years were suspended on condition of good behaviour.
Mwanjeya will serve 16 years effective after Mr Murendo suspended eight years of his prison term.
In passing the sentence, Mr Murendo said the pair committed a very serious offence warranting a lengthy prison term.
He said police were still to account for some of the suspects the pair freed using fake bail orders.
“Because of the accused’s actions, dangerous criminals were released from prison as a result they endangered the lives of ordinary citizens.
“The main purpose of the punishment is to rehabilitate the accused because they undermined the administration of the justice delivery system in the country, so there is need to pass a deterrent sentence,” he said.
Mr Beaven Marevanhema from the Attorney-General’s Office, proved that when Mwanjeya was released from jail last year, he teamed up with Simbi and hatched a plan to facilitate the release of other notorious armed robbers and a carjacker using forged High Court bail release orders.
They obtained a genuine bail release order issued lawfully to one Cainmore Ngorima and used it as a specimen copy to generate fake ones.
They would visit armed robbers at Harare Remand Prison and solicit for payments from them to facilitate their unlawful release.
After agreeing with their “clients” they would approach the robbers’ relatives who paid them amounts ranging from $100 to $1 000 and generators.
Armed with High Court case numbers and court record book numbers (CRB) from the armed robbers, Mwanjeya and Simbi produced fake High Court bail release orders on their computer using the obtained specimen.
They would stamp the bogus orders using a fake High Court date stamp, forged the signature of the registrar of the High Court and presented the fake bail orders to the alleged armed robbers’ relatives for bail processing.
Relatives of the accused paid bail for inmates – Arnold Kwarira, Shepherd Mhizha, Fanuel Muchineripi, Enerst Chikate, Tawanda Mandudzo, Brighton Chagara, Clever Nengomasha and Emmson Mutevera, who were subsequently released.
However, police were tipped off and arrested Mwanjeya who in turn implicated Simbi.
Simbi was arrested at Machipisa Shopping Centre and was found in possession of a fake High Court date stamp lodged in his socks and a genuine High Court bail release order in respect of Ngorima.
Two of the alleged armed robbers, Kwarira and Chikate, were re-arrested last year while Mhizha, Muchineripi, Mandudzo, Chagara, Nengomasha and Mutevera were still on the run.