Family members nabbed for dumping relative’s body at neighbour’s home

Court Reporter
FOUR family members from Rixon in Insiza District, one of them a policeman, have been arrested on allegations of dumping the body of their relative at a neighbour’s homestead and demanding 18 head of cattle before they could bury it.
Never (60), Sabelo (46), Themba (38) and Fidres Gumede (42) appeared before Bulawayo provincial magistrate Mr Abednico Ndebele on Thursday charged with extortion.
The charge comes after the four allegedly demanded 18 beasts from Mr Costa Sibanda, from Mazwide Village 1 in Fort Rixon, as compensation for the death of their relative Hlanganiso, who was allegedly killed by Trymore Sibanda.
Trymore was employed as a domestic worker by Mr Sibanda when he allegedly killed Hlanganiso on 1 August.
Mr Sibanda is based in South Africa where he is employed.
Never, Sabelo, Themba and Fidres indicated that they would deny the charges and were remanded to 29 August on $100 bail each.
Never, Sabelo and Themba reside at Mazwide Village 1 while their brother Fidres, a policeman, resides at Number 14 Browning Road in Malindela.
His rank and station could not be established.
The four agreed to the fact that the family convened and made the decision not to bury the body until Mr Sibanda compensated them.
Themba said the family dumped the body at Mr Sibanda’s homestead because Trymore’s family was not known to them while Fidres distanced himself from the matter, saying he only carried the body from Bulawayo to Fort Rixon when the family had already made the decision.
Never and Sabelo said they were not part of the family meeting that made the decision to demand compensation.
It is alleged that two weeks ago, Trymore allegedly fatally assaulted Hlanganiso for reasons not yet known to the court.
Police attended to the matter and took the body to the United Bulawayo Hospitals (UBH) for a post-mortem the next day.
The State alleged that on Tuesday last week, Hlanganiso’s body was taken from the UBH mortuary to the family homestead.
While there, the body was not taken into the yard as the family members insisted that there was a need for Mr Sibanda and his family to pay compensation for the loss and other expenses incurred by the family.
It is alleged that the Gumede family demanded a beast for the Sibanda family to notify it about the death of Hlanganiso, two beasts for the body to be accepted and 15 cows for compensation for the loss suffered by the family due to the death of their relative.
The court was told that Mr Sibanda said he would only help with the burial and offered three beasts, adding that Trymore was merely his domestic worker and were not related.
Never, Sabelo, Themba and Fidres, together with other family members allegedly did not agree with Mr Sibanda’s terms.
It is alleged that Themba and other family members not mentioned in court, and acting on the instruction of Never and Sabelo loaded Hlanganiso’s body into a pushcart and dumped it at Mr Sibanda’s homestead in front of a kitchen hut.
The court was told that they wanted the 18 beasts to be paid beforehand.
Fidres and another elder brother identified as Jabulani, who is still at large, allegedly blocked efforts by police to intervene and resolve the matter.
Mr Sibanda allegedly gave in to their demands and gave the Gumede family five cows.
The court was told that Never, Sabelo, Themba and Fidres made Mr Sibanda sign a payment plan agreement in which he was supposed to pay the remaining 13 beasts by 2015.
The body was only removed from Mr Sibanda’s homestead and buried on Wednesday last week.
The value of the five beasts was R20 000 and all were recovered.