Harare miller acquitted of fraud

Fidelis Munyoro

Chief Court Reporter

Harare businessman Wayne Victor Moss was this week acquitted on charges of duping a city businessman of US$25 000 by misrepresenting to him that his co-accused had offshore funds in the United Kingdom.

The court found Mr Moss had simply passed on an e-mail from a contact, being described as a conduit, not an actor, and had not been involved in any deception.

Mr Moss, who is the managing director of Machiareer Investments (Private) Limited trading as Mr Brands, a local food and beverage processing company, was jointly charged with Kudakwashe Gambanga, a director of Avanteguard (Pvt) Ltd.

Mr Moss walked out of court a free man after Mbare magistrate Ms Feresu Chakanyuka cleared him of all the charges, as the prosecution failed to establish a prima facie case against him. But the court is yet to deliver judgment on Gambanga, who is now at large, after he skipped bail just before the court announced its decision on the application for discharge that was successful in the case of Mr Moss.

Over the past four years, postponements by Gambanga were frequent and countless warrants for his arrest were issued on failure to appear for trial. Gambanga, however, successfully cancelled all warrants approaching different Harare Magistrates lacking background knowledge to the case.

And in April this year, with prosecution concluded and judgement on whether the State had made a case ready for reading, Gambanga failed to appear and another warrant of arrest was issued with the file being held back in the trial magistrate’s office to avoid Gambanga’s previous antics. Gambanga fled amid reports that he was in hiding.

Suspected to be using a UK passport, he has failed to appear since April.

Ms Chakanyuka granted the second attempt by Mr Moss to separate the trial simply for purposes of reading the judgment and on Tuesday, Mr Moss was found not guilty on all charges of fraud. But Gambanga’s separate ruling is yet to be handed down.

An expert witness from Webdev email domain host, who testified in the trial, proved that Mr Moss received a proof of payment from Gambanga’s email which was forwarded to the complainant, Liju Vargese, which later turned out to be a fake payment.

In his ruling the trial magistrate found that Gambanga’s attempts to blame hackers were nonsensical, finding that Mr Moss was a mere conduit and was also duped by him.

Mr Moss and Mr Vergese had a pre-existing amicable business relationship until Mr Vergese unceremoniously turned on him with false criminal allegations which may well see another landmark court ruling if Mr Moss successfully proves damages suffered due to ill-health contracted in remand prison under Covid-19, financial losses in business due to loss of tenders, banks refusing to open company bank accounts and reputational losses due to wide publication of his arrest four years ago.

A few weeks before his arrest on fraud, Mr Moss gave evidence before the Parliament’s then Portfolio Committee on Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Resettlement against millers who were investigated on allegations of fraud and abuse of the Government maize subsidy programme and smuggling grain out of Zimbabwe.

In 2020, maize was a scarce commodity selling at US$128 per tonne with roller meal retailing around US$3,34 per 10kg.

Today with possible shortages later this year, the maize price is around US$420 per tonne with roller meal currently retailing around US$6 per 10kg.

Charges against the Mr Moss and Gambanga were that the two connived to defraud Mr Vergese of the money by manufacturing fake proof of payments.

It was alleged that Mr Moss approached the businessman and introduced Gambanga in absentia, claiming that he was in urgent need of the money to pay lobola for his fiancée, Pride Gono of Borrowdale, but could not access his free funds in cash.

He further suggested that Gambanga was offering to meet any foreign obligations for anyone who could give him the US$25 000.

The unsuspecting businessman is reported to have believed him and offered to assist on condition that Mr Moss should present him with a proof of transfer for the money into his bank account in the United Arab Emirates.

According to the State, Mr Moss later emailed the businessman a fictitious proof of payment for the transfer of the money from a United Kingdom Metro Bank account into that bank account.

The businessman then released the money in batches of US$4 000 and US$21 000 to Mr Moss. However, the money never reflected in the businessman’s account, prompting him to make a follow up with Mr Moss, who then gave him Gambanga’s contact details.

But the businessman allegedly failed to recover his money so he reported the deal to the police leading to the arrest of Mr Moss and Gambanga.