Injiva nabbed for fraud

Court Reporter
POLICE have arrested a Zimbabwean based in South Africa, popularly known as injiva, for allegedly misrepresenting to a colleague and defrauding him of 87 000 rand in cash.
Milton Ndlovu (35), of Thungulula area, Ebalozwini Village under Chief Maduna in Filabusi approached Mr Shepherd Ndlovu while in South Africa in 2010 and told him that he wanted to send money to his relatives back home.
Shepherd was reportedly in the business of assisting people to send money to Zimbabwe from South Africa.
He gave Ndlovu a South African bank account number where he was supposed to deposit the money.
Shepherd would then give the money to Ndlovu’s relatives in Bulawayo.
Ndlovu, in connivance with one Castro Ndlovu, who is still at large, allegedly manufactured a fake cheque with a face value of 87 000 rand and deposited it into Shepherd’s account.
After depositing the money, Ndlovu reportedly phoned Shepherd informing him to give the money to his relatives, Mr Bongani Ndlovu and Ms Sakhile Ndlovu in Cowdray Park, which he did.
The matter came to light when Shepherd went to the bank intending to withdraw the money and discovered that the cheque had been dishonoured and no money had been deposited into his account.
The bank told him that Ndlovu’s account had no such amount as he had stated in the cheque.
Ndlovu has been on the run since the commission of the crime in 2010.
He, however, ran out of luck when he returned home last week for the Christmas holiday and was immediately arrested.
He was not asked to plead when he appeared before Bulawayo magistrate Mrs Sophie Matimba yesterday to answer to a charge of fraud.
Ndlovu was remanded in custody to 12 January next year.
For the State, Mr Malvern Nzombe told the court that between 13 and 22 December last year, Ndlovu and his friend Castro allegedly hatched a plan to defraud Shepherd on the pretext that they wanted to send money to Zimbabwe from South Africa knowing they did not have money in their bank account.
After contacting Shepherd, who was offering a service of bringing money to Zimbabwe, Ndlovu and his alleged accomplice allegedly went on to manufacture a fake cheque, which they used to defraud him.
Ndlovu was arrested last week when police received a tip-off from members of the public that he was in the country.