Chronicle EditorSharon Chiware Midlands Reporter
A man from Gweru has been sentenced to two years in prison for stealing a vehicle which was parked in the city centre. Leeford Sekereta (25) of 988 Mkoba 4, Gweru, the court heard, was arrested in the process of driving the car off, but at a snail speed after he forgot to disengage the handbrake. Sekereta appeared before Gweru magistrate Ms Judith Taruvinga facing one count of theft of a motor vehicle.
He pleaded guilty to the charge.
“You had no right to take the motor vehicle and you acted unlawfully,” said Ms Taruvinga. “You are effectively sentenced to two years imprisonment.” In mitigation, Sekereta told the court that he had a similar vehicle before which had been stolen. He said he thought he had recovered his car.
“I once had a car which looked similar and it was also stolen from me,” he said. “When I saw the vehicle parked I was actually relieved because I thought I had recovered my stolen car and just drove off.” The agreed facts were that on May 9 last year, Sekereta saw a Grey Honda Odyssey vehicle that was parked at Meikles Mega Mart. The court heard that the owner, Mr Musafare Redzo, switched off the engine, but did not remove the keys from the ignition since the vehicle had developed a fault of rejecting car keys whenever they were taken off. At around 2:30pm, Sekereta proceeded to the car, started driving it without disengaging the handbrake and that is when a resident, Mr Mike Anderson, heard a screaming sound of tyres. The court heard that Mr Anderson knew that Sekereta did not own any vehicle and suspected that he was in the process of stealing one. The court also heard that Mr Anderson jumped into the car, switched off the engine and got hold of the car keys. The value of the vehicle was $4 000.
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