adminMercy Ngwebvu
A Nyanga man who accidentally killed his son during a fight with a man he suspected to be his wife’s boyfriend was last week charged with culpable homicide and sentenced to 10 years behind bars.
In passing judgment, High Court judge Justice Charles Hungwe said this was a worst form of domestic violence.
“Your defence outline is fallacious and I put it to you that you badly assaulted your child to death for no apparent reason. Your hopeless drunkenness led to the negligent killing of a person who looked up to you as father. This is a case of the worst form of domestic violence. Fathers are supposed to protect their families from danger but instead, you killed your own son. You are therefore guilty of culpable homicide.”
The accused, Washington Mawarire (24) of Tsatse Village, Chief Tangwena, killed his son Nigel sometime in July last year.
The court heard that on July 4 last year, Mawarire got home drunk at around 6pm and saw a man standing at his gate.
Thinking that the man was his wife’s boyfriend, Mawarire went into his house using a different entrance, yelling that he was going to kill someone that day.
He got into his house and threatened to assault his wife, Lisa Mabwe, after he had dealt with her boyfriend who had been courageous enough to come to his homestead.
When he got outside, Mawarire started throwing bricks at his suspected rival who in turned retaliated, throwing bricks back at him.
In the process, Mawarire hit his son on the head with his ‘‘missiles’’.
He only stopped when he heard his badly injured son crying.
Mabwe, who had fled to her brother’s homestead in fear of being assaulted, came back the following day and when they took the child to Nyanga District Hospital, he was pronounced dead upon arrival.
The post-mortem read in court stated that the child succumbed to a swollen head, gushed left eye and multiple bruises on the back and both legs.
Ms Jane-Rose Matsikidze prosecuted.
Online Reporter