A HARARE magistrate yesterday convicted a Zimbabwe Republic
Police traffic officer on 104 counts of fraud after he manufactured several
traffic offence fines receipt books (Z69J) and used them to accept fines for
traffic offences.
Claudius Muzvimba (35) who pleaded not guilty, was
convicted by Francis Mapfumo after a full trial.
Muzvimba said he was given the receipt books by his
superiors to use on receipting fines from motorists.
But magistrate Mapfumo said Muzvimba had fleeced several
motorists of their money which was not remitted to the government.
“There is no way the money which was collected using fake
books was handed over to the administration. The receipt books were printed
somewhere with criminal intention to swindle the motorists and government,”
Mapfumo said.
“The fake books were used concurrently with the original
receipt books and the whole purpose of printing the Z69J was to make sure the
money will not be remitted to the government.”
Mapfumo postponed the matter to today for sentencing. The
court heard that from August 2016 to October last year while stationed at
Avondale police station, Muzvimba connived with other fellow traffic officers
who are still on remand and obtained various fake Z69J books.
Muzvimba and his accomplices would unlawfully use the fake
receipt books to accept fines and receipt from unsuspecting traffic offenders.
The culprits would then pocket the money thereby
prejudicing the State.
As required by the police administration procedures,
completed dockets can only be filed after attaching the pink triplicate copy
from a receipted Z69J book.
In all these cases Muzvimba, Mushayahwaro and accomplices
misrepresented by attaching a fake pink triplicate copy which they would have
receipted from their counterfeit Z69J books.
The court heard that on the strength of the fake pink
triplicate copies Muzvimba and his accomplices would submit their completed
dockets to their authorities for closure and filing.
Muzvimba was arrested after an audit was carried out on the
books.
Michael Reza appeared for the State. Newsday
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