MAN STRANGLES BOY (6)

High Court judge, Justice Sunsley Zisengwe has sentenced a 66-year-old Chivi man to 13 years in jail after convicting him of murdering a six-year-old boy he chased down and strangled for stealing chewing cane (ipwa) from his garden.

The court heard that Alphios Gwatirinda (66) of Dzigagwi Village, Headman Gororo, Chivi chased after Blessed Mafirowanda (6) of Charamba Village, Headman Gororo, Chivi for about 20 metres, caught him and strangled him to death with his bare hands.

Gwatirinda then carried the body for about 300 metres and hid it in a bushy area.

The incident happened on March 4, 2022, and Gwatirinda will be 79 years old when he leaves jail.

The court concluded that Gwatirinda was of sound mind when he committed the murder.

Gwatirinda was represented by Derick Charamba on a pro-deo basis and Emmanuel Matose prosecuted.

Charamba argued that the State cannot rely on the evidence of Blessed’s 11-year-old-brother as it was inconsistent.

“The boy did not report the supposed murder immediately, not even when directly asked by his mother about his missing brother. This delay raises a fundamental question: If he truly saw his brother being strangled, why did he remain silent for so long? Fear of his mother’s reaction is an insufficient and implausible excuse when weighed against the gravity of witnessing a murder.

“The boy continued to withhold his supposed knowledge even as a search party was actively looking for his missing brother. This defies natural human behavior. A genuine eyewitness would have spoken immediately to direct searchers to the location of the body…,” argued Charamba.

Circumstances are that Blessed, his older brother Lovemore (10), Tinashe Charamba (12) and Ernest Dube (10) went to drive their cattle from the grazing lands and penned them at Morgan Rudhodho’s homestead.

The quartet went and stole chewing cane from a nearby garden around 5:30pm and that is when they bumped into Gwatirinda.

Gwatirinda accused the boys of stealing from his garden and the minors ran away from him in different directions. They dropped the chewing cane.

Gwatirinda chased after Blessed and Lovemore and caught Blessed whom he strangled and dumped the body in a bushy area some 300 metres away.

Lovemore went home around 8pm and told his mother Sithembile Ndlovu that Blessed had been captured by Gwatirinda. Ndlovu went to Gwatirinda’s homestead and confronted him over the matter. Gwatirinda refused the allegations.

A search party led by Lovemore found Blessed’s lifeless body in the morning. A postmortem performed by Dr Godfrey Zimbwa at Masvingo Provincial Hospital concluded that the cause of death was strangulation and respiratory failure. Masvingo Mirror

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