A prominent Bulawayo businessman, Simon Tapera, and his two accomplices, Collen Mukombwe and Norman Tapera, have had their appeal against a 15-year prison sentence for murder dismissed by the Supreme Court, Newsday has reported.
The trio had been found guilty of the brutal death of Tonderai Doka, a suspected speaker thief, in January 2022.
The Supreme Court judges, Elizabeth Gwaunza, Samuel Kudya, and Joseph Musakwa, upheld the High Court’s judgment, concluding that the evidence presented unequivocally supported a conviction of murder.
The incident unfolded on January 31, 2022, when the trio invited Doka to their shop at Entumbane Complex. Instead of addressing any alleged theft, they subjected him to a brutal assault.
Handcuffed, Doka was then driven to his mother’s house, where Mukombwe continued the assault, kicking and stomping on his ribs. Despite pleas from Doka’s mother to take him to hospital, the trio ignored her and continued their attack.
The trio then took Doka and his mother to his home, where he lived with his girlfriend, Sibongile Ndlovu, and daughter. Failing to find the alleged stolen speaker, they took Doka to Entumbane Police Station, where they reported a theft case while Doka reported an assault. Doka was then taken to Mpilo Central Hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries a week later.
In court, the trio pleaded not guilty to murder, claiming that Doka had been assaulted by members of the public. However, Doka’s girlfriend, Ndlovu, testified that the trio had invited them for a stroll at Entumbane Shopping Complex before taking Doka to the basement of their shop.
She recounted how she waited for Doka for some time, only to find her calls being terminated immediately after being answered. The next day, she found Doka at Mpilo Central Hospital, severely injured and unable to communicate.
Doka’s mother corroborated Ndlovu’s testimony, stating that when the trio brought him to her residence, he was severely injured. She pleaded with them to take him to hospital, but they refused, with Mukombwe threatening to whip her with a sjambok. Doka pleaded with his mother not to leave, fearing that the trio would kill him if she did.
Three police officers testified that Doka had informed them that he had been assaulted by the trio at their shop, not by the public. A government pathologist who conducted a post-mortem confirmed the severity of the injuries, observing multiple bruises on Doka’s back, upper limbs, swollen neck and face, wounds on his foot, and lesions on his shoulder and neck. The pathologist concluded that the injuries were consistent with torture.
Norman Tapera, a security guard at the shop, denied killing Doka, claiming that Doka had stolen a speaker and was assaulted by a mob of irate passersby before he intervened. His testimony was corroborated by Mukombwe and Simon.
However, the High Court ruled that the trio’s evidence was untruthful, concluding that they had assaulted Doka in the basement of their shop, leading to his death. The medical evidence unequivocally showed that the cause of death was assault.
Aggrieved by the conviction and sentence, the trio appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the offence of murder was not proven. Their lawyer, Advocate Tawanda Zhuwarara, argued that the High Court judgment lacked a specific finding and that the trio believed they were disciplining a thief.
The State opposed the appeal, arguing that the charge was clear and specific. In its analysis, the Supreme Court bench found that the severity and nature of the injuries, as described by the medical report and observed by medical personnel, indicated that the appellants had assaulted the deceased with a level of brutality that inherently carried a high risk of causing death.
The judges ruled that the medical evidence established a direct causal link between the assault and the deceased’s death. The multiple injuries demonstrated that the assault was the proximate cause of death.
The fact that the deceased developed such life-threatening conditions as a direct result of the assault underscored the serious nature of the attack and the substantial risk of death inherent in the appellants’ actions.
The judges concluded that the evidence proved beyond reasonable doubt that the appellants, through their actions, foresaw or realised that there was a substantial risk of causing death and continued assaulting him regardless of that risk.
