HIGH Court judge Justice Munamato Mutevedzi has sentenced two Chivhu teenagers to 10 years in jail for killing a rival suitor after a misunderstanding over a sex worker.
Ashton Tadiwanashe Mandaza (19) and Kudakwashe Machingauta (18) pleaded not guilty to the charge, but were convicted due to overwhelming evidence provided during the trial.
According to the court documents, at the time the crime was committed, Mandaza had just turned 19, while Machingauta was 17 and considered a minor.
The argument which resulted in the death of Onisimo Mavhungire stemmed from a misunderstanding which the deceased had with a commercial sex worker at a beerhall in Chivhu.
Mandaza then intervened as he also intended to hire the services of the same woman.
Justice Mutevedzi, while narrating the events in his judgement, said the woman was a lot older than Mandaza and that he wanted to have sexual intercourse with someone approximating his mother’s age.
The judge said that demonstrated the depth of love or more accurately, the bravery and possibly the depravity that today’s generation has.
“He (Mandaza) and Machingauta had been drinking. Most probably they gathered Dutch courage from the drink. The deceased was also inebriated. The woman at the centre of the dispute though was not. She had been outside the beerhall, like a predator stealthily stalking her prey.
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“It turned out to be a nightmarish night. The two offenders killed the deceased,” the judge explained.
However, their lawyers asked for a lenient sentence saying they had been on remand since May 2022 and it was enough punishment for them.
The State also submitted in aggravation that their moral blameworthiness was high as the deceased suffered several injuries to his body due to the attack by the two.
Justice Mutevedzi said murder carries a minimum mandatory penalty of 20 years imprisonment unless the court makes a finding that the crime was not committed in aggravating circumstances.
The judge said in this case, there was no robbery although the offenders may have either taken the phone or picked it after the assault.
“There is no evidence that the assault was perpetrated to force the deceased into handing over his phone to the offenders or to induce some form of submission. The evidence which the court admitted was that they assaulted him indiscriminately for his involvement and disagreement with the coveted woman,” Justice Mutevedzi said.
“Our view is, therefore, that the taking of the deceased’s phone was coincidental or even an afterthought by the offenders. After assaulting the deceased outside and behind the beerhall, the offenders are said to have gone back into the bar.
“It was only after a while that they went back to the scene and returned with the phone. If anything, the taking was, therefore, more of a theft than a robbery. It therefore does not qualify as an aggravating circumstance.”
The judge said the youthfulness of offenders was a big factor in mitigation, but would ensure that the offenders went to prison for the minimum possible period from which he was obliged to deduct the two years that they had already been in prison.
“It is punishment on its own. There is no basis for the court to treat the two offenders differently,” Justice Mutevedzi ruled.
“At the material time, the law considered both of them as juveniles. Neither of them can claim to have been influenced by the other. Against all the above, each offender is sentenced to 10 years imprisonment.”
