The appellant and another, who is not a party to this appeal, appeared before the High Court sitting at Harare, charged with one count of murder.
After a contested trial, they were found guilty of murder with actual intent and were sentenced each to 25 years imprisonment.
It was the finding of the court a quo, that, on 11 March 2011, they had unlawfully and intentionally caused the death of one Alneshto Bayeta by pushing him down a steep slope into Marongora Game Park which is infested with wild animals.
This is an appeal against both the conviction and the sentence.
Background Facts
The appellant, then aged 20, and his co-accused, not much older, were working in Chirundu, digging trenches for a telecommunications corporation. When the contract ended, the two survived on odd jobs for some time thereafter. They soon ran out of money and planned to steal a vehicle.
On 11 March 2011, they approached the deceased, who was working as a taxi driver, driving a vehicle belonging to one Leonard Mhundwa, and purported to hire the vehicle to Chirundu Heights. This was around 9:00pm.
On the way to Chirundu Heights, they robbed the deceased of the vehicle and tied him up before placing him in the back of the vehicle. They then drove along the Harare-Chirundu Road, and, at a certain spot where the Marongora Game Park slopes steeply from the road, stopped the vehicle and there left the deceased.
When the deceased did not return with the vehicle at the appointed time, Leonard Mhundwa, the owner of the vehicle, lodged a report with the police. Investigations led to the arrest of the appellant and his co-accused who were found in possession of the motor vehicle.
After the arrest of the appellant and his co-accused, a search for the body of the deceased was conducted around the spot at which the appellant and his co-accused had left the deceased. The search was conducted with the assistance of armed Rangers from the Department of Parks and Wildlife who know the area to be infested with wild animals.
Some 20 metres down the slope, a spoor showing that something had been dragged along was observed going down the slope. Along the spoor, torn and blood-stained clothes and sandals belonging to the deceased were recovered.
The body of the deceased was not.
Presuming the death of the deceased, at the time of the trial, as the only reasonable inference that could be drawn from the facts, the court a quo found the appellant and his co-accused guilty of murder and sentenced them as stated above.
The Appeal
Aggrieved by the conviction and the sentence, the appellant noted this appeal raising five grounds of appeal.
In the first three grounds, he challenged the admissibility into evidence of a warned and cautioned statement that he made to the police upon his arrest.
It was his argument that the court a quo erred in admitting the statement into evidence in the face of clear evidence that he had not made the statement but that he was given the statement by the police to sign.
He further argued, that, the statement was irregular as it was “re-taken” on the orders of the confirming court after that court had declined to confirm the first statement.
In his view, apart from the confession in the statement, there was no evidence implicating him in the commission of the crime.
As against the conviction proper, the appellant challenged the sufficiency of the evidence against him arguing that the court a quo drew improper inferences that he had committed the crime.
Finally, he argued that the sentence imposed upon him was severe and induced a sense of shock.
From the above grounds, three issues arise for determination in this appeal. These are;
(i) Firstly, whether the appellant's warned and cautioned statement was correctly admitted into evidence;
(ii) Secondly, whether the appellant was properly convicted of murder; and
(iii) Finally, whether the sentence imposed on the appellant is severe and induces a sense of shock....,.
Whether the confirmed warned and cautioned statement by the appellant was admissible evidence
The appellant and his co-accused were arrested on 1 April 2011. Four days later, on 5 April 2011, the investigating officer recorded a statement from the appellant after duly warning and cautioning him on his rights.
On 12 April 2011, the appellant was taken before a magistrate for the confirmation of the statement. He successfully challenged the confirmation of the statement on the basis that the statement was not his and that he had not made it voluntarily.
The confirming magistrate correctly declined to confirm the statement.
However, without citing any law for his decision, the magistrate thereafter ordered the appellant and the investigating officer to record a second statement.
The second statement was recorded the following day and was confirmed on the same date.
In challenging the second statement during the trial a quo, the appellant alleged, that, he had been threatened by the investigating officer with assault if the second statement was once again not confirmed. He thus did not inform the confirming magistrate that the statement was not his but that it was merely presented to him for signing.
It appears that the court a quo was not quite clear on the steps to take in dealing with the challenge.
The admissibility of the statement was challenged in the Defence Outline and orally in court when the prosecution tendered the statement with the other exhibits at the commencement of the trial.
In a terse, but correct ruling, the court a quo provisionally admitted the statement into evidence with the other exhibits and placed an onus on the appellant to rebut the admissibility of the statement.
The court was correct in provisionally admitting the statement into evidence, as, on its face, there was nothing irregular.
During the State case, the investigating officer gave evidence on how he had recorded the statements from the appellant, and, during his evidence-in-chief, the appellant in turn gave evidence on how the statement was taken.
He maintained his stance that the statement was not his as certain portions of it were insertions by the police.
In the main judgment, the court a quo held, that, the appellant, through his counsel, had withdrawn his objection to the admission of the statement into evidence.
This was contrary to the evidence on record.
And, to confirm the uncertainty that the court a quo appears to have been operating under regarding what to do with the challenge to the statements, it initially held that it was unnecessary for it to establish whether or not the second statement had been voluntarily made by the appellant as the appellant had withdrawn his objection to the admission of the statement.
Moments later, it observed that:
“Although the warned and cautioned statements were produced by consent after the accused had withdrawn their objections, it is in my view necessary to deal with the accused's evidence of the alleged duress because of the continued reference to the statements by the accused persons. Mr Mushonga submitted that the accused were not challenging the confirmation of the statements per se but the decision by the magistrate to confirm a new set of statements.”
The court then proceeded to find that the appellant had not been unduly influenced in making the statement.
The law on the admissibility of confirmed statements is codified. It is settled.
Section 256(2) of the Criminal Evidence Act [Chapter 9:07] provides that a confession or statement made by an accused person and confirmed before a magistrate following the procedures laid down in section 113(3) of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act [Chapter 9:07] is admissible in evidence before any court upon its mere production by the prosecutor without further proof.
However, the confession or statement shall not be used as evidence against the accused if he proves that the statement was not made by him or was not made freely and voluntarily without his having been unduly influenced thereto.
In a long line of decided cases, the steps that a court must take where an accused person challenges a confirmed warned and cautioned statement is settled. It is this:
Where the accused raises a potentially sustainable challenge to the propriety of the confirmation proceedings, the court is obliged to determine the validity of that challenge as a separate issue of fact.
The onus is on the State to prove the absence of any irregularity.
If the State discharges the onus, the statement is provisionally admissible and the onus shifts to the accused to rebut the presumption that the statement is admissible.
The onus of proof, on the accused, is to prove, on a balance of probabilities, that, the statements are inadmissible.
If the accused's challenge is upheld, the onus remains on the State to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the accused made the statement and that he made it freely and voluntarily: see S v Woods 1993 (2) ZLR 258 (SC); S v Slatter and Others 1983 (2) ZLR 144; S v Manukwa and Others 1982 ZLR 30 (SC); and S v Gwaze & Anor 1978 RLR 13…,..
Against the yardstick set by the above authorities, the court a quo erred in many respects which I will not fully go into.
Primarily, as this was its ratio decidendi, the court a quo erred in holding that the appellant had withdrawn his challenge to the statement.
The record indicates that the appellant consistently denied having made the statement which he alleged was a confession to the offence.
The court a quo was aware, that, right up to the end, the appellant challenged the statement attributed to him. He thus “continued to make reference” to the irregularity of the statements throughout the trial as rightfully observed by the court a quo in its judgment.
In the absence of consent to the admission of the statement, the court a quo had to make a finding of fact on whether or not the statement was admissible evidence.
This it did not do.
I must make the point, that, contrary to the finding by the court a quo, that the confirming magistrate did not err in directing the police to record a statement from the appellant afresh, the recording of the second statement from the appellant was irregular and must be set aside.
The court a quo was of the view, that, since the appellant had not advanced any law that precluded the recording of the statements afresh, the order by the magistrate was proper.
Such a law is easy to find and ought to have presented itself to the court a quo.
The recording of extra curial statements from the accused is part of the investigation of the alleged crime. It is an exercise that falls wholly within the domain and discretion of the police. They, and not the court, elect whether or not to record a statement from the accused.
In our legal system, which is adversarial, and the magistrate or judge is a neutral umpire, the magistrate, or judge, has no role or place in the investigation of matters that come before the court.
Therefore, he or she cannot direct the investigation of the alleged crime at any stage.
It matters not that he or she will not tell the accused person on what to say in the statement as was contended by the court a quo. The bottom line is that the court has no power, whatsoever, to direct the police to record a statement from the accused person at any stage of the investigations or of the trial.
It is thus over-reaching of grave proportions for confirming magistrates to direct the police to record second statements from accused persons after declining to confirm the first statement.
Even if the statement that is eventually recorded from the accused is exculpatory, the bottom line is that a directive by the court, to the police, to record a statement from the accused is grossly irregular and so is the statement that is recorded pursuant to such a directive.
I note, in passing, and for the benefit of the Chief Magistrate, that, the directive to the police by the confirming magistrate in casu appears similar to one that was issued by the confirming magistrate in Mangoma v S SC36-20 in which this Court also set aside the statement.
The police may feel obliged to comply with such directives which not only have no basis in law but may violate the rights of an accused person to a fair trial.
I do not think that it is necessary to burden this judgment with a discussion on whether or not there is a law that precludes the police from recording a second set of statements from an accused person after the confirmation of the first has been declined.
It however presents itself clearly to me that the recording of a statement from an accused person by the police, whether first or subsequent, at the instance of, and in fulfilment of a directive of the court, is grossly irregular.
It is therefore my finding that the court a quo erred in admitting into evidence the statement by the appellant on the basis that it was adduced by consent.
There was no such consent.
Had the court a quo followed the approach laid out in the authorities cited above, it would have found, as I do, that the recording of the statement was irregular as it was at the instance of the court.
The confirmed statement by the appellant, dated 13 March 2011, must be struck off the record, and, any reference to its contents be expunged from the evidence.
The finding that I make above must apply with equal force to the statement made by the appellant's co-accused on the same date. This is so notwithstanding that he is not a party to this appeal. His statement was recorded in similar irregular circumstances.
