25 years for former death row inmate

Isaiah Morewagae | Friday February 7, 2014 15:31

Kgati was sentenced to death by Lobatse High Court judge Mercy Garekwe in January last year after she found no extenuating circumstances that could persuade the court to impose a sentence other than capital punishment on Kgati.

However, in their judgment yesterday, justices of appeal Dr Seth Twum, Steve Gaongalelwe and acting judge David Newman found extenuating circumstances and replaced the lower court’s decision with a 25-year jail term.  Reading the judgment, Justice Twum said “after a very hard and anxious consideration of this human tragedy, I have come to the firm conclusion that the death of the deceased was not premeditated and that it was a rape which went wholly wrong'.

In the result, Justice Twum held that the absence of premeditation constituted an extenuating circumstance. After the prosecution convinced the High Court last year that 31-year old Kgati had pre-planned the murder of his rape victim in October 2008, Kgathi was sentenced to death. It failed to proof the allegation before the CoA.

However, when the matter came before the appeals court, the prosecution admitted that there was no evidence that the man, who was aged 25 when he committed the crime, had pre-planned the murder.

The prosecution’s none opposition to the fact that there were extenuating circumstances made the judges work a little easier. Kgati, who had previously admitted to having strangled his victim to death, was represented by Busang Manewe of Bogopa Manewe Tobedza Attorneys.

Manewe contended that the death sentence should not have been imposed in a case where evidence was lacking and on a person who committed an offence under the influence of alcohol. Nevertheless, the question that remained to be answered was how intoxicated the convict was at the time the he committed the crime. Manewe pleaded with the appeals court to be lenient when passing the final sentence on his client because he was a first offender. He further told the court that Kgati had a painful upbringing that could have influenced him to partake in illegal activities.

'He has a painful past,” Manewe said. 'His mother is Bafedile Robert. His proper surname ought to be Robert, but because his mother abandoned him when he was a toddler, his mother’s sister, Kgomotso Kgati, raised him. His mother is married in Mochudi and stays there. His mother never showed him any affection and he was raised by the Kgatis.”

The defence added that the convict had told him that he did not know his biological father and was traumatiSed by the fact that his mother never even came to court during the trial of his case. 'He was a street kid and never wrote the Standard Seven examinations,” Manewe continued. 'He abandoned everything and gave up on life.'

He averred that Kgati appeared to have a negative view about family because he was rejected by his mother at a young age and was totally disconnected to his half brothers and sisters. This could have had an influence on the unemployed man’s wayward behaviour, he added.

Although he did not condone Kgati’s actions, the man had told him that the experience he had had while on death row at Gaborone Maximum Prison’s infamous Cell 10 (for death row inmates) had taught him a lesson.

He susequently showed remorse for his actions. Kgati will now serve his 25-year jail term in a normal prison because he is no longer on death row.