NDB swindler walks with suspended sentence
Lebogang Mosikare | Thursday April 16, 2015 10:54
The 24-year old was given three years in jail wholly suspended for two years on condition that she does not commit any offence that has an element of theft within that period.
Keitebetse was found guilty of swindling NDB of P97 000 in October 2011. The money increased to P122 000 after interest was added as at January 2015.
In addition, Keitebetse was fined P500 payable within seven days or in default of payment she will serve eight months in jail.
Keitebetse will also serve six months community service and was ordered to compensate the complainant the remaining balance.
Basupi said that documents presented before court clearly showed that the accused had an intention to commit the crime.
“The circumstances surrounding this offence tend to disclose that the accused was part of a syndicate that planned to defraud NDB and was unable to defend herself. As it can be seen from the evidence led, a certain amount of money was deposited into her account. I take it that she deliberately did not want to comply with the prosecution,” said Basupi adding that he had no doubt that the accused planned to commit the offence.
Basupi added that it is the duty of the courts to protect individuals and organisations from thieves by passing deterrent sentences.
Basupi said that the first prosecution witness who is a risk analyst at NDB said that Keitebetse applied for Bokamoso loan, which subsequently made NDB to deposit P97 000 into her account.
She later denied that she had ever applied for a loan from NDB adding that the bank did not deposit any money into her account.
A First National Bank statement, Certificate of land rights, Omang, NDB loan letter, salary advice slip amongst other documents bearing Keitebetse’ s full names were produced in court as evidence.
Basupi said that the manager of FNB who was the second prosecution witness said that it is not possible for another person to withdraw the money from Keitebetse’s account without her authority.
In another matter, Basupi found Tobekani Ntshimbukwe guilty of a single count of uttering a false document. He will be sentenced on April 17.
The state case show that the accused was nabbed using the Madirelo Trade and Testing Centre (MTTC) certificate bearing his late brother, Joseph Ntshimbukwe’s name, last year September to gain promotion at the City of Francistown Council (COF) where he was employed as an electrical craftsman.
According to the facts of the matter, no one then applied for the post when it was first advertised internally. The post was then advertised externally and Tobekani applied using his late brother’s certificate and was successful.
His underhand tactics to gain promotion were discovered after COF contacted MTTC to ascertain if Tobekani ever enrolled there.
In reply, MTTC told COF that indeed Tobekani enrolled there but he did not complete his electricity course.
Tobekani told the court that he used his brother’s certificate to gain promotion because he wanted to earn an increased salary although that is not a legal justification of having committed the offence.
Carol Mantle from the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) represented the state in the matter.