'Serial offender' Ntsuape back in court seeking bail
Lebogang Mosikare | Tuesday April 17, 2018 15:15
The 32-year-old man from Ramotswa allegedly committed the offences on September 13 in 2016 at Block 9 location, in the country’s second city.
He allegedly committed the offences after his girlfriend and mother of his child Dorcas Kgosietsiele told him that they should end their love relationship; a factor Ntsuape did not take kindly.
Ntsuape moved an application for bail pending trial saying that he has been languishing in jail since September 2016 but his trial was not progressing.
“Trial dates have not been set in all matters that I allegedly committed but since investigations have long being completed I am praying that I should be given bail because I will not interfere with police investigations. I am still innocent till proven otherwise. I pray that I should be granted bail on those grounds,” he said.
However, Khani Khani from the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) sternly opposed Ntsuape’s bail application.
“We have filed our papers and an answering affidavit from the investigating officer which clearly shows that the accused is not a good candidate for bail. There is evidence that the accused committed other offences while still being remanded in custody. The accused later tried to escape from custody and in the process he committed other serious offences which we have listed in our papers,” the state prosecutor said.
Khani added that they have fear that since the accused has the audacity to commit other offences while still being remanded in custody, he may commit more offences if he is granted bail.
“In a nutshell it will not be in the interest of justice for the applicant to be granted bail,” he said.
Moroka then asked Ntsuape if he wanted to reply to what Khani had said to which Ntsuape responded: “I take it that even in the law of this Republic, there is a distinction between an accused person and a convict. Even if I am suspected to have committed offences this court should not solely rely on those allegations to deny me bail. The law of presumption of innocence until proven guilty should equally apply to me”.
Ruling on the matter has been reserved for tomorrow.
Ntsuape is also charged with two counts of manslaughter and one count of disabling in order to commit an offence.
The charges arise from the incident, which claimed the lives of a special constable Thuso ‘Jah’ Ntusa and a prison inmate, Emmanuel Mapholo on December 1, 2016.
The accused allegedly wrestled for the steering wheel of the Quantum minibus with its driver when he was being taken back to a prison facility at the Francistown Centre for Illegal Immigrants (FCII) after he appeared in court.
The police say Ntsuape did that in a bid to escape although he denies that.
The Quantum overturned several times, killing Ntusa and Mapholo, an inmate from Zimbabwe who was charged with rape and murder.
Other inmates, prisoners and police officers who were in the car at the time of the incident sustained varying injuries and were referred to the Nyangabgwe Referral Hospital (NRH) for medical treatment.
Ntsuape survived the accident with minor injuries to his head.
He has on numerous appearances in court applied for bail, but his applications were turned down.
On one occasion, Ntsuape’s bail application was dismissed based on a report by a psychiatric expert, which said that he has serious anger management problems and was even a danger to himself and the family members of his former girlfriend who sustained varying burn injuries after Ntsuape allegedly set fire to their house.
One of them later died at NRH after Ntsuape allegedly burnt the house.