Of the quartet, two death sentences of Ramotswiri Mokobela and Simba Mampori were confirmed whilst Unangoni Alton and Passmore Moyo escaped by a whisker.
Ramotswiri Mokobela, death row inmate
In Mokobela’s case, CoA justices Leatile Dambe, Mercy Garekwe, and Michael Leburu, described him as a cold-blooded killer who brutally ended the life of an innocent soul. “There is absolutely nothing that could have been found in his favour for extenuation. This was a cold-blooded killing carried out with utmost brutality,” described the justices.
The appeal against the death sentence was dismissed and the sentence handed by the High Court on December 14, 2024, was confirmed. Justice Dambe, in reading the judgment, said the judge of the High Court made certain profound observations which shed light on Mokobela’s mental well-being based on the findings of the psychiatrists. “The first observation was that Mokobela had no psychopathology and wasn't suffering from mental disorder at the assessment. The second observation made was that his clinical history suggests that he has some schizoid and antisocial personality traits. The third was that clinical history did not suggest that he was suffering from mental disorder at the time of the alleged offence,” she said. Dambe explained that the judge had considered the characteristic features of schizoid and antisocial personalities and in their view, the High Court was justified in holding that the two personality disorders mentioned were personality traits and not mental disorders. She stressed that the judge was also right in holding that such an individual would be viewed as having negative, unpleasant, and dangerous personality traits but that didn't mean that one has a mental condition. The facts of the case are that Mokobela was convicted on his plea of guilty on a single count of murder. The particulars of the offence were that on or about December 24, 2017, in Gantsi he murdered Qwaba Xana.
The deceased Qwaba, reportedly a minor, died of stabbing with a knife at the hands of Mokobela. In the judgment, it is said that the deceased’s brother, Klass Xana, saw Mokobela pick the little girl and head towards the bush. He followed him where he saw Mokobela put his sister down, then took out a knife and stabbed her in the throat. Xana reportedly upon seeing what was happening ran back to where he left his mother and on the way back he met his father who upon asking why he was crying informed him that someone was killing the child. “Xare, the father of the deceased, proceeded to the scene of the crime and found Qwaba lying down and Mokobela was sitting on top of her. When he saw the deceased’s father he got off the child and ran away. The father tried to put a chase but Mokobela outran him. The matter was then reported to the police,” reads part of the judgment.
Simba Mampori, death row inmate
In Mampori’s case, Justice Dambe and acting justices Chris Gabanagae and Reuben Lekorwe dismissed the appeal and confirmed the sentence handed down by the High Court on July 19, 2024. According to the judges, Mampori had pleaded intoxication and provocation as extenuating circumstances in particular that he drank the whole day and that the deceased referred to him as a "useless Mokalaka". He had apparently said the deceased informed him that he wasn't the father of her child in relation to whom he had paid P12,000 as damages to the deceased's family for impregnating her.
Justice Dambe, when reading the judgment, said the High Court judge had considered the whole evidence and concluded that the allegations were lacking in truth because they were raised for the first time in extenuation. “The trial court was justified and it was also right in holding that the evidence of the prosecution that Mampori and the deceased were not known to each other in the manner described by him was a proper one to draw from the facts, especially that if that had been the case. The deceased’s sister would have mentioned it in her statement,” she said. Dambe explained that Mampori had said that the deceased person had uttered some hurtful and demeaning words to him on the fateful day, and had also wanted the trial court to believe that he was in a fight with the deceased and that at one point she overpowered him. The judge stated that Mampori failed to call a single witness to support any of his assertions by negating the story of intoxication and that he couldn't have driven the distance that he did if he was mentally impaired but had admitted that he was in control of everything meaning that his senses weren't impaired at all and he was fully awake mentally when he carried out the atrocious act. The facts of the case are that Mampori was convicted of murder with no extenuating circumstances and sentenced to death. The prosecution’s case contained in the judgment is that on March 26, 2019, at Bojanala Waterfront, he murdered Tshwarelo Moruti and on March 30, 2019, her body was found by someone looking for his cattle near the waterfront, badly decomposed. On April 1, 2019, Mampori was arrested and led the police to his residence at Partial where a search was conducted. “He handed to the police a red pair of shorts and a red golf t-shirt which he alleged he was wearing on the day of the incident. He also handed a knife with a blue and white handle which he alleged to have used to stab the deceased,” reads the judgment.
Unangoni Alton, 25 years imprisonment
In Alton’s case, justices Isaac Lesetedi, Singh Walia, and President of CoA Tebogo Tau, though agreeing that Alton acted in a beastly manner and the injury inflicted to the neck of the deceased showed a clear intention to inflict a very painful death, it wasn't premeditated and that the love affair between him and the deceased was tempestuous, beset with misunderstandings and trust issues. “The trial court erred in finding that there were no extenuating circumstances and in imposing the ultimate sentence. The extenuating circumstances, in this case, is provocation offered by the deceased in insulting him and or falsely accusing him of infidelity and disrespecting him by spitting saliva on his face as well as intoxication,” stated the judges. Justice Lesetedi, when setting aside the sentence of death, explained that it remains a fundamental tenet of sentencing that punishment must fit the crime, the offender as the interest of society. She emphasised that the circumstances and brutality inflicted on the deceased were heinous and repulsive and that kind of conduct should draw revulsion in the minds of all right-thinking members of the community.
“The courts won't be playing their fair share in dealing with what has become a shameful scourge in our society where lovers, predominately males, believe they own the lives of their lovers and arrogate to themselves the latitude to viciously end the lives of lovers in the knowledge or hope of serving light prison sentences to walk free and continue with their own lives,” he said. However, the judge pointed out that one must bear in mind the admonition not to come to sentencing in anger and stated that 25 years imprisonment appeared appropriate. In the end, Alton received 25 years imprisonment to run from April 25, 2023, and shall also be deduction there from the period in which he may have been in custody awaiting trial. As per the facts, Alton was convicted of a single charge of murder for killing Kefilwe Mogorosi on October 25, 2012. The circumstances leading to the violent end of the deceased are that the one-year affair ended tragically on the morning of May 25, 2012, in the house where the deceased worked when Alton brutally murdered her with a knife leaving her at the scene with the knife lodged in her throat. It was alleged that he locked her inside the house and fled the scene.
Passmore Moyo, 20 years imprisonment
In Moyo’s case, he escaped the death penalty when justices Lesetedi, Walia, and the President of CoA Tau agreed that there were several extenuating circumstances, being the absence of intention to kill, absence of premeditation, and provocation excited by jealousy. “The High Court put emphasis on the size of the brick used by Moyo as an aggravating feature. The evidence of the witnesses doesn't show that the size of any of the bricks or stones exhibited in court was of any appreciable mass,” stated the judges.
Justice Lesetedi, when reading the judgment, said what may have been a significant extenuating circumstance was that from the evidence, Moyo found the deceased in the company of another and believed that his previous suspicions of an affair between the two hadn't ended. He explained that from the words uttered by Moyo as he was assaulting the deceased was evident that he was consumed with rage aroused by jealousy of finding his lover in the company of a former lover, an occurrence which in his mind confirmed his suspicion that the deceased was cheating on him.
“He evidently believed that the affair between the deceased and her neighbour was ongoing and that he was being cheated on,” Lesetedi said. Subsequently, Moyo received 20 years imprisonment to run from March 31, 2022, and to take into any other period he may have spent in custody awaiting trial. The facts of the case are that on December 25, 2018, he assaulted the deceased who was his girlfriend after catching him with a neighbour and her former lover. It is contained in the judgment that Moyo saw the deceased walking with the neighbour, approached from behind, and started assaulting the her with fits at the same time asking, "What did you say to me about this man?" The deceased upon being assaulted fell to the ground. “Upon the deceased falling to the ground, he picked up a nearby brick with which he kept assaulting the deceased as she lay on the ground. The neighbour took to his heels and ran away and according to his account, he had earlier tried to come to the deceased’s assistance but wasn't able to save her from Moyo’s attack,” read the judgment. The incident was immediately reported to the police and the deceased was rushed to the hospital where succumbed to her injuries a day or so later.
