The Monitor was present to cover the proceedings that followed the events of February 2022. Around mid-afternoon, a brazen daylight cash-in-transit robbery in Gaborone's busy Main Mall brought the area to a standstill. A police chase ensued, leading to a deadly shoot-out in sleepy Gaborone West Phase 2. By evening, 10 individuals, whom the police identified as robbers, had been killed, leaving one survivor. Thirty-one-year-old Tsaone Reboeleng, the sole survivor, appeared before Magistrate Kamogelo Mmesi this week. Dressed in an all-black designer suit, four-inch stilettos, and red lipstick, Reboeleng cut a solitary figure in the dock. She is charged with a single count of robbery alongside 10 others who died in the shootout.
Keeping a rather straight face, Reboeleng’s charge sheet was read out to which she pleaded not guilty. Before trial, her lawyer, Kgosietsile Ngakaagae, notified the court that they would be challenging the validity of a confession statement allegedly issued by Reboeleng. “There is going to be a trial within a trial. We want to bring to the attention of the court how this confession was obtained,” he said. Pressed by Prosecutor Pascal Mhandu to provide the court with further details of what he meant, Ngakaagae gave chilling details of what happened on the fateful day. Whilst the details will be narrated by the survivor in court next week, the attorney shared that his client was the only person to come out alive from the massacre. “My client was taken out of the residence after surrendering herself to the police. She had been shot by state agents. A bullet had gone through her,” he said.
