The trial, which started at Maun Magistrate court two months ago, saw major suspect Metlha, also known as 'Golden Tooth' Maphanyane and his three counterparts Bashi Mokwatso, Katorora Hange and Okolo Antony Eke Chuke entangled in a battle with the state over their freedom.
They all washed their hands of guilt in the crime stating that the facts that the state presented against them were all ambiguous and confounded.
Eke Chuke, related to recently deported prohibited immigrant, Nigerian Dr Henry Chianumwa, is represented by Maun-based Ndawana and Taolo Associates while the other accused stood unrepresented. Each state witness, starting with the hospital staff gave their evidence saying how on the morning of the 21 of November they started work to find the Infectious Diseases Control department ceiling open and the doors to the ARV-clinic dispensary and storeroom ajar.
Even the fridge where some of the medicines were kept was found open and empty. Some drugs, according to evidence, were picked up at the hospital fence where the accused is believed to have entered. The others were found dumped near the Thamalakane River bank.
The recovered loot, some of which was hidden in a pit at a field in Sanakona ward, Maun, was exhibited in court contained in two big bags, two black refuse plastics, a travelling bag and a sheet. The drugs are valued at P17 000.
State witness Detective Constable Golebamang Magawe from Maun said that the suspects were linked to the crime after a woman called the police station to alert them that she had seen Hange with the drugs.
After being arrested, Hange confessed that he was not alone in the game and that Maphanyane and Mokwatso accompanied him.
Maphanyane was arrested coming out of the Maun Magistrate Court where he had just heard mention of charges placed against him in connection with one of his chain of alleged armed robberies.
He was acquitted in most because of what former Maun Magistrate Nsikelelo Moyo described as carelessness in collecting evidence on the part of the Maun Investigating officers.
Last to be detained for interrogation was Mokwatso who opened a can of worms on how they had carried out the crime.
In a confession before the police, Mokwatso revealed that he and Maphanyane stole the drugs at the hospital.
The Magistrate informed the prosecution that the confession was not admissible before the court because it was not recorded before a judicial officer.
Hange's link to the crime came out to be a contractual letter of sale and a receipt that he and Mokwatso jointly signed as proof that they sold the drugs to Eke Chuke. Eke Chuke showed the cops where he had hidden the drugs after the sale.
Magawe went further to tell the court that fingerprints from both the accused and the hospital staff were given to the police. Those, together with impressions collected from the scene of crime, were sent for analysis at the Criminal Record Bureau in Gaborone.
However, when the results came back, a set of fingerprints taken from the crime scene came out similar to Maphanyane's.
The court heard that the travelling bag containing part of the recovered booty belonged to Maphanyane.
The bag was linked to him after the police identified a previous exhibit number that they had assigned when Maphanyane was arrested in connection with an armed robbery.
The bag was returned to him after his acquittal from the case in June 2006.
Maphanyane's signatures and the specification of the bag on the book were exhibited before the court as proof of collection. Quizzing the state in defence, Maphanyane demanded proof of the fact that the fingerprints identified as his were collected from nowhere else but the scene of the crime.
He said the finger prints were not his saying that it has become common knowledge that police present biased exhibits in court driven by the urge to win a case or hatred of the suspect.
In response, Officer Commanding Goitsilwe Lesetedi who analysed the fingerprints said that as a trainer on how to pick impressions from the scene of crime, he has always told his trainees to keep note of the fact that a full salary is paid to them whether the fingerprints collected convicted or led to the acquittal of the suspect.
"With such knowledge instilled in them your worship, there is no way in which the police can submit falsely collected impressions for analysis," he said.
A fortnight ago, the trial was temporally relocated to Letlhakane over the weekend following the defence attorney's plea that Nigerian Eke Chuke, who was denied bail after trying to abscond to his home country, had been in prison for almost seven months now.
In Maun last weekend the Magistrate pronounced that he was not in position to set the date of judgment because of the state prosecutor's commitment to other cases at the High Court.
