A CHIPINGE teenager fatally stabbed his older brother with a pocket knife following a heated argument over the amount of load they were supposed to carry home during harvesting in a family field.
Report By Obey Manayiti Staff Reporter
Brain Mbeure (19), who was 15 when he committed the crime, was last week sentenced to three years in prison by High Court judge Justice Susan Mavangira after being convicted of culpable homicide. He will, however, serve an effective six months after two-and-a-half years were suspended on condition that he does not commit a similar offence in the next five years.
The brothers are from Mbeure village under Chief Musikavanhu.
Circumstances leading to the heinous act were that on April, 3 2008, the now deceased Obvious Mbeure, who was 16 years old then, went to harvest sorghum with the accused and other family members. At the fields, the two brothers had a misunderstanding over the load each one of them would ferry home.
The court heard that the argument degenerated into fisticuffs and strenuous efforts by other family members to stop the two were fruitless.
The State submitted to the court that the two were fighting because the deceased had overloaded the sack which the accused was to carry home.
As the fight continued, Obvious is said to have produced a knife to stab his younger brother, but family members wrestled it from him.
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Realising that his elder brother wanted to stab him, Brian produced his own pocket knife and stabbed the now deceased once on the back just behind the shoulder.
Obvious sustained a deep cut and was rushed home by family members who intended to take him to a local clinic. He, however, died before receiving treatment.
In passing sentence, Justice Mavangira considered Brian’s age at the time of the crime and also noted that the elder brother had been violent and provocative on the fateful day.
Jane-Rose Matsikidze prosecuted.