FOUR Harare municipal police officers, who were recently slapped with effective 18-month jail term each for public abuse of office, have approached the High Court seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court over the High Court’s decision denying them bail pending appeal.
BY CHARLES LAITON
The four, comprising Pardon Chifanza, Talent Mujere, Gerald Marwa and Alpha Muzvidzwa, were last month convicted of criminal abuse of duty after assaulting a commuter omnibus driver, Sunnywell Kamudira, and towing away his vehicle without issuing an impounding ticket.
Aggrieved by the conviction and sentence, the city cops filed an appeal with the High Court on February 23 this year and subsequently made an application for bail pending appeal, but their application was dismissed by High Court judge Justice Clement Phiri on March 10.
Justice Phiri ruled the appeal by the quartet “lacked prospects of success” and that the sentence imposed by the Magistrates’ Court “does not induce a sense of shock and that on appeal, there are no prospects of applicants (convicts) avoiding a custodial sentence”.
In his statement accompanying the application, Chifanza said: “The present application is an application seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court against the decision to deny applicants bail pending appeal.
“I and the other applicants (Mujere, Marwa and Muzvidzwa) are of the firm view that the learned judge (Justice Phiri) misdirected himself when he made a finding to the effect that the appeal lacked prospect of success against conviction.”
Circumstances leading to the quartet’s incarceration were that on July 19 last year, the complainant in the matter, Kamudira, was driving in the city centre when he was approached at a traffic light by the convicts who told him he was not supposed to drive in the central business district.
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They went on to accuse Kamudira of having a hand in the arrest of their colleague, one Ngoma, and demanded him to go and withdraw the criminal abuse of duty charges against him.
The court heard Mujere and Marwa then pulled Kamudira out of the vehicle and manhandled him, leaving the vehicle in the middle of the road after which the others joined and punched him indiscriminately.
Later, the court heard, Muzvidzwa arrived at the scene with a towing vehicle and towed away the commuter omnibus without issuing a ticket as required by council by-laws.
