AfricaPress-Tanzania: MBEYA resident Geofrey Sichizya is to be hanged to death for killing his grandfather Labson Sichizya for an unspecified motive.
This followed the decision of the Court of Appeal to dismiss the appeal he had lodged against the judgment of the High Court.
Justices Shaban Lila, Rehema Mkuye and Ignas Kitusi confirmed both the conviction of murder and the death sentence imposed on the appellant for killing his grandfather.
“When the evidence is taken in its totality, we agree with the State Attorney that the case against the appellant was proved beyond reasonable doubt. For that reason, we find the appeal devoid of merit. We, thus, dismiss it in its entirety,” the justices declared.
During hearing of the appeal, the appellant stated, among other things, that the prosecution had failed to prove the offence against him beyond a reasonable doubt and that the High Court wrongly relied on his repudiated or retracted caution statement to convict him of the offence of murder.
In their judgment, however, the justices of the Court of Appeal took into consideration of the evidence adduced by prosecution witnesses, in particular, the village chairman, a police officer who recorded the appellant’s cautioned statement in reaching the decision.
In his testimony, the village chairman stated that on November 19, 2012 at about 8:00am he was informed by the village executive officer that Sichizya had been killed.
He rushed to the scene of crime and found that indeed Sichizya was dead and his body was lying on the floor near the door of his kitchen, while the appellant was tied with ropes and locked in the house.
While at the scene, the appellant admitted that it was him who had killed his grandfather.
“Ni mimi niliye muua babu…” and that he was sent by his uncle Adamu Sichizya to do so. “This evidence was not materially controverted by the appellant. Neither was there any evidence that at the time the appellant gave the admission he was not a free agent,” the justices noted.
To the contrary, they found that the appellant made such a statement while his mind was still fresh to the incident and it was made to a reliable witness whose credibility could not be questioned.
The justices added that there was evidence of Insp Lameck Chimika, who had visited the scene of crime after being assigned by his boss and after he arrived at the scene of crime he saw the appellant who was by then locked inside the house.
They went on noting that upon being asked, the appellant told him that he was the one who had done so and much as the police officer also recorded the caution statement which was admitted after a trial within trial had been conducted, the appellant did not challenge the witness on the evidence.
