04 Nov 2020

Justice Modiri Letsididi of the high court has sentenced Ooma Thomas, 29, of D’kar settlement to 15 years imprisonment for murder.

The accused is said to have stabbed to death one Gaokaelwe Gaokaelwe of New Xade in 2015.

Last Friday, Justice Letsididi found Thomas guilty of murder with extenuating circumstances.

He, however, maintained that the fact that the accused person stabbed an unarmed person six times in sensitive areas of the body, being the neck and the chest, he had direct intention and acted with malice aforethought.

Justice Letsididi said the accused intended to kill or at the very least cause grievous bodily harm.

These factors, Justice Letsididi said, negated any self-defence or claim of provocation and thus found the accused person guilty of murder.

During trial, evidence from all witnesses suggested that the deceased had provoked Thomas before the start of the fight that led to the death of Gaokaelwe near a shebeen located at Morama ward in the Ghanzi Township, where both the deceased and the accused had spent some time drinking.

Another state witness in the matter, Keneilwe Joseph relayed to the court that at some point and before the fight ensued the deceased had accused Thomas of bullying him during their school days.

Joseph and another witness Constable Goganne Sebodu had also relayed to court that Thomas used Okapi knife to stab the deceased.

In his unsworn statement, Thomas claimed that the deceased provoked him and kept on following him despite several attempts to avoid him.

He said during the fight he saw the deceased searching his pocket. “I thought he wanted to kill me so I decided to search my pocket too and I found a knife. I do not know if at that point in time the deceased was holding anything,” he told the court.

Thomas stated that his intention was to scare him away by scratching him with a knife, ‘because I was drunk I did not realise that I was stabbing and I do not know how many times I stabbed him’.

He denied trying to flee the scene as was suggested by some of the witnesses, saying  his mother, who was present at the scene, advised him to sit down and wait for the police.

“I sat down and took out my wallet and gave it to my friend,” he said in referring to one Khanxla Xota, who was also a state witness in the case and had previously confirmed that he and Thomas had been drinking alcohol for some time before the ordeal.   

Thomas, who was represented by Evelyn Badasu of Badasu and Associates, did not call any witnesses.

Bantekanye Dikago was the Prosecutor. ENDS