15 Jan 2025

 Death row inmate, Passmore Moyo, who was convicted for killing his girlfriend about seven years back, is appealing his sentence.

The Zimbabwean national appeared before justices of the Court of Appeal, judge president Justice Tebogo Tau, Justice Isaac Lesetedi and Singh Walia on Tuesday, to plead for lenient punishment.

“The court erred in finding that there were no extenuating circumstances,” his lawyer Ms Legolo Relaeng submitted before the panel of three judges, over her assessment of retired judge, Justice Abednigo Tafa’s sentence of Moyo.

Without contending the conviction, Ms Relaeng said evidence before the trial court was suggestive of jealousy, as Moyo had suspected the deceased to be having an affair with her ex-boyfriend.

“The evidence suggesting she was having a relationship with the ex-lover should also be an extenuating circumstance,” she said.

In addition, Ms Relaeng said there was no evidence to suggest that the murder was premeditated, and pleaded with the panel to set aside the High Court sentence for a custodial one.

Moyo was found guilty in 2022 by retired Gaborone High Court judge, Justice Tafa over the murder of his girlfriend, Mosianeemang Motswagole in Good Hope in 2018.

Moyo was said to have assaulted Motswagole with fists and hit her on the head with bricks, while she was lying down.

The trial court had found that the assault, which resulted in the death of the deceased, occurred after Moyo found Ms Motswagole with her ex-boyfriend, whom he also assaulted and caused to sustain a fracture on the left hand.

In addition to the murder charge, he was charged and convicted for entering Botswana through an ungazetted point of entry and causing grievous harm.

The court subsequently fined him P300 for entering the country illegally, which was wholly suspended on condition that he would not commit a similar offence within three years.

A two-year imprisonment sentence was also imposed on him for unlawfully causing grievous harm to Charles Moalosi, who was the ex-boyfriend to Motswagole.

When sentencing him to death, Judge Tafa had said there were no extenuating circumstances in the matter, adding that the vicious attack on the deceased was unprovoked and the deceased did not show any resistance at all.

He said jealousy, whilst qualifying as an extenuating circumstance, was nonetheless far outweighed by the aggravating feature of the case, which was a sustained vicious assault perpetrated on the deceased, even as she lay on the ground. ENDS