Four-year jail term for youthful knife killing

A FATAL stabbing outside a Khomasdal bar more than four and a half years ago resulted in a young Windhoek resident being jailed for four years last week.

It was in the early morning hours of May 1 2005 that a fight broke out between Marco Coetzee and Freddy Winston van Wyk (17) outside a bar in Khomasdal where they and some of their friends had spent the night drinking and socialising.Coetzee, having been assaulted by Van Wyk, retaliated by stabbing Van Wyk in the chest with a knife. Van Wyk was rushed to hospital, but died.In the Windhoek Regional Court on Wednesday last week, Magistrate Sarel Jacobs sentenced Coetzee (21) to a four-year prison term over the killing.Coetzee faced a charge of murder in his trial before Magistrate Jacobs. He pleaded not guilty to the charge in January last year. In a plea explanation, Coetzee admitted that he stabbed Van Wyk, but claimed he was acting in self-defence when he did that.The first testimony in the trial was only heard in January this year.On October 14, Magistrate Jacobs gave his verdict in the matter. He accepted that Coetzee did not have an intention to kill Van Wyk – but, finding that Coetzee had caused Van Wyk’s death through negligence on his part, the Magistrate convicted him of culpable homicide.With the sentencing last week, Magistrate Jacobs recounted that the court heard during the trial that before the stabbing Van Wyk assaulted Coetzee by bumping his head against a wall.The two fighting youngsters were separated, but Coetzee later walked back to where Van Wyk was and stabbed him once in the chest, the Magistrate recalled the evidence before the court.Coetzee did not act in self defence, but stabbed Van Wyk out of revenge, Magistrate Jacobs commented. He stabbed Van Wyk without regard for the consequences of his actions, and was grossly negligent as a result, the Magistrate said.He said he was taking into account that Coetzee was still youthful at the time of the incident and that he acted impulsively through his immaturity when he stabbed Van Wyk.Although he was still young at the time and had been drinking before the stabbing took place, Coetzee still knew what he was doing was wrong, the Magistrate also said.Noting that knife stabbings have become a common occurrence in Namibia, the Magistrate warned that the court should send out a clear message that it would not tolerate it if people resort to this sort of violence to deal with conflict.Coetzee’s defence lawyer, Jan Wessels, suggested to the court that a suspended sentence or a fine would be an appropriate sentence for Coetzee, who is the father of an eight-month-old child. Public Prosecutor Ingrid Husselmann argued that a direct jail term of at least five years was fitting.The Magistrate decided to sentence Coetzee to a direct jail term of four years instead.