“She suffered a horrific death.”
Judge Dinnah Usiku made this remark when she sentenced a man who raped his girlfriend and stoned her to death four years ago to an effective period of 41 years’ imprisonment yesterday.
“It is no secret that our society has been horrified by the wave of murders which are reported on a daily basis in the media, in which mostly women engaged in romantic relationships are killed by their so-called lovers,” Usiku said during the sentencing of Hardap region resident Jeremias Nowaseb.
The crimes Nowaseb committed pose a threat to his community, from which he should be removed, she said.
Nowaseb (41) was found guilty on charges of murder, rape and assault, all read with the provisions of the Combating of Domestic Violence Act, and a count of obstructing the course of justice at the end of September.
Usiku found that he assaulted, raped and murdered his girlfriend, Christina Kooper (22), at Aranos in the Hardap region on 31 October 2020 by throwing a rock weighing about 14.5 kilograms onto her head.
The day after the murder, Nowaseb made a false missing person’s report about Kooper to the police at Aranos.
Kooper’s body was discovered near Aranos on 1 November 2020. A bloodstained rock was found at the scene where her body was discovered.
A medical doctor who carried out a post-mortem examination on Kooper’s body recorded multiple injuries to her head, including a skull fracture, and told the court that in his opinion she could not have been struck fewer than five times with a stone.
During his trial, Nowaseb claimed he defended himself by hitting Kooper twice with a stone after she had struck him with the same rock.
Usiku rejected his claim that he tried to defend himself, and found that he intended to kill her when he struck her repeatedly with the rock.
The court also heard during Nowaseb’s trial that he told the police officer who investigated his case that he confronted Kooper about rumours that she had had sexual relations with other men while he was absent from home, working on farms in the Aranos area. Nowaseb also told the officer he threw a stone at Kooper, demanded to have intercourse with her, and hit her with a stone afterwards.
“[Nowaseb] first assaulted [Kooper], whereafter he lured her to faraway bushes, where he finally killed and left her,” Usiku recounted during the sentencing.
“His behaviour is shocking to any reasonable person,” she added.
Usiku sentenced Nowaseb to 26 years’ imprisonment on the murder charge and a prison term of 15 years on the count of rape.
He was also sentenced to a one-year jail term on the charge of assault and two years’ imprisonment for obstructing the course of justice, with those two sentences ordered to be served concurrently with the sentence on the charge of murder.
Legal aid lawyer Eliaser Shiikwa represented Nowaseb during thew trial.
State advocate Ethel Ndlovu prosecuted.
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