Top cop sentenced for drunken driving

SUSPENDED Police Commissioner Neromba Lotti Uusiku was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment or fines totalling N$8 000 when his trial on a drunken driving charge ended in the Windhoek Regional Court yesterday.

Uusiku (51) was convicted on January 16 of driving under the influence of intoxicating liquor and failing to provide a blood or breath specimen to traffic police officers.He was charged after a vehicle driven by him crashed into the rear end of another car at a traffic light in Windhoek’s Independence Avenue on May 8 2006.Uusiku denied guilt on both charges on which he was convicted, as well as on a count of reckless or negligent driving, on which Magistrate Sarel Jacobs found him not guilty three months ago.The Magistrate was told that Uusiku appeared to be under the influence of liquor after the collision. He was smelling of alcohol, was aggressive and quarrelsome, and appeared to be unsteady on his feet, witnesses who were at the scene of the crash and dealt with Uusiku in the hours that followed on the incident told the court.Uusiku refused to have a breathalyser test done on himself at the scene or later at the Windhoek Police Station. Only after another senior Police officer, Commissioner Samuel //Hoëbeb, had been called in to deal with the matter, he agreed to be taken to a hospital where a blood sample was taken from him for its alcohol content to be tested.The court was told that damage amounting to over N$18 000 was caused to the car that Uusiku’s vehicle collided with.Magistrate Jacobs sentenced Uusiku to a year of imprisonment, or a fine of N$5 000, on the charge of driving under the influence of liquor. On the charge of failing to provide a blood or breath specimen, he sentenced Uusiku to a year of imprisonment or a fine of N$3 000. Uusiku had to pay N$1 000 of the fine yesterday, while he was given time until the end of June to pay the remaining N$7 000.The Magistrate also suspended Uusiku’s driver’s licence for three months with effect from yesterday.Uusiku is still suspended from his post in the Police because of another criminal charge that has been pending against him since March 2006. He and a fellow Commissioner, Joseph Kamati, are on trial in the Windhoek Regional Court on charges that they had stolen money from the Police between August 2005 and March 2006. Uusiku is accused of stealing N$12 000, and he and Kamati are jointly accused of stealing amounts of N$500, N$700 and N$600 respectively. They are denying the charges.