/ 19 June 2008

Judge calls for probe into police corruption

A Pretoria High Court judge on Thursday called for an investigation into police corruption after a security guard paid a police captain to obtain a weapon that he subsequently used to murder his wife and her mother.

Acting Judge Chris Eksteen said the matter should be investigated because such corrupt conduct tended to undermine the administration of justice.

He sentenced 27-year-old Mduduzi Doctor Nkuna to 30 years imprisonment — of which he must serve 25 years — for the October 2006 murders of his common-law wife, Christina Maswanganyi, and her mother Queen at their house in Rietgat near Pretoria.

Nkuna was also declared unfit to possess a firearm.

Christina, the mother of Nkuna’s two children, had obtained a protection order against him a few days before her death.

His firearm was also confiscated and handed in at the Soshanguve police station.

Nkuna managed to have his firearm returned to him after paying the police captain in charge a R500 bribe.

Eksteen said there was a strong suspicion that Nkuna had approached his wife with a cocked firearm with the intention to kill her and had sent his mother-in-law to her death in the same frame of mind.

The court could, however, not make a finding of premeditation on a mere feeling and had to find in Nkuna’s favour that he had acted on the spur of the moment during a heated argument.

Nkuna fired numerous shots at his wife and mother-in-law after an argument about the protection order.

The judge said although Nkuna claimed he was remorseful about his actions and wanted to take care of his children, his actions belied these claims.

If he really had the best interests of his children at heart, he would not have deprived them of their mother and grandmother, Eksteen said. – Sapa