Three people suspected of the murder of Conan Thomas, a South African tourist in Bulawayo last month, have been remanded to 15 July in absentia.
The suspects are already serving a 28-year-jail term each for robbery.
Thomas, who was strolling at a picnic spot in the company of his girlfriend, her father and her two young sisters, was shot dead by one of three assailants. He was a sound and lighting student at Allenby College in Gauteng.
The suspects were nabbed by Zimbabwean police in Bulawayo after a massive manhunt.
Prosecutor Richard Ramamboya told the court in Bulawayo on Thursday that Judas Misheck, Ezekiel Ncube and Wiseman Ncube, all from Bulawayo’s Pumula township, were already serving long sentences for robbery.
The three were convicted on their own plea of guilt for robbing the Bezuidenhout family at gunpoint after shooting Thomas when they appeared on June 27 before magistrate James Mutsauki, who sentenced them forthwith.
Ramamboya told the court that on June 22 the three men went to the Hillside Dams area armed with a Star pistol which they had obtained in a robbery.
They waylaid Thomas and the Bezuidenhout family as they strolled, taking photographs around rock sites.
When they arrived at the point where the three were hiding, the trio confronted them and shot Thomas in the chest. They then robbed the Bezuidenhout family at gunpoint.
They made off with a sizeable amount of cash. Property and a pistol used in the shooting incident were later recovered.
A friend of the suspects, who was not involved in the robbery and murder, was arrested after he was seen suspiciously loitering around the area. The man was found with a hyena’s tail, which he told police was a talisman which he used to evade police with. – Sapa