WINDHOEK: A man who stands accused of shooting and killing two women in Mariental in the Hardap Region during May 2009, was found guilty as charged in the High Court here on Friday.
The 34-year-old Salmon Nakale was found guilty on two counts of murder with a direct intent to kill by High Court Judge Alfred Siboleka on Friday morning.
He was found guilty of the murder of his late girlfriend Rebecca Katana, 22, and her sister Lucia Erastus, 31, when he shot and killed them on 09 May 2009 at the Ombili informal settlement at Mariental in the Hardap Region.
“The evidence provided by several State witnesses during trial is consistent and the witnesses corroborated with one another in their testimonies. I am, therefore, satisfied that the State has proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt that you (Nakale) were responsible for the death of the two women. You shot the duo in a jealous rage,” said Judge Siboleka.
According to the Judge, the court has dismissed Nakale’s version of the events that unfolded that day as false and untrue. He claimed that the women were accidentally killed when
a shot or shots went off from a firearm during an alleged struggle between himself and Katana for possession of the weapon during a heated argument on that day.
Nakale had denied the double murders and pleaded not guilty to the two counts of murder at the start of his double murder trial in the Windhoek High Court last year.
In a plea explanation presented to court by his State-appointed lawyer Titus Ipumbu, he claimed that the two women were shot accidentally.
Nakale had surrendered himself to members of the Namibian Police Force (NamPol) at Mariental a day after the two murders.
Katana died instantly, while Erastus died of multiple gunshot wounds a few hours later at the Mariental State Hospital where she was taken by the police for medical treatment.
Evidence presented before and during the trial had it that Nakale was arrested only after he had instructed his brother Simpson Nakale to inform the police of his whereabouts.
The police then found Nakale in the veld near Gibeon, close to where he abandoned his car after the shooting incident that claimed the lives of the two women.
Nakale has remained in police custody at the Windhoek Central Police Prison holding cells since his case was transferred from the Mariental Magistrate’s Court to the Windhoek High Court in 2010.
Deputy Prosecutor-General Antonia Verhoef handled the State’s case in the matter.
Nakale’s case has now been remanded until 21 September this year for the submission of mitigating evidence before the sentencing by both the defence lawyer and prosecution.