Bongani Hans
A FORMER teacher of a school in Nkandla whose wrongful conviction and prison sentence for killing her husband a decade ago impaired her dignity has successfully sued the State and was yet to determine how much money should be paid to her.
Phikisile Alvina Dlamini was robbed of the right to earn a salary and raise her children for more than five years while she was serving a 20-year prison sentence.
The state subjected Dlamini to almost eight years of pain with the wrongful arrest, malicious prosecution and conviction.
“I am still battling to recover because I was physically and emotionally abused,” she said.
When granting Dlamini, who was sentenced in 2009 for allegedly shooting her husband Thamsanqa Gumede, the go-ahead to claim compensation from the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) and Police Ministry, Durban High Court Judge Robin Mossop likened her ordeal to the popular television series, “CSI”.
Delivering the order last month, Mossop said what happened to Dlamini “has the hallmarks of a work of fiction that has been brought into existence by the creative mind of a screenplay writer. But they are entirely true.”
Dlamini, 54, told Sunday Tribune this week that her dignity suffered when after witnessing her husband kill himself, she was handcuffed and frogmarched to a prison cell.
She said she was deprived of her right to mourn the death of her husband in dignity.
“I did not get bail because the investigating officer claimed that I was going to skip it and run away.
“He also said I was going to threaten a witness and that my family members had already threatened the witness,” she said.
Judge Mossop’s 39-page order revealed how the life of the innocent woman from a humble and deep rural area of northern KwaZulu-Natal was turned into a nightmare.
“In prison, I was kept with inmates who boasted about killing people, and when I told them that I was innocent they would laugh and call me a liar and demanded that I take responsibility for what I did not do,” she said.
According to the court papers, Dlamini’s nightmare started in the early hours of January 28, 2008, when her husband shot himself in front of her.
An eyewitness, her sister’s boyfriend Hlonipheni Ntanzi, who was present during the incident told the police that he “notice[d] the deceased’s wife putting down the fire-arm next to the doorway inside [house]” where her husband Thamsanqa Gumede laid dead with a bullet wound to the head.
At the scene, police collected gunshot residue specimens (GRS) from Dlamini, Ntanzi and Gumede’s hands and sent them to the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL).
However, throughout the trial at Eshowe Regional Court, the investigating officer did not mention the results of the GRS test. Even the prosecutor told the court that the tests were never done.
Dlamini was convicted in 2009 and sentenced.
The test results were only released to the court when she applied for an appeal.
“The GRS test result revealed that the deceased tested positive for GRS on his right hand,” said Judge Mossop.
Although she was released on R10 000 bail in 2013, the appeal dragged on until 2016 and even went through many enduring processes including the Pietermaritzburg High Court.
The judge concluded that there was a rush by police, which led to a wrong conviction.
“The evidence that did exist was not sufficiently strong enough to identify the plaintiff (Dlamini) as a murderer.
“Her arrest, in the circumstances, was unlawful,” Mossop said.
Mossop found the police ministry liable for Dlamini’s wrongful arrest and detention. He ordered that Dlamini should be paid for “any damages arising therefrom that she is able to prove at a further hearing in due course”.
She said she was currently waiting for her lawyers to help her determine the damages caused to her life and the amount of compensation she should claim from the state.
However, she was relieved that after the withdrawal of the sentence, the high court removed her criminal records, and she was now back to work as a teacher in Ulundi.
She has still not recovered emotionally and wanted those who conspired against her to be tried and sentenced “because I want them to feel what I felt”, she said.
KwaZulu-Natal National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson Natasha Ramkisson-Kara said, “the judgment is being considered to establish a way forward.”
Police Minister Senzo Mchunu’s spokesperson Kamogelo Mogotsi said the ministry could not comment until the matter was finalised.
Dlamini’s lawyer Mxolisi Ndwandwe said his client’s next step would be to set down the matter on quantum, meaning that the parties involved would have to establish the money legally payable in damages.
Ndwandwe was not in a position to disclose how much Dlamini wanted to claim in damages.