Man goes berserk over cheating wife

News
BEITBRIDGE man went berserk, damaging his best friend’s vehicles after he discovered that he was having an affair with his wife.

A BEITBRIDGE man who went berserk, damaging his best friend’s vehicles after he discovered that he was having an affair with his wife, will pay $8 000 after pleading guilty to a litany of charges.

Albert Ncube Own Correspondent

Adolph Mbedzi appeared before regional magistrate Mark Dzira on Friday and was convicted on his own plea of guilty to charges of malicious damage to property and brandishing a gun in public.

Allegations against Mbedzi were that on August 24, he went to house number 626 Baobab Road in Beitbridge without permission from the owner of the property, Tinashe Mabidi.

He went on to destroy six window panes at the house before crushing the windscreen of a VW Amarok car and its rear screen brandishing a loaded FN Browning pistol.

Mbedzi also destroyed the rear and front windscreens of a Mercedes-Benz Compressor C200 vehicle and crushed the rear windscreen of a Toyota Corolla Ex-salon.

The value of the destroyed property amounted to $7 159.

Mbedzi was sentenced to 14 months in prison for destroying the vehicles with six months suspended on condition he does not commit a similar offence within the period.

The remaining eight months were suspended on condition he pays Mabidi $7 159 by December 13. The money would cover expenses Mabidi incurred in repairing the vehicles.

Mbedzi was fined $300 or two months in prison for unlawfully entering Mabidi’s garage.

He was also fined $300 or two months in prison for abuse of a firearm after behaving disorderely while brandishing a pistol.

In mitigation, Mbedzi through his lawyer David Maribiti, argued that he had been provoked after he found Mabidi, his best friend of 10 years in his bedroom with his wife.

“Any reasonable person in the accused person’s position would have been excused for doing even worse under the circumstances and he should be rewarded for exercising restraint,” Maribiti said.

The defence produced the wife’s cellphone in which Mabidi sent Mbedzi’s wife an sms saying he wanted her to accompany him to Petersburg in which the wife asked, “Where do you think it’s safe for us to meet?”

Johannes Tlou prosecuted.