From: The Registrar, Supreme Court of Appeal

Please note that the media summary is intended for the benefit of the media and does not form part of the judgment of the Supreme Court of Appeal

DANIEL MUSINGADI & 3 OTHERS v THE STATE

1. The Supreme Court of Appeal today handed down judgment in the appeal of Daniel Musingadi and three others against their convictions for murder and robbery with aggravating circumstances. The case arose out of the robbery and murder of Mrs C M Dercksen on the farm Doornspruit, district Louis Trichardt on 5 July 1993. The appellants were convicted and sentenced in December 1994. The first two appellants were sentenced to death. The court deprecated the unexplained delay in bringing the appeal to hearing. The judgment deals with several questions of procedure and evidence, and with inferential reasoning. It also contains a discussion of the concept of effective disassociation or withdrawal from a conspiracy or common purpose. The discussion shows how difficult courts in several jurisdictions have found it to formulate a precise rule or set of rules, and that the matter appears to be one of degree according to the circumstances of each case.

2. The SCA confirmed the convictions of all four appellants. But in the case of the first appellant the court held that it was reasonably possible that he, like appellants 3 and 4, had departed the scene, taking the money with them, before the deceased was strangled to death. They had trussed her up and were aware, from the second appellant’s attempt to poison her, that the second appellant (the domestic worker in the household) was intent on killing the deceased, probably to avoid detection. Their disapproval of the poisoning, and their departure from the scene, did not amount, the SCA held, to an effective disassociation from the murder which had become part of the common purpose. The men should at least have untied the deceased and perhaps have done more to prevent the murder which they knew was imminent and which their prior conduct, unless reversed, would facilitate.

3. The death sentence has been abolished. The two sentences of death were set aside on appeal and replaced by an effective 16 years’ imprisonment in the case of appellant 1, and life imprisonment in the case of appellant 2. The third and fourth appellants were not granted leave to appeal against their sentences.