Staff Reporter
A 74-year-old man from Hertfordshire suburb Gweru has been sentenced to 60 months in prison for stealing residential stands from River Valley Properties before selling them to unsuspecting clients for amounts between 9000 and 10000 per stand.
Mugeza Hove(74) benefited from some stands under the government commonage facility when his deceased brother’s farm was possessed for purposes of urban expansion.
Property developer, River Valley Properties (RVP) developed the farm but Hove then stole some stands belonging to River Valley Properties and started selling them to unsuspecting clients.
According to court papers, Mugeza appointed an agent, who then started selling River Valley Properties stands through his company, Otichmar Investments.
Chikoore and his company were also convicted of theft and were ordered to restitute River Valley Properties’ money amounting to USD 85,000 or risk having all the stands they sold repossessed.
Sentencing the two, Zvishavane resident magistrate, Mr Sengster Tavengwa noted that Mugeza was an elderly man and suspended 12 months on the condition of good behavior, a further 18 months were suspended on the condition Mugeza performs 630 hours of community service at Thornhill Airbase.
The remaining 30 months were suspended on condition he restitute USD$85 000.00 to RiverValley Properties.
According to the state outline, in 2017 Mugeza Hove engaged Otichmar Investments to sell his commonage stands in Hertfordshire surbub.
Mugeza then gave Otichimar a list of Stands to sell but some of the stands belonged to River Valley properties.
The company later realized that Mugeza was selling some of its stands and reported him to the police.
Ms Vivian Chindedza prosecuted the case.