A 27-year-old man named Emmanuel Sande was found guilty and sentenced to five and a half years in prison by the Senior Resident Magistrate’s court in Lilongwe for breaking into the National Cancer Centre at Kamuzu Central Hospital and taking various office property valued at K12 million on December 26, 2022, during the day.
Assistant Superintendent Richard Kandeya of the Lilongwe Police told the court that the prisoner broke into the National Cancer Centre offices at KCH at approximately 8:30 a.m. and took several items worth K12 million, including 15 chairs, two plasma screens, a computer set, an upright fridge, and an office table.
Staff members at the hospital detained Sande as he was packing his belongings into a 5-ton van he had rented, claiming he was taking them to Chilinde Primary School, where the hospital was supposed to give out cholera vaccines.
Sande entered a not guilty plea in court, which led the state to call four witnesses in an effort to establish the case beyond a reasonable doubt.
sande begged the court for mercy during the sentencing process, citing his first-time status as an offender and his role as the family’s primary provider.
However, Kandeya submitted a request that the court give the prisoner a harsher term, arguing that Sande’s hire of a vehicle to transport the stolen government goods was indicative of his deliberate planning to perpetrate the crime. Kandeya further argued that the offender intended to deprive the public access to high-quality healthcare by stealing such priceless property from a central hospital, which is why a deterrent punishment was necessary.
Senior Resident Magistrate Shukran Kumbani agreed with the State and imposed a sentence on Sande that would take effect from the date of his arrest: five and a half years in jail.
The prisoner is from Chiphwanya Village in the Dedza District’s Traditional Authority Tambala.
Story by Inspector Hastings Chigalu, Protective Officer of the Lilongwe Police, edited for www.newsaih.com
