KILLER DAD JAILED

GRACE CHAILE-LESOETSA writes@sunzambianA 32-year-old man of Kanyama township will spend the next 12 years of his life in prison for causing the death of his two-year-old daughter.Lusaka High Court judge William Mweemba yesterday sentenced Luckson Manda to 12 years imprisonment with hard labour for manslaughter.On December 8, this year, Mr justice Mweemba convicted Manda after […]

KILLER DAD JAILED
GRACE CHAILE-LESOETSA writes@sunzambianA 32-year-old man of Kanyama township will spend the next 12 years of his life in prison for causing the death of his two-year-old daughter.Lusaka High Court judge William Mweemba yesterday sentenced Luckson Manda to 12 years imprisonment with hard labour for manslaughter.On December 8, this year, Mr justice Mweemba convicted Manda after he pleaded guilty to a charge of manslaughter.Manda was initially charged with murder which was reduced to manslaughter.The matter came up yesterday for sentencing.Facts of the offence in this matter were that on July 10, this year, around 12:00 hours, Manda was at home with his two year old daughter Gift who started crying continuously.This irritated Manda and he started beating the child to stop her crying.After beating the daughter, Manda negligently lifted her from where she was and the child fell down hitting her head on the ground.She started bleeding from the noise and mouth and was rushed to the hospital where the victim was pronounced dead.A postmortem was conducted and the cause of death was brain hemorrhage due to fatal blunt force head injury.In mitigation, Manda through his lawyer from Legal Aid, Jonas Matende said he was very remorseful for having caused the death of his daughter and it is a burden he will have to carry throughout his life especially that Gift was his only child.He said since his arrest on July 13, 2020, he has come to a realization that prison is not a good place and vowed to walk a straight path before the law.Manda said he has since started going to church to help him manage his temper.In sentencing, justice Mr Mweemba said he had considered Manda’s mitigation, particularly that he was a first offender entitled to leniency and that he had readily pleaded guilty thereby did not waste the Court’s time.He however, said he had noted from the statement of facts a number of aggravating factors.Judge Mweemba said the deceased was a two year old child and a helpless victim.He said that the convict negligently lifted the child and threw her up but failed to catch her and she fell down.Judge Mweemba said manslaughter attracted up to life imprisonment as a maximum sentence.He said owing to the aggravating factors, he sentenced Manda to 12 years imprisonment with hard labour effective July 13, 2020.“The convict is at liberty to appeal,” judge Mr Mweemba ruled.