Harare - A domestic worker has gone on trial in Zimbabwe for allegedly killing a 10-month-old baby she was looking after by stuffing him into a drawer, the Chronicle reported on Wednesday.
Prosecutors allege Violet Moyo, 22, was “incensed” because her charge was crying too much in a house in Cowdray Park, Bulawayo, in February 2013.
She allegedly wrapped baby Ethan Phiri in a blanket, put him in a drawer, closed it, and went to watch television.
When she went to check on him three hours later, he was dead.
She admitted causing the baby's death but claims she was “possessed by an evil spirit”.
Her lawyer Prayer Muzvuzvu told the Bulawayo High Court: “My client's intention was not to kill the baby.
She intended to stifle the baby's cries so that it wouldn't attract the attention of neighbours fearing that they would report her to her employers”.
A neighbour testified on Tuesday that Moyo ran to her house “in panic mode” to tell her the baby had fallen off the bed.
In 2012 an HIV-positive domestic worker from Masvingo, southern Zimbabwe, was sentenced to eight years in prison after she was found to have laced her four-year-old charge's porridge with menstrual blood.
Sapa