Police in Zimbabwe arrested an accused murderer, who had been a fugitive from the law for a number of years, after he poured hot cooking oil on his wife. The suspect was on the police’s wanted list for the brutal murder of his girlfriend in 2015.
According to national police spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi, the 28-year-old fugitive was arrested on Monday after he burnt his wife with hot cooking oil. The wife was admitted to a hospital in Harare where she is reported to be battling for her life after she suffered serious burns all over her body.
In 2015, the suspect allegedly killed his 21-year-old girlfriend at her parents’ home. He is reported to have struck the young woman with a hoe four times in the head after she tried to end their relationship.
After the murder, he hid in one of the bedrooms when her mother returned home before he could escape. The deceased’s mother followed her instincts and sought help from police officers who were in the neighbourhood. The police officers arrested the suspect after they found him hiding under a bed in the main bedroom. The girlfriend’s body was hidden under the bed in another bedroom.
However, when he was granted bail by the High Court in 2017, the suspect skipped bail and became a fugitive, forcing the courts to issue a warrant for his arrest.
Despite the serious charges that he is facing, the suspect was not apprehended despite claims by the girlfriend’s family that he was moving freely around and that they had sighted him in public on several occasions.
The murdered woman’s father accused the police of deliberately failing to arrest her alleged killer. He argued that he had provided the officers at Glen Norah Police Station with the suspect’s current location on several occasions, only for the police to fail to act on the information.
Ironically, the suspect’s own father told the media in November that he was puzzled at why his son was roaming free when he had personally helped them to apprehend him.