Nomsa Seyisi guilty of murder, attempted murder

By Aphiwe Ngowapi

In a significant ruling yesterday, the High Court in Makhanda found Nomsa Seyisi guilty of the murder of Thembinkosi Wambi and the attempted murder of her cousin, Zukiswa Frans.

However, the 48-year-old paramedic was found not guilty on the charge of robbery with aggravating circumstances.

Wambi, 41, was shot in the head on 25 August 2023 and Frans was shot and injured on the hand, and surived after pretending to be dead. Seyisi had also been charged with robbing Wambi of his Stylo cellphone. She was arrested a month after the incident, but her two alleged accomplices have not been found.

The court found Frans’ testimony credible.

Frans had testified that she was at her family home when she received a phone call from Seyisi, the relative she considered to be her sister, considering Seyisi is her uncle’s daughter and they were brought up together.

Frans said she had no reason to be suspicious of the call as Seyisi had called to alert her of food parcels that were going to be distributed by the department of social development as part of their programme to support indigent families and Seyisi didn’t want her to miss out.

“Nomsa came in a car with two men and Thembinkosi and myself were told to enter the car, which we did. After a short drive she asked the driver to stop the car because she needed to urinate. However after she got out she told me to step out too and I told her I am fine, and that I did not need to relieve myself, so there was no need for me to step out,” she said.

Frans said it wasn’t long thereafter when Seyisi and the two men became aggressive and forcefully removed her and Thembinkosi from the vehicle they were travelling in. She recalled how the men took the firearms that had been visible to them from when they entered the car, and started to use them to force them out and onto the ground.

“We were manhandled out of the car and told to put our hands behind our heads and to lie face down on the ground. At this moment I was very confused, trying to make sense of what was happening and why she would be doing this, but we complied. At that moment, I felt myself losing my breath as a result of short breath and I just heard gunshots.”

Yesterday, the judge found that witness testimony and postmortem evidence confirmed that Wambi suffered fatal head wounds from gunshots. The police officer who first responded to the scene testified to the distress of Frans and confirmed that she was sober at the time and took the police to the scene immediately.

The court disagreed with the defence that there was no direct evidence and found that there was direct evidence. The court decided that the crimes of the two gunmen would be put on Seyisi because she was also present during the whole ordeal.

Defense advocate Charles Stamper had focused on discrepancies in Frans’ statements, arguing that her initial trauma may have led to inconsistencies. However, the court highlighted that minor errors in police statements did not inherently undermine credibility, especially when evidence in court aligned with the essential details. “Context is everything.”

Forensic evidence established that Wambi sustained a fatal gunshot wound, and cartridge cases were found at the scene. Despite inconsistencies in Wambi’s position, the court held that this detail did not impact the outcome.

The court found Seyisi complicit in a scheme to eliminate Wambi and Frans, allegedly linked to an insurance policy taken out by Seyisi’s associate, Buntu Melani, on Frans’ life.

The court accepted statements of key witnesses, including Nandi Cetu, whose testimony concerning the insurance policy was deemed unbiased and reliable. The court agreed with state advocate Jan Engelbrecht’s statement that Seyisi gave Melani’s number to Cetu to open a policy on Frans.

The court further linked the killing of Wambi and the attempted murder of Frans to the funeral policy and both the accused and Melani would benefit from the policy payout, since they fetched Frans’ identity document together.

Seyisi had mentioned she would call Buntu Melani as a witness to corroborate her evidence that she did not give him Frans’ identity number. However, Melani was not one of the two witnesses called by the defence. When asked where Melani was, Seyisi could not answer, although she agreed that Melani accompanied her to fetch Frans’ identity document from her family home.

Conversely, Seyisi’s statement was riddled with contradictions, the court found. Her account shifted significantly under questioning, casting doubt on her reliability. She provided misleading information about her connection to the gunmen and gave conflicting details about the events surrounding the shooting.

Seyisi contradicted herself by mentioning in her cross-examination that she did not see any guns until she heard a gunshot. Seyisi maintained that she was focusing on the men’s faces. However, the judge did not understand how this was possible when Seyisi was sitting in the back seat of the vehicle.

The court disputed that Seyisi was scared, saying that there was no threat to her since she got into the car with the gunmen, as Seyisi gave false evidence intending to mislead the court. It was reiterated that the evidence that Seyisi gave was unreliable, false, and with the intention to deceive because the reason for the gunmen shooting Wambi and Frans was invalid since defence witness Mcebisi Nelson Mbunge testified that no case or suspects were found in the shooting of his daughter.

In her judgment, the judge asserted that Seyisi’s presence and actions at the scene implicated her in the crimes. The court concluded that Seyisi acted with intent, allowing the gunmen to harm both victims without intervention, despite her role as a trained paramedic.

Sentencing is scheduled for 13 November 2024, pending a probational report from social workers on Seyisi’s role as a primary caregiver.