Tapiwa Moses Maswela a 39-year-old man from Harare faced court charges on Friday for allegedly forging a Zimbabwe Republic Police General Headquarters dispatch office date stamp in a bid to reclaim a car he had lost in a previous court case.
Tapiwa Moses Maswela appeared before Harare magistrate Mrs. Ruth Moyo, accused of fraud.
According to the allegations, Maswela had filed a criminal case against Bernard Guveya in February 2021, accusing him of unlawfully borrowing or using his motor vehicle, under Hatfield CR: 38/02/21. However, Guveya was found not guilty and acquitted by the Harare Magistrate Court, leading to the release of the vehicle to him by the Hatfield Police, who had held it as evidence.
It’s further claimed that on June 17, 2022, Maswela devised a scheme to regain ownership of the vehicle, despite knowing it had been released to Guveya. Allegedly, he used a forged Police General Headquarters dispatch office date stamp to give the impression that he had served court documents to the Commissioner General of Police, with Constable Mupakaviri cited as the recipient.
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Maswela then purportedly submitted a certificate of service to the High Court, indicating that he had served the Commissioner General of Police. Subsequently, on July 6, 2022, Justice Webster Chinamora of the High Court of Zimbabwe in Harare ruled in default of the Commissioner General of Police, ordering the release of a Mercedes Benz E280 with registration number AEC 1840 to Maswela.
However, suspicions arose the next day when the Commissioner General of Police received the order, leading to an investigation into how the verdict was reached in default. Investigations revealed no records of Maswela’s purported visit to the Police General Headquarters on June 17, 2022, raising doubts about the legitimacy of his claims.