HARARE – The State has expressed concern over what it has called the habitual intimidation of prosecutors by businessman George Katsimberis in an effort to influence the outcome of an ongoing case.
Deputy prosecutor Micheal Reza slammed Katsimberis, who is accused of fraud, claiming that prosecutors were now too scared to handle the case due to his alleged forceful tactics.
Reza claimed Katsimberis was prone to bringing false charges against prosecutors, threatening to have them arrested, and filing police reports against them in order to intimidate them.
Reza was replying to Katsimberis’ third request for recusal.
Reza stated in his written response that he disagrees with the application which he alleged had been made without reference to any known statutory requirements, “as has become customary in this situation.”
“To their credit, they have cited Mupungu v. Minister of Justice, a case law that is sadly completely irrelevant,” Reza said.
Reza said that he did not mislead anyone when he drafted the letter dated October 14, 2022 since the facts speak for themselves and a reading of CRB 241-2/20 will corroborate this.
“In that case the trial magistrate Nduna ESQ concluded that Roy cannot be a witness in a case involving the submission of the plans because the plan that was in issue was a fake plan,”he said.
He said the accused and his counsel are really scrapping the bottom of the barrel, they allege that in all cases where Pokugara Properties, Tatiana Aleshina or Kenneth Raydon Sharpe have connections with complainant in this case, “I am always the prosecutor.”
“In their application in paragraph 5(a) they mention “four cases running concurrently”, add this current case and the case of S.V. Tendai Biti, making it six cases. Both counsel and his client are being melodramatic. They both know that in this current trial I am only prosecuting because the accused person ahs bullied off all prosecutors who have handled this case. The matter was initially being jointly prosecuted by Mr. E Zinyandu and Miss A chogumaira. The accused wrote a long letter of complainant falsely accusing the two prosecutors of impropriety. despite the fact that they had done nothing wrong. they recused themselves because they felt unsafe,”he said.
Reza said Katsimberis was in the habit of routinely bullying off prosecutors by either making entirely false accusations against the prosecutor or by threatening to cause their arrest or by actually making police reports against them.
“To date the accused has made police reports against the following prosecutors, Mr. T. Chirambira, Mr. C. Muchemwa, Mr. R. Chikosha and Mr Chesa.
“All of these are prosecutors who have taken part in his prosecution or deposed to affidavits against him. He has bullied off to his case the following prosecutor, Mrs. T. Makiya, Ms. C. Mashingaidze. Mr. Zinyandu and Miss A Chogumaira.” He said.
