WINDHOEK – A resident from Otjiwarongo unhappy with his sentence of 17 years on a rape conviction got more than he bargained for when two judges of the Windhoek High Court increased his sentence instead of decreasing it as he wished.
Richard Katjatenya lodged an appeal against his sentence eight months after the fact and gave the excuse that it was because he needed help from fellow inmates to compile his appeal.
Judge Nate Ndauendapo who wrote the judgement in agreement with Judge Naomi Shivute find that reason for the later filing of the appeal is not reasonable and that in any event no prospect of success exists.
Katjatenya argued the magistrate erred on the facts and the law by overemphasizing the retributive aspect of punishment at the expense of deterrence and rehabilitation.
Judge Ndauendapo however said that the attack on the complainant was brutal and vicious and the magistrate was correct to impose a severe sentence.
The facts of the case are that Katjatenya was offered accommodation in the complainant’s room after he asked for it.
During the night, however, he stabbed the complainant seven times in her arms and ear and demanded sex from her and out of fear she agreed and told him to get condoms from her handbag.
When the rapist passed out after the act, two boys came to her rescue and they managed to call the police and take her to hospital where she spend two weeks recovering from her injuries.
According to the appeal judges, the conduct of Katjatenya was clearly brutal, vicious and callous.
“The complainant was attacked in the sanctity of her own home,” Judge Ndauendapo said and continued: “The magistrate remarked that ‘this was one of the worst rapes with the worst consequences that this court has come upon.”
He further remarked in his considered opinion the magistrate did not err in sentencing Katjatenya to 17 years.
However, Judge Ndauendapo stated, the magistrate did err in ordering that the sentence on a conviction of escape from lawful custody must run concurrently with the rape sentence.
Judge Ndauendapo set aside that order and substituted it with an order that the sentence of 18 months for escape is to run consecutively with the rape sentence.
This means that Katjatenya must serve the escape sentence after he finished the sentence on the rape conviction.