Staff Reporter

JANDRÉ Dippenaar, a Henties Bay resident who was sentenced to 15 years in prison on six counts of murder in connection with the fatal road collision in which he was involved in December 2014, has lost a case in the High Court in which he tried to overturn his sentence.

Dippenaar’s case is the first in Namibia’s legal history in which a road accident led to a murder conviction rather than culpable homicide. The crash resulted in the deaths of three passengers in Dippenaar’s car and three members of a visiting German family, after Dippenaar allegedly overtook vehicles at high speed on a blind rise near Henties Bay, in a manoeuvre that led to a head-on collision with another vehicle.

High Court judges Peter Shivute and Boas Usiku delivered a judgment on an appeal challenging the conviction, with Dippenaar contending that murder with dolus eventualis was not proved.

Dippenaar was initially convicted in the Regional Court sitting in Swakopmund, among other things, of reckless driving, contravening section 80(1) of the Road Traffic and Transport Act 22 of 1999, and sentenced to an N$8 000 fine or, in default of payment, two years’ imprisonment. He was further convicted on six counts of murder with dolus eventualis arising from the collision of motor vehicles. The six counts were taken together, and he was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment.

Grounds of appeal, among other things, included the contention that the court ignored, rejected or attached less weight to the evidence of expert witnesses as opposed to the evidence of eyewitnesses’ testimonies.

In their ruling, the High Court judges found that the proper approach to dealing with expert witness testimony vis-à-vis eyewitness testimony includes the consideration that direct and credible evidence of what happened in the collision generally carries greater weight than the opinion of an expert witness.

They added that an expert view of what might have probably occurred in a collision must give way to the assertions of the direct and credible eyewitness.

“It is only where such direct evidence of an eyewitness is so improbable that its very credibility is impugned that an expert’s opinion as to what may or may not have occurred can persuade the court to the expert’s view,” the judges said.

They further held that the court which convicted Dippenaar correctly drew inferences consistent with the proven facts.

“The court made credibility findings. It is trite that the discretion to accept or reject evidence lies primarily with the trial court. The court of appeal can only interfere with the exercise of that discretion by the trial court if irregularities or misdirections have been shown or are apparent from the record. The court found no misdirection on the trial court’s part,” the judges said.

Photo: File

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