Fungai Lupande: Court Reporter
Three directors of Paroan Trucking (Pvt) Ltd were yesterday jailed three years for fraudulently using premises they were renting to secure a $1,5 million loan. Edmund Christopher Peters (61), Rosetta Elizabeth Peters (54) and, Hebron Thomas Peters (42) were sentenced to seven years in prison before Harare magistrate Mr Elijah Makomo.
One year was suspended. Furthermore, three years were suspended on condition they pay the complainant, Mohamed Yakub Ibrahim a total of $300 000 before March 31 next year. Ibrahim has since entered into an agreement with the owner of the premises. The trio was jointly charged with their company, which is in the business of fraudulently selling fuel. The complainant is Lexrac Investment (Pvt) Ltd, a sister company to Dimension Investments (Pvt) Ltd represented by its director Ibrahim. The prosecutor, Mrs Molyn Mutamangira-Mavhondo told the court that sometime in December 2009, the trio approached Ibrahim asking for a loan to finance their struggling business.
The Peters were renting a service station at Lot 6, Block X Ardebennie Township in Harare, also known as No. 6 King George Road, Ardbennie in Harare, belonging to Emma Rita Frost and held under Deed of Transfer 3684/ 1978.
Frost left Zimbabwe in 2006 and is a now a permanent resident in the United Kingdom. She left the property in the hands of her lawyers Gallop and Blank Legal Practitioners and being managed by Knight Frank Property Management Company. The Peters paid their monthly rentals for the property to Knight Frank Property Management.
Ibrahim gave the Peters $1,5 million on condition of collateral security in the form of an immovable property. They had misrepresented to Ibrahim that the property they were renting was registered under their company’s name. On February 24, 2010 the Peters applied for a duplicate title deed at the Registrar of Deeds purporting to be Frost. On March 5, the same year, they managed to fraudulently transfer the property from Frost into their company’s name. They surrendered the title deeds to Ibrahim and agreed that in the event that they fail to repay the loan he would take over the property.
The Peters later failed to repay the loan and on September 30, 2011 they authorised the transfer of the property into Ibrahim’s name. In October 2012, Ibrahim approached the High Court after the Peters refused to vacate the property. He realised that the title deeds were fake prompting him to report the matter to the police.