An ex-policeman who murdered his former romantic partner at Keetmanshoop in June 2021 showed he had no respect for the law and order he was required to enforce.
Judge Dinnah Usiku made this remark when she sentenced former police officer Morgan Plaatjie (46) in the High Court at Windhoek Correctional Facility yesterday.
Usiku sentenced Plaatjie to an effective prison term of 25 years.
Plaatjie admitted guilt on charges of murder, assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm, contravening a domestic violence protection order and malicious damage to property when his trial began in April.
He admitted that he murdered his former romantic partner, Yvette Louw (38), at her home at Keetmanshoop during the night of 25 to 26 June 2021 by stabbing her repeatedly with a knife.
He also admitted that a domestic violence protection order issued against him in August 2020, after Louw applied for the order, was still in force when he carried out the fatal attack on her.
Plaatjie was a warrant officer attached to the Namibian Police's unit for the investigation of gender-based violence cases at Keetmanshoop when he committed the murder.
Louw was employed at the Keetmanshoop municipality before her death.
Plaatjie denied guilt on a second charge of contravening a domestic violence protection order and a count of assault by threat. After hearing testimony on those charges, Usiku convicted him on those two charges as well.
Plaatjie said in a plea statement given to the court that he stabbed Louw "out of anger, hurt and resentment" after he was told she had started a relationship with another man who supposedly was the real father of Plaatjie's daughter with Louw.
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The murder that Plaatjie committed was premeditated, and he did not appear to have shown genuine remorse for his crimes, Usiku said during the sentencing.
"People in any society on a daily basis encounter situations in which they are angered and humiliated, but still, they are required or expected to have control over their emotions without taking the law into their own hands and punishing those they perceive to have wronged them," Usiku said.
The court was informed that there was disharmony in Plaatjie's relationship with Louw, with her accusing him of domestic violence, and the best he could have done was to let her go, the judge also remarked.
She sentenced Plaatjie, who has been held in custody since June 2021, to 22 years' imprisonment on the murder charge and a jail term of three years on the count of assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm.
Usiku did not order that those sentences should run concurrently, resulting in an effective prison term of 25 years.
Plaatjie was also sentenced to a one-year prison term on each of the charges of contravening a domestic violence protection order, one year in jail on the charge of malicious damage to property, and six months' imprisonment for assault by threat. The sentences on those counts are to be served concurrently with the sentence on the murder charge, Usiku ordered.
Defence lawyer Boris Isaacks represented Plaatjie during his trial.
State advocate Anna Amukugo prosecuted.
