Maid attempts to benefit from deceased stranger's estate

A Harare maid's bid to fraudulently benefit from the estate of a deceased stranger hit a brick wall after her scheme was discovered, leading to her arrest by the police.

Aleyina Liweta (48), who appeared before Harare magistrate Elisha Makomo yesterday, sought to enjoy an inheritance that rightly belonged to Mandy Jane Bannister of Hillside.

Bannister's father Bertram Parsmortam passed away on June 27, 2012, and was buried three days later at Warren Hills Cemetery.

On October 18 2012, Bannister was nominated to administer the estate of her late father.

She went to Defence House where she started processing her father's pension payout.

She submitted letters of administration from the High Court and the death certificate to the human resources director at Defence House, Tinofira Zhou.

During the same month, Liweta manufactured a fake death certificate with the same serial number purporting that the deceased had been buried in Mutare.

She also produced a fraudulent certificate to falsely confirm that she had entered into a customary union with Parsmortam before his death.

She took the documents to Defence House where she presented them to process the pension as the rightful beneficiary of the estate.

When Bannister made a follow-up, she was told that Liweta had also presented the documents as the surviving spouse.

She subsequently made a police report leading to the arrest of the accused person.

The fake documents were recovered from Liweta during police investigations and the Registrar-General's Office confirmed that the documents were fake.

Liweta was lucky to escape with a wholly suspended four-month sentence after she was convicted of the offence yesterday.