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House deal backfires

by Fungai Jachi
22 Oct 2015 at 06:36hrs | Views
Three alleged fraudsters appeared in court for swindling an unsuspecting man of $90 000 in a botched house deal. Innocent Munyani (45), Tonderai Chakacha (35) and Mike Kawanzaruwa (29) appeared before Harare magistrate Mr Hosea Mujaya charged with fraud.

The trio was remanded in custody to next Thursday. Their accomplice, Peter Tsuro, is still at large. Allegations are that on June 22 this year, the trio placed an advertisement in The Herald selling a house in Borrowdale Brooke for $365 000.

The court heard that Wilbert Manyika responded to the advertisement by calling Munyani, who confirmed that he was selling the property. It is alleged that Manyika went to view the house and they agreed on the purchase price of $260 000.

They further agreed on a payment of an initial deposit of $100 000 and the balance of $160 000 was to be paid in four quarterly instalments. Manyika advised his lawyer to do a deeds search and he confirmed that the deeds were genuine.

On July 3 the trio introduced Peter Tsuro as Alexio Dzidzwa and misrepresented to Manyika that Dzidzwa was the owner of the house.

It is alleged that they asked for part payment of the property and were given $35 000 before signing the agreement of sale.

The court heard that on July 4 Manyika deposited $54 640 into the account of the trio's lawyer who later handed over $53 000 to Tsuro.

It is further alleged that Tsuro went on to collect $10 000 from Manyika who then noticed some anomalies in the documentation that Tsuro had brought with him to be signed.

Manyika allegedly asked his lawyer to investigate the sellers of the house and upon investigation Manyika's lawyer discovered that Tsuro had misrepresented to them that he was Dzidzwa.

The real Dzidzwa was based in Botswana.

The matter was reported to the police and the three were arrested.

Source - the herald