'I burned someone to death because of $30'

A 49-year-old farmer from Suri Suri area in Chegutu has warned that crime does not pay, saying he lost his family and spent decades in prison after committing an offence over a US$30 salary dispute.

Peter Jacob shared his story during a recent engagement at Harare Central Prison organised by the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service (ZPCS) in partnership with Desistance Champions, an organisation that supports former inmates.

Jacob said he was convicted of murder after setting fire to the house of his former employer, a white female farm owner, at Pondoroza Farm in Marondera, Mashonaland East, in 1998. At the time, he was earning US$30 per month and claimed his employer had delayed paying his wages.

"I was working at Pondoroza Farm in Marondera, owned by Janet Jackson, earning US$30 per month. When my employer delayed paying my salary in 1998, I developed anger and decided to hurt her by burning down her house, which was a thatched structure," said Jacob.

He said on the day of the incident, he saw his employer leaving for Harare and assumed she would not be at home. His intention, he claimed, was to destroy property, not to kill.

"Later that night, I went and set the house on fire without knowing that she had returned. The house was completely destroyed and she died in the fire. I was arrested, tried in 1999 and sentenced to death," he said.

Jacob said he spent years on death row before his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. He was eventually released on 5 May 2020 under a Presidential amnesty.

"I lived for many years expecting to be executed until my sentence was changed to life imprisonment. I deeply regret my actions and I ask the victim's family to forgive me. I realised that crime does not pay after I found my wife had left with our child and my home was destroyed," he said.

After his release, Jacob said he was allocated land which he is now farming. He added that he later remarried and now has two children, although his first child left with his former wife while he was incarcerated and is now grown up.

Desistance Champions chairperson, Trevor Kunaka, said the organisation runs programmes aimed at assisting former inmates to reintegrate into society by supporting them to start income-generating projects and rebuild their lives after prison.