A suspected murder fugitive has been captured at his hideout in Chiredzi, over three years after he allegedly killed a man in Harare for stealing money and clothes.

Elton Pardon, 27, is accused of committing the crime with two accomplices, Wallen Mupunga and Masimba Makoto.

The pair are currently serving life sentences for the murder of Tinotenda Mandiyanike.

Pardon appeared before Harare magistrate Dennis Mangosi, charged with murder.

He was not required to enter a plea and was remanded to June 4 pending his indictment.

According to the prosecution, on May 22, 2021, around midnight, Pardon and his accomplices attacked Mandiyanike, accusing him of stealing Makoto’s US$400, seven pairs of jeans, and tools.

“The accused stuffed some cloth in deceased’s mouth preventing him from shouting for help, and tied his hands and legs using shoelaces,” prosecutor Thomas Chanakira told the court.

The court heard they severely beat Mandiyanike with electric cables, car jumpers, a button stick, their hands, and kicked him until he confessed to stealing Makoto’s property.

They then allegedly forced Mandiyanike to take them to his home to retrieve the stolen items.

“At around 8am, they accused took Mandiyanike into Makoto’s blue Mercedes Benz C180 with registration number ADI 7937 and went to deceased’s residence where they conducted a search for the stolen property in the presence of deceased’s sisters Miriam Mangozho and Vivian Mandiyanike but found nothing.

“The accused took him back into their motor vehicle and drove off to Sunway City area where they continued assaulting him until he became unconscious,” reads court papers.

The group then took Mandiyanike to Windsor 24-hour Medical Clinic, where they falsely claimed to Doctor Blessing Nyamvura that a mob had assaulted him after he stole a cell phone.

The doctor checked for a pulse but found none, advising the accused to report the case to ZRP Ruwa.

It is alleged that Pardon and his accomplices instead dumped Mandiyanike’s body in Norton, at a 62-kilometer peg along Harare-Bulawayo Road, before fleeing.

The same day, a motorist discovered Mandiyanike’s body along the road and reported it to ZRP Norton Traffic.

Police attended the scene and transported the body to Norton Hospital for a postmortem.

On August 11, 2021, Makoto was arrested and implicated Mupunga as his accomplice.