Maseru Magistrate's court acquits man as phone photograph leaves pocket recovery unresolved

The Magistrate's court in Maseru found Thabo Ralefeta not guilty of knowingly possessing stolen property and dismissed the charge. It denied the prosecution's request for a conviction and sentence, finding that although the phone was stolen, neither his possession nor his knowledge of its stolen status had been proved.

The dispute centred on a single minute: an officer's signed account recorded recovery from Ralefeta's right jacket pocket at 23:49, while his photograph showed a phone among belongings on a low wall at a displayed time of 23:48. The court found that the evidence did not reliably resolve what happened between those points.

The owner's statement and purchase record established the phone's stolen status through a matching serial number. They did not establish who possessed it, and the owner did not identify Ralefeta as the person who took it.

The officer's account directly supported a pocket recovery. But it contained no entry for 23:48 and mentioned neither the wall nor another person—omissions concerning the circumstances at the heart of the dispute.

The photograph had limits too. It showed no faces or hands, its device timestamp had not been independently verified, and it did not establish that the pictured phone was the stolen one. It therefore neither proved Ralefeta's explanation nor conclusively contradicted the officer.

Under the recorded rules, the prosecution had to support every required element with reliable evidence. Ralefeta did not have to prove who placed the phone on the wall or that another man possessed it. With the central circumstances unexplained, possession remained unproved.

Knowledge also failed. The reported denial of ownership could indicate awareness that a phone belonged to someone else, but did not itself establish knowledge of theft. The account recorded no inquiry into how Ralefeta obtained it.

The prosecution relied on the signed recovery account, the matching serial number and Ralefeta's reported denial of ownership. It argued that recent pocket recovery supported an inference of knowing possession, while acknowledging that it had no further independent evidence to explain the wall, the other man or the missing minute.

The defence argued that the photograph and omissions left possession unproved. It also sought inquiry into the other person reportedly stopped during the encounter.

Ralefeta's account, relayed through counsel, described being stopped while returning from work and instructed to put belongings on a wall alongside another stopped man. The court treated that account as attributed material, not independently verified evidence or admitted witness testimony.

The decision did not establish who placed the phone on the wall. Nor did it decide the defence's question about a female officer searching a male: the record did not support resolving that issue, it was unnecessary to the outcome, and no misconduct finding was made.