ZAMBIAS MOST DANGEROUS CRIMINALS

By Austin Kaluba THE long hunt for the Mailoni brothers finally came to an end last week, closing a
sinister chapter of the yokels who defied police, prompting authorities to engage the
army to shoot the trio.
The trio Mika, Fabian and Stefan collectively known as the Mailoni Brothers,
officially killed about 12 people since they started their killing spree on April 27,
2007.
How did illiterate villagers elude being captured for so many years? Was it to do
with their knowledge of the terrain they operated in? Did they use witchcraft as
many superstitious Zambians have concluded?
Whatever the answer is to these questions, the Mailoni brothers will go down in
criminal history as dangerous serial killers who had challenged our security
personnel to improve their manhunts.
The Mailoni brothers killing has also been received with mixed feelings on social
networks like Facebook with some concluding that they should have been captured
alive to answer murder charges and another group hailing the killing as befitting of
such ruthless killers.
Then there is the emotional issue of the trios 70-year-old mother Janet who ran
away to Kabwe for fear of her life, only surfacing to identify her notorious sons in
death.
Any mother would be heartbroken to see three of her children killed at a go even if
the world has condemned them as serial killers.
As the grim chapter of the Mailoni brothers closes, it is important to chronicle the
history of other notorious criminals who have terrorised different parts of Zambia
since independence and the usual laxity of security in bringing them to book.
The hall of infamous misfits includes Roy Mudenda, Adamson Mushala, Never
Spoiler Kapenda, Uncle Barry, Sipalo, Benson Chilala, Ngangula and Chanda Siliya.
In the early 1970s, Roy Mudenda, an ugly and broad-faced dangerous thug
committed various criminal activities in Lusaka engaging in armed robbery,
burglary, murder and rape.
On many occasions, he had James Bond-type skirmishes with the police then
called the Zambia Police Force (ZPF) usually escaping by a whisker before he was
finally nabbed, tried and sentenced to death by hanging.

He was hanged at Mukobeko Maximum Prison in Kabwe amidst much media

publicity which generated both abhorrence and admiration, especially among
youths.
Even more sophisticated and elusive was Adamson Musanda Mushala, a Chinatrained guerrilla-turned-terrorist who caused terror in North-Western Province.
After finishing his guerrilla training in China, Mushala worked as a wildlife warder, a
position he felt was far below his military qualification.
Mushala, who had been sponsored for military training in China with Martin Nondo,
the latter who became a notorious car thief, also felt that his contribution to the
liberation struggle of Zambia qualified him to a better job. He wanted a plum job
like a director in the Wildlife and Fisheries ministry.
However, the UNIP government which had sent Mushala and several other UNIP
leaders abroad with a view of overthrowing the colonial government militarily
thought otherwise, prompting the freedom fighter to take to the bush with a number
of ill-trained self-styled soldiers.
He later became inspired by Jonas Savimbis UNITAs activities in the pre- and postindependence Angola and waged war against the government of Kenneth Kaunda
in 1975.
Partially sponsored by the apartheid South African government, Mushala caused a
long reign of terror and later lost direction of his earlier motive of destabilising
government infrastructure when he started burning villages, abducting women and
children and enlisting child soldiers to join his ranks.
Like in the case of the Mailoni brothers, he was believed to use magic in his
operations. This, however, should be taken with a hefty pinch of salt as Mushala
knew the terrain he operated in which, coupled with his guerrilla training, made him
appear invisible.
Mushala was finally tracked and gunned down on November 26, 1982 by a young
Zambian corporal after a tip off from one of his wives. Like the Mailoni brothers,
his body was displayed in Solwezi for the nation to see.
His number two, Alexander Saimbwende took over the reins and continued with
terrorist acts until 1990 when he voluntarily surrendered himself to his namesake
Alexander Kamalondo, then a member of the Central Committee for North-Western
Province.
Saimbwende was flown to Lusaka where he was pardoned by the then president Dr
Kaunda.

In the mid-part of the 1970s, Zambia was again beset by a wave of serial killings in
Lusaka that made headlines in the daily newspapers leading to fear, especially
among women who were the victims.
The mysterious serial killer was simply dubbed strangler and was known to target
lone young women whom he courted in exclusive pubs or night clubs before killing
them.
The strangler killed his victims by twisting their necks until they died of
strangulation, thus the name strangler.
He terrorised mostly the greater City of Lusaka and had at least strangled an
estimated 28 women before he was finally cornered after a bungled murder attempt
of a woman he left for dead.
The victim apparently regained consciousness and identified the strangler who
turned out to be Sipalo, an ex-soldier. He was identified from an identification
parade.
However, the exposure seemed not to daunt the ill-tempered strangler who had one
more trick up his sleeve because before he could be sent for trial, a lapse in security
by the police enabled the killer to find his way up the highest point at the Police
Headquarters where he plunged to his death.
The strangler was captured in mid-air by an intrepid Times of Zambia
photographer Luke Mwanza who won an award for the picture of the handcuffed
killer jumping to his death.
Around the same time when the strangler was making headlines, another criminal,
Never Spoiler Kapenda continued causing policemen sleepless nights with his
spate of crimes.
Kapendas turf was mainly Lusaka and the Copperbelt where he committed
offences, becoming notorious for audacious escapes. He was finally arrested and
given a lengthy prison sentence.
When he came out after many years in prison, Kapenda tried to engage in more
criminal activities but was gunned down during an encounter with the police which
by then had evolved from the Zambia Police Force to Zambia Police Service (ZPS).
They say sometimes films have a negative influence on real life criminals. One such
Zambian criminal was Uncle Barry who styled himself along the character Shaft
starring Isaac Hayes.
At the time when Zambian youths copied the actions of their heroes, Uncle Barry
styled himself along Shaft complete with wearing long leather coats like his fictitious
screen hero.

Uncle Barry was a smart criminal who commanded respect among his peers who
elevated him to a Mafia type status of a Godfather in that he didnt have an image
of a thug.
He was the man at the helm of most of the Copperbelt Provinces horrendous
crimes, including armed robbery, before he met his fate when he was gunned down
when he attempted to escape from a police van.
He was shot fatally but not before he disembowelled a police officer with a knife.
The police officer was admitted to the University Teaching Hospital (UTH) but
miraculously recovered.
Long after Zambians breathed a sigh of relief that the country had been ridden of
dangerous criminals, stories started appearing in the Press in the late 90s of some
serial killer called Gilbert Benson Chilala who was killing people indiscriminately.
Chilala was finally arrested and sentenced to death although the sentence was later
commuted to life imprisonment for good behaviour. The monster is still serving his
sentence.
In 2010, Chilala, who claimed to have killed 200 people, asked Zambians to forgive
him arguing that he was now a changed man who had accepted Christ as his
personal saviour.
The convict, who is now 55 years old, killed, among others, the former National
Assembly deputy speaker Leonard Kombe and his wife Elizabeth in Lusaka East.
Some time in the late 90s, another notorious criminal called Chanda Siliya surfaced
on the Copperbelt causing a lot of terror.
After playing cat-and-mouse with the police, he was gunned down by the antirobbery squad.
In 2008 while the Mailoni brothers started causing havoc in Luano Valley,
Munyumbwe residents were also living in fear because of a serial killer called
Ngangula, a.k.a Fanwell Kalivungwe.
It was reported that Ngangula, a ruthless murderer had killed several people in the
area and like the Mailoni brothers seemed invincible.
However, the myth of his invincibility was challenged when an incensed instant
justice mob beat him to death ending his shortlived spate of terror.
Ngangula was so notorious that even in death, people feared having anything to do
with him, refusing to bury him in Gwembe where he had been terrorising residents.
The Gwembe District Council allegedly declined to offer space at Gwembe
Cemetery.

Ngangulas grandfather Dominic Siakaputa, who had appealed to the Government

to assist the family buy a coffin, said the family was making arrangements to bury
the body in Monze.
As the Mailoni brothers are being buried together with their secret motives for the
killings since they were not tried, maybe it is high time the Zambia Police Service
established a department to deal with serial killers and other notorious criminals
who cause mass terror.
Somewhere a would-be serial killer is being nursed by an unsuspecting mother and
the cycle of a manhunt would start all over again when he starts harassing
members of society.