Two former employees of Debmarine Namibia, a joint venture between De Beers and the Namibian government, were recently acquitted of a diamond theft.
The duo had been accused of attempting to steal 453 pieces of unpolished diamonds in November 2011.
The rough stones had a combined weight of 668.26 carats and were valued at N$6.2 million at the time.
The Namibian reports that the accused Emmanuel Shikololo and Rodney Klim were acquitted by the Windhoek High Court after the prosecution's main witness failed to give a credible version during the trial.
The accused faced one count of theft of unpolished diamonds or possession of unpolished diamonds and one count of conspiracy to commit an offence.
Shikololo and Klim were employed as plant hand and process controllers, respectively.
The prosecution alleged that the two hatched a plan, where they lobbied security officer Dawid Jarvis on the vessel to allow them to smuggle the diamonds they intended to steal, the indictment reads.
They travelled to Cape Town in October 2011 together with Jarvis to meet a potential buyer of the stolen diamonds.
It was alleged that the accused blocked the vacuum air transfer unit on the vessel that caused the vacuum pressure to increase to above normal levels, which needed a manual intervention to empty the pipe.
Shikololo then entered the recovery plant ostensibly to unblock the airlifts and he allegedly picked up the diamonds.
The prosecution alleged that on 6 November 2011, Shikololo called Jarvis to the forward stores, where he handed him a yellow bag containing the unpolished diamonds for him to smuggle them out of the vessel and deliver them to the buyer in Cape Town.
Unknown to Shikololo, he was under surveillance from security personnel who had installed secret cameras.
He was arrested soon after the handover.
“…there was not an iota of evidence adduced that corroborates any aspect of Jarvis' evidence,” said judge Christie Liebenberg in his ruling.
Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor in Chief of the African Bureau, Rough&Polished
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