Simon Mann sentenced to 34 years for Equatorial Guinea coup plot
British mercenary Simon Mann
(Rodrigo Angue Nguema/AFP/Getty Images)
British mercenary Simon Mann (1stRowR) sits with co-accused of Equatorial Guinea are pictured on July 7, 2008 at Malabos courthouse. Mann was sentenced on July 7 by Malabo court to 34 years and four months in prison for leading an abortive coup in Equatorial Guinea.
Martin Fletcher
Simon Mann, the Old Etonian mercenary, was sentenced last night to 34 years in one of Africa’s most infamous prisons for attempting to oust the President of Equatorial Guinea in a 2004 coup.
The former SAS officer did not flinch as the sentence was delivered, although it was even longer than the 31 years requested by the prosecution at his five-day trial last month. He was also fined the equivalent of £119,000.
Mann, 56, will serve his sentence in Black Beach prison in the Equatoguinean capital of Malabo, and will almost certainly die there if he has to serve it all. He has already served nearly four years in Zimbabwe’s equally notorious Chikurubi prison.
Mann apologised during his trial and admitted his guilt but Carlos Mangue, head of the three-judge panel, said that he had failed to show sufficient regret.
Mr Mangue also ordered José Olo Obano, the Equatoguinean Attorney-General, to bring Sir Mark Thatcher and the reclusive London tycoon Ely Calil to justice. Mann alleged in his testimony that Mr Calil was the plot’s mastermind and chief financier, something that Mr Calil has always denied. He said that Sir Mark was part of the “management team” and not the “unwitting” financier, as the former Prime Minister’s son has claimed.
Another defendant sentenced yesterday, Mohamed Salaam, a Lebanese businessman, received a jail term of 18 years, while four Equatoguineans were given terms of six years each.
Mann led a group of more than 60 predominantly South African mercenaries that was planning to seize control of the West African state by replacing President Teodoro Obiang Nguemo with Severo Moto, an exiled opposition leader living in Madrid.
The coup failed when the Zimbabwean authorities arrested Mann and his soldiers of fortune after they landed at Harare airport in March 2004.
When he was released from Chikurubi in January, Mann was spirited across Africa to Malabo - the Equatoguineans having presumably bribed President Mugabe’s regime with oil.
The mercenaries’ plan was lamentably executed, but not totally hare-brained. Had Mann’s team caught Mr Obiang’s guards by surprise he would now be kingpin in Malabo. Instead, he is to live in a prison renowned for its brutality and barbarity, away from his wife and seven children, the youngest of whom he has never met.
Mann was a man who had everything, a scion of the Mann brewing family, son and grandson of England cricket captains, a member of White’s and owner of a 20-acre Hampshire estate. He had been to Eton and Sandhurst, and served in Northern Ireland and the Gulf War with the Royal Scots Guards and SAS.
It would be nice to think that his motive was to help Equatorial Guinea’s wretched natives.
British mercenary Simon Mann
(Rodrigo Angue Nguema/AFP/Getty Images)
British mercenary Simon Mann (1stRowR) sits with co-accused of Equatorial Guinea are pictured on July 7, 2008 at Malabos courthouse. Mann was sentenced on July 7 by Malabo court to 34 years and four months in prison for leading an abortive coup in Equatorial Guinea.
Martin Fletcher
Simon Mann, the Old Etonian mercenary, was sentenced last night to 34 years in one of Africa’s most infamous prisons for attempting to oust the President of Equatorial Guinea in a 2004 coup.
The former SAS officer did not flinch as the sentence was delivered, although it was even longer than the 31 years requested by the prosecution at his five-day trial last month. He was also fined the equivalent of £119,000.
Mann, 56, will serve his sentence in Black Beach prison in the Equatoguinean capital of Malabo, and will almost certainly die there if he has to serve it all. He has already served nearly four years in Zimbabwe’s equally notorious Chikurubi prison.
Mann apologised during his trial and admitted his guilt but Carlos Mangue, head of the three-judge panel, said that he had failed to show sufficient regret.
Mr Mangue also ordered José Olo Obano, the Equatoguinean Attorney-General, to bring Sir Mark Thatcher and the reclusive London tycoon Ely Calil to justice. Mann alleged in his testimony that Mr Calil was the plot’s mastermind and chief financier, something that Mr Calil has always denied. He said that Sir Mark was part of the “management team” and not the “unwitting” financier, as the former Prime Minister’s son has claimed.
Another defendant sentenced yesterday, Mohamed Salaam, a Lebanese businessman, received a jail term of 18 years, while four Equatoguineans were given terms of six years each.
Mann led a group of more than 60 predominantly South African mercenaries that was planning to seize control of the West African state by replacing President Teodoro Obiang Nguemo with Severo Moto, an exiled opposition leader living in Madrid.
The coup failed when the Zimbabwean authorities arrested Mann and his soldiers of fortune after they landed at Harare airport in March 2004.
When he was released from Chikurubi in January, Mann was spirited across Africa to Malabo - the Equatoguineans having presumably bribed President Mugabe’s regime with oil.
The mercenaries’ plan was lamentably executed, but not totally hare-brained. Had Mann’s team caught Mr Obiang’s guards by surprise he would now be kingpin in Malabo. Instead, he is to live in a prison renowned for its brutality and barbarity, away from his wife and seven children, the youngest of whom he has never met.
Mann was a man who had everything, a scion of the Mann brewing family, son and grandson of England cricket captains, a member of White’s and owner of a 20-acre Hampshire estate. He had been to Eton and Sandhurst, and served in Northern Ireland and the Gulf War with the Royal Scots Guards and SAS.
It would be nice to think that his motive was to help Equatorial Guinea’s wretched natives.
posted by Happo at
7:57 PM
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