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Taxi child-killer not a murderer?

The Supreme Court of Appeal has reserved judgment in an appeal by Cape Town taxi driver Jacob Humphreys against his conviction and sentence for a deadly crash in 2010.

His legal team approached the court on Monday (March 11) asking that it overturn his conviction for 10 murders and replace it with one - of culpable homicide, the Cape Times reported.

10 CHILDREN KILLED

He began a 20-year sentence in February 2012 after the Western Cape High Court found him guilty of 10 murders and four attempted murders.

Humphreys, 57, was driving his taxi on August 25 2010, ignored warnings, overtook a queue of cars, drove on to a railway line and his taxi was hit by a train. Ten children died and four were injured.

His lawyers argued that the state had not proven that he had the necessary intent to kill and that, at most, he had been negligent. They cited case law which dictated that, where the death of more than one person flowed from a single negligent act, the conviction should be on one count of culpable homicide involving all those who died as a result of the act.

A "just and proper sentence", they said, would be a five-year prison term, the paper reported.

Do you think Humphrey's legal team has a leg to stand on or is it just trying its luck? Email us and we'll publish your thoughts - or have your say in the Readers' Comments section below...

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