BREYTEN – Lt Gen Semakaleng Manamela, the provincial police commissioner, was delighted over the hefty sentence that had been handed down to a 30-year-old murderer.
According to Brig Selvy Mohlala, a spokesman for the provincial police, the sentence was imposed by the Mpumalanaga Division of the High Court sitting in Breyten on October 6, to a man who had murdered the mother of his two-year-old son in Piet Retief on February 11.
“The decision to sentence the accused was taken after enough evidence had been presented in court, which revealed details on how he had brutally stabbed the 20-year-old woman to death,” he said.
He said the court had heard that on the said day, the man had gone to visit the mother of his child where she was residing with her grandmother and her son.
The grandmother was at that time unaware that their relationship was over. She went and informed her granddaughter that she had a visitor.
“The two were left while the granny looked after the child. Moments later, the child was sent to fetch something in his mother’s room, and that is when the victim was stabbed and left in a pool of blood by the accused who fled the scene thereafter,” Brig Mohlala said.
She was certified dead by the paramedics and a murder case was opened accordingly by the Piet Retief police.
An investigation commenced and a manhunt was launched for the suspect.
The accused handed himself over to the police in Piet Retief on February 12 and was charged accordingly. He never pleaded guilty when he appeared in court, even throughout the trial.
Read the complete article in the Highvelder newspaper.
