According to Sergeant Sivenkosi Mtwa, the media spokesperson for the Katlehong SAPS, the incident happened on October 30, 2021, on Kwanza Street in Katlehong South.
Mtwa described how, at about 23:45, the police received a call about the death of a young man stabbed with a sharp object in his upper body.
Paramedics at the scene later declared him dead, and his body was removed to the Germiston Mortuary.
Mtwa said a murder docket was opened and assigned to Lekalakala. After a brief preliminary investigation of the incident, the next day, October 31, the investigating detective arrested his first suspect.
Mtwa added that Lekalakala later learnt that the suspect was an Uber driver and had quarrelled with the deceased, who wounded him in the presence of his girlfriend. He was then arrested, later appeared in court and remanded in custody pending a bail application, later granted following several considerations, including the accused’s fixed address.
After several attempts by the defence (accused), lawyers tried to get the case struck off the court roll and withdrawn by the State. However, the investigator and the State remained unshaken by such attempts, which gave Lekalakala more than enough time to gather sufficient evidence from the pathologist and witnesses’ statements, including a concrete report from the social worker to keep the accused in jail for his deeds.
On May 21, 2024, Lithemba Mabetao (the accused) was convicted after he was found guilty of murder. Barely two months later, on July 30, 2024, Mabetao was sentenced to 13 years for the murder and declared unfit to possess a firearm in terms of Section 103 of the Firearms Control Act 60 of 2000.
The judgment was tabled at Court No DC 3, sitting at the Regional Court in Palm Ridge.
The acting station commander of police in Katlehong, Colonel Piet Erasmus, welcomed the hefty sentence against the accused, who took the law into his own hands by stabbing someone to death.
