Leigh Matthews: Parole-seeking murderer is a ‘monster’

It was a Friday morning in early July when Leigh Matthews and Donovan Moodley fatally crossed paths.

Matthews had turned 21 just a day earlier and she was leaving her Sandton university to meet her mother to discuss plans for her birthday party that weekend when Moodley stopped her and asked for a lift. She never made it to her mother – or the party.

Later that day when Matthews’ parents tried to phone her, a stranger answered and demanded a ransom for her safe return. Desperate to get their little girl back, they did what they had to do to get the money together and dropped R50,000 off as arranged by the kidnapper.

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They never saw their daughter alive again.

Instead, a municipal worker discovered her naked body in a veld in Walkerville, south Johannesburg, 12 days after she had disappeared. She had been shot in the back of the head.

It was legendary police bloodhound Piet Byleveld who eventually put Moodley behind bars. The case was so watertight, Moodley pleaded guilty to charges of murder, kidnapping and extortion was given life in prison.

But just 16 years into his sentence, Moodley is now coming up for possible parole – something the Matthews family intends fighting tooth and nail.

Speaking at a press conference hosted by Woman and Men Against Child Abuse (WMACA) and the family on Monday, the Matthews’ lawyer, Peter van Niekerk of Eversheds, said they were vehemently opposed to Moodley’s release and that while a date for a parole hearing had not yet been set, they had already started drafting representations.

“My mandate from the Matthews family is to keep Mr Moodley in jail,” he said.

Van Niekerk – who also sits on the WMACA board – described Moodley as a “monster” and his crimes as “carefully planned”. He also said Moodley hadn’t shown even “an ounce of remorse”.

Contrary to the version of events Moodley offered when he was arrested, Judge Joop Labuschagne – who presided over his case in High Court in Johannesburg – found he couldn’t have acted alone.

Keeping his dark secrets buried, Moodley has never disclosed who his partner in crime was – or who he believed framed him, the basis for his last appeal.

Van Niekerk on Monday said this wasn’t “the conduct of someone who is showing any remorse”. Matthews’ father Rob Matthews also said their fight wasn’t “just about Leigh”.

“It’s about all the Leighs out there,” he said. “Our pain is many other people out there’s pain.”

The family, together with WMACA, have raised serious concerns with the parole process itself, calling for it to be more transparent and victim-centric.

He described their efforts in trying to navigate the system as “an absolute nightmare”.

Luke Lamprecht, an advocacy manager at WMACA, which was also involved in the Bob Hewitt case, said the core of the issue was that in a criminal court, the state bore the onus of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that an accused had committed a crime; but when establishing if an inmate was a good candidate for parole, he said it effectively fell to the victims to show otherwise.

The Matthews family has been invited to participate in a victim-offender dialogue with Moodley, but Rob said on Monday they had no interest in doing so.

The Department of Correctional Services spokesperson Logan Maistry said offenders serving sentences of life imprisonment, due for consideration for possible placement on parole, are considered by the case management committees, correctional supervision and parole boards.

“Profile reports are then forwarded to the regional offices for quality assurance process and referred to the directorate pre-release resettlement if they have passed this process,” said Maistry.

bernadettew@citizen.co.za