Picture for illustration purposes. Picture: iStock
A Mpumalanga pastor has been convicted of raping a 39-year-old woman.
The 45-year-old Vlaklaagte pastor, Chris Derrick Gabisani Xaba, was also found guilty of a charge of robbery in the Witbank Regional Court on Thursday. He is a pastor at a charismatic church in Vlaaklaagte, near KwaMhlanga.
According to police spokesperson Brigadier Leonard Hlathi, the incident occurred in December 2019.
“The court heard how on that fateful day [Xaba] offered a lift to [the hitchhiking] woman, who was desperate to get to Nelspruit,” said Hlathi.
“Xaba then drove to a secluded bush at a certain farm near Witbank where he drew out a firearm along the way and started behaving violently against the helpless woman. He further threatened to kill her should she resist to cooperate with his orders.”
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He “brutally raped the victim” before robbing her of her personal belongings, including her clothes, firing a gunshot and then leaving her, naked and stranded, Hlathi added.
The woman received help from people at a nearby house and the incident was reported to the police.
Hlathi said, although there was no information about the man, “the tenacity of police in their investigation” led to his arrest in March 2020 in KwaMhlanga. At the time, he was out on bail in another rape case.
He is expected to be sentenced on 19 March.
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