Shoes stolen off body of Middelburg suicide victim

47-year-old Xavier Liebenberg always said that there were no bad people, just people with bad manners and habits.

One of the latter stole the shoes off Liebenberg’s lifeless body hanging from a tree, after he took his own life near a prayer resort in Middelburg, reports Middelburg Observer.

His body was found last Tuesday morning.

Before his death, he was the kind of person all communities needed – someone to lend a helping hand, especially when it came to cars, without seeking payment. He was a father and a grandfather figure for children who weren’t his.

His death leaves behind many answers and broken hearts, most of which is his fiancé of 13 years, Rita Richards.

Rita said that when they met, it was love at first sight. Both came from failed marriages and were afraid to make the same mistake again.

They saw each other for the first time when Rita dropped a mutual friend of theirs off in Steelpoort. After that, he began looking for Rita to see her again.

Despite their fears, they were engaged just a few days after they met until death ultimately separated them.

Rita said Xavier loved to philosophise, and always walked away from conflict.

She said he had recently undergone a spiritual awakening, and went to church often. He and Rita were set to tie the knot this year, and he wanted to be baptised.

Xavier always encouraged people that wanted to give up to keep going, which only deepens the mystery surrounding his suicide.

In a letter Xavier left Rita, he touched on technicalities, such as his policy not yet being ready to pay out, and that she would thus be responsible for financial responsibilities. But he neglected to explain why he decided to end his own life so unexpectedly.

She said she bid him farewell when she last saw him, and was under the impression that he went to the gym. One of his friends saw him on the afternoon before his death at a prayer resort, and asked if Xavier could drop him off at home, as a storm was picking up.

Xavier reportedly told him that he wanted to go on a walk alone to clear his head.

Rita was woken up on Tuesday morning with flashlights in her eyes when police came to let her know what happened to Xavier.

“At first, I thought they had the wrong information, and that it couldn’t be Xavier. But it was him. I don’t know who would be so cruel as to steal the shoes off his feet while he hanged there. Who does such a thing?

“No one could console me. No one can say anything to make it better. I am broken,” an emotional Rita said.

Xavier was buried at the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Middelburg on Saturday.

This article was translated from Afrikaans by Nica Schreuder.

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