The report first appeared in Vaalweekblad of 6 October 2023.
VANDERBIJL PARK. – Residents of the CW2 residential area are once again on the lookout for a possible serial killer in their area after yet another murder came to light.
A cloud of fear has hung over the CW areas since the end of July after at least six pedestrians were murdered in a radius of 2 km from each other and several others were seriously assaulted.
Among the deceased whose names are known to Vaalweekblad, was Ms. Beaula Ellis (died July 25), Mr. Patrick Smit (died 30 July) and Ms. Skye Fagyas (died August 18). All three were assaulted in separate incidents late at night while walking alone in the CW area. Beaula and Patrick died of their injuries on the street and Skye died in hospital nine days after her assault.
It now appears that another young man, Mr. Lukas Pretorius, was murdered around 19:00 on 29 July. What makes his murder different is that he was the only victim who was not attacked on the street but in an apartment building in CW2’s Becquerel Street area. Just like the murdered Patrick, Lukas apparently had characteristic injuries to his head and face, with the difference that both his legs were also broken. His family has so far refused to speak to the media about the events.
Vaalweekblad requested official confirmation about Lukas’s murder from the SAPS’s public relations department, but has so far received no response. Police spokesperson Capt. Fikile Funda confirmed to Vaalweekblad in August after the first wave of murders that the incidents were being intensively investigated, but added that there was no indication yet that the murders were related. In follow-up inquiries in September, Capt. Funda told Vaalweekblad associate Craig Kotze that the police are not going to report step-by-step to the media about their crime investigations in the CW areas.
Residents of different races held a march in the streets of CW2 on August 25 and handed over a memorandum to the police with an urgent request to investigate and apprehend the murders, assaults, drug trafficking and prostitution in the area. “Nothing has changed in the meantime. Drug dealing still takes place openly on the streets. The ‘drug lords’ also force young men and women, both black and white, to work as sex slaves,” says a woman from Lesotho who has lived in CW2 for eight years. “It’s bad in our neighborhood. Shocking things happen here. We see a lot of sadness,” she says.
Three parents of children between the ages of 18 and 21 have since contacted Vaalweekblad in the hope that the newspaper can help them make contact with their missing children who are believed to be somewhere in the CW areas.
“My son was lured to Vanderbijlpark with the promise of work, but we suspect he was caught up in those drug dens. We only heard from him once in the past month when he found a place to stay with someone in the CW area. Since then he doesn’t answer his phone and doesn’t read our messages. This is completely out of character. The rumors of murders in the area make us anxious. We worry to death,” says a mother from Klerksdorp.
* Anyone with information about the irregularities in the CW areas can report it to branch commander. Mahlaha on 082 335 6785, the police station on (016) 910 9046 or Crime Stop on 0860 10111.
