Nelspruit – A man and his wife confessed in the Nelspruit circuit of the Pretoria High Court on Tuesday to killing a traffic policeman.

Prosecutor George Baloyi described the murder as a crime of passion, a Sapa correspondent reported.

Muziwakhe Moses Sithole, 42, had murdered the traffic officer after finding him having sex with his wife, Elizabeth Nomsa Sithole, 40, the court heard.

The Sitholes, from Ronaldsay Trust outside Hazyview, pleaded guilty to murdering Lucas Zwelabantu Ndinisa, 45, and stealing his state-issued car.

They were arrested in May and June last year, after dousing Ndinisa’s body with petrol and setting it alight.

Ndinisa was attached to the KwaMhlanga traffic testing station.

The court heard that his burnt body was discovered by a headman in a ditch near Ronaldsay Trust, outside Calcutta, on May 20 last year.

In an affidavit, Muziwakhe Sithole said he became angry when he found Ndinisa naked in the couple’s room at a guesthouse in Emalahleni.

“I realised they had sex and a fight broke out between us. After he bit me on my finger, I grabbed his throat and strangled him to death,” he said.

“I then drove in his vehicle with his body to Ronaldsay Trust, where I dumped it in a ditch after I had burnt it with petrol.”

Sithole said he realised his actions were wrong and punishable by law.

“I plead guilty to the two charges that I am faced with.”

His wife pleaded guilty to being an accessory to murder and theft.

She and her husband had been married for 20 years, she told the court, adding that he had threatened to kill her if she did not help him destroy the evidence.

“We arrived at The Ridge Casino on May 18 and booked a place at Serengeti Guest House. Later, while my husband was busy gambling, we had a quarrel,” she said.

“I was angry and asked to go to our room at the guesthouse to get my medication. Before I left, I met the deceased, who I dated in 2006. We drove in his Toyota vehicle to the guest house.”

She said she knew her husband loved gambling. He had told her he would be back in the room at 6am the next day.

“I then slept with the deceased and we made love,” she testified.

When her husband arrived back the room earlier than expected at 4am, a fight broke out between him and Ndinisa.

“My husband beat the deceased with an iron rod on the head and he was bleeding. He then strangled him until he lost consciousness,” she said.

“As there was blood all over the room, he ordered me to clean it up. As I did, he left to buy plastic bags, but I did not think the man was dead.”

When they carried Ndinisa’s body to his car, they realised he was dead.

“We put it in the boot and put it inside the plastic bags. We then drove to Bushbuckridge in the deceased’s car,” she told the court.

There, they stopped at a petrol station where her husband bought two litres of petrol.

“At first, I was scared, thinking he would burn me, but I then realised he wanted to burn the body. We then drove to a veld outside Marite, where we removed the body,” she said.

“My husband poured petrol over it and lit it. We left it burning.”

The next morning, they drove to the place where they left the body. Her husband suggested they move it elsewhere.

They took it to a place outside Ronaldsay Trust, where it was found.

Judge Nomsa Khumalo convicted the couple and postponed the matter to Wednesday for sentencing.

Sapa

Explosive devices were found on a bus entering South Africa at the Beitbridge border post on Tuesday, Limpopo police said.

Thirteen blasting cartridges and 13 connector cap fuses were discovered on a bus during a routine check, police spokesperson Hangwani Mulaudzi said.

“No arrests have been made and all passengers will be questioned.”

Mulaudzi said similar devices were found in a woman’s possession last month.

She was carrying 26 plastic cartridges and 100 detonators on a bus travelling from Zimbabwe.

– SAPA

Cape Town – A policeman did not see a white bakkie outside murder-accused Johannes Christiaan de Jager’s workshop the day of his arrest, the Western Cape High Court heard on Tuesday.

Captain Michael Volkwyn, one of four investigating officers, made the arrest on 3 June 2008, and was testifying in De Jager’s trial.

De Jager has pleaded not guilty to raping and killing prostitute Hiltina Alexander, in May 2008, and the murder of 18-year-old Mpumalanga resident Charmaine Mare in January this year.

Acting Judge Chuma Cossie asked Volkwyn where De Jager’s white bakkie was parked when he arrived on the scene, in Parow, Cape Town.

“The bakkie was parked inside the building where the accused was standing, behind a steel gate,” he testified.

He previously testified that the workshop’s steel shutter was only open about 25cm off the ground.

Cossie asked if he could the bakkie through this opening.

Volkwyn replied: “I couldn’t see the bakkie. It was only after the steel gate was opened that I went inside and could see the bakkie.”

This version contradicted the testimony of Alexander’s friend Colin Jacobs, who last saw her get into a white bakkie with a “tall, white man”. Her body was found a day or two later, on 19 May 2008.

Jacobs testified last week that he was a suspect at that stage and the police told him to keep a lookout for the bakkie.

He said he was walking to gym one day when he spotted the white bakkie parked outside a workshop in Parow.

He phoned the police detective, called his brother and friends for back-up, and confronted De Jager.

Jacobs testified that an earring was found under a mat in the bakkie that day, which he recognised as Alexander’s.

Earring found under mat

Volkwyn testified on Monday that he picked up the mat on the spur of the moment and found the earring.

He said he did not touch it and the forensic team confiscated it.

On Tuesday, Sakkie Maartens, for De Jager, said his client would disagree.

He put it to Volkwyn that the officer stood at the bakkie, found the earring under the mat and picked it up.

“And you asked the accused about the earring, to which he took the earring from you and said something like ‘that is nonsense’ in Afrikaans, and threw it on the ground,” Maartens said.

Volkwyn denied this version.

“None of us, myself and the accused, touched that earring. The forensic people confiscated it. The forensic people confiscated the bakkie on the scene.”

Maartens said his client explained at the time that the earring belonged to a woman from a Voortrekker camp he attended that weekend.

“I don’t know about that,” Volkwyn responded.

– SAPA

Johannesburg – Four men and a domestic worker have been arrested after the robbery and assault of a farmer in Bergville, KwaZulu-Natal police said on Tuesday.

The 43-year-old farmer was severely assaulted on his farm by five armed men when he arrived home around 19:30 on Monday, police spokesperson Thulani Zwane said.

He and his domestic worker were tied up and left in one of the bedrooms. The men fled with the farmer’s vehicle and several of his firearms.

“The farmer managed to get help from other employees on the farm and police were called in,” Zwane said.

A tracking device led the police to the farmer’s stolen vehicle, which was left abandoned on a road between Bergville and Winterton.

Zwane said police received information about getaway vehicles the men used to escape.

The four men were apprehended on Monday afternoon when police spotted two of the getaway vehicles in the Bergville area.

The domestic worker, who was also arrested, was allegedly an accomplice in planning the attack, Zwane said.

Police were still searching for the other two vehicles and another suspect.

All four men and the domestic worker were expected to appear in the Bergville Magistrate’s Court later this week.

The farmer was recovering in hospital.

– SAPA

A teacher accused of raping a 13-year-old pupil appeared in the Lehurutshe Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday, North West police said on Tuesday.

The teacher, from Dinokana village near Zeerust, would be back in court on Wednesday for a formal bail application, police spokespersn Pelonomi Makau said.

On 6 November, he allegedly asked the girl to stay behind after school ended, took her to the school’s toilets and raped her.

Makau said the rape was confirmed when the girl was taken to a hospital.

The following day the school’s principal reportedly took the teacher to a police station.

He remains in police custody.

– SAPA

Mbombela – A man and his wife confessed in the Nelspruit circuit of the North Gauteng High Court on Tuesday to killing a traffic policeman.

Prosecutor George Baloyi described the murder as a crime of passion, a Sapa correspondent reported.

Muziwakhe Moses Sithole, 42, had murdered the traffic officer after finding him having sex with his wife, Elizabeth Nomsa Sithole, 40, the court heard.

The Sitholes, from Ronaldsay Trust outside Hazyview, pleaded guilty to murdering Lucas Zwelabantu Ndinisa, 45, and stealing his state-issued car.

They were arrested in May and June last year, after dousing Ndinisa’s body with petrol and setting it alight.

Ndinisa was attached to the KwaMhlanga traffic testing station.

The court heard that his burnt body was discovered by a headman in a ditch near Ronaldsay Trust, outside Calcutta, on May 20 last year.

In an affidavit, Muziwakhe Sithole said he became angry when he found Ndinisa naked in the couple’s room at a guesthouse in Emalahleni.

“I realised they had sex and a fight broke out between us. After he bit me on my finger, I grabbed his throat and strangled him to death,” he said.

“I then drove in his vehicle with his body to Ronaldsay Trust, where I dumped it in a ditch after I had burnt it with petrol.”

Sithole said he realised his actions were wrong and punishable by law.

“I plead guilty to the two charges that I am faced with.”

His wife pleaded guilty to being an accessory to murder and theft.

She and her husband had been married for 20 years, she told the court, adding that he had threatened to kill her if she did not help him destroy the evidence.

“We arrived at The Ridge Casino on 18 May and booked a place at Serengeti Guest House. Later, while my husband was busy gambling, we had a quarrel,” she said.

“I was angry and asked to go to our room at the guesthouse to get my medication. Before I left, I met the deceased, who I dated in 2006. We drove in his Toyota vehicle to the guest house.”

Cleaning up the murder scene

She said she knew her husband loved gambling. He had told her he would be back in the room at 06:00the next day.

“I then slept with the deceased and we made love,” she testified.

When her husband arrived back the room earlier than expected at 04:00, a fight broke out between him and Ndinisa.

“My husband beat the deceased with an iron rod on the head and he was bleeding. He then strangled him until he lost consciousness,” she said.

“As there was blood all over the room, he ordered me to clean it up. As I did, he left to buy plastic bags, but I did not think the man was dead.”

When they carried Ndinisa’s body to his car, they realised he was dead.

“We put it in the boot and put it inside the plastic bags. We then drove to Bushbuckridge in the deceased’s car,” she told the court.

There, they stopped at a petrol station where her husband bought 2l of petrol.

“At first, I was scared, thinking he would burn me, but I then realised he wanted to burn the body. We then drove to a veld outside Marite, where we removed the body,” she said.

“My husband poured petrol over it and lit it. We left it burning.”

The next morning, they drove to the place where they left the body. Her husband suggested they move it elsewhere.

They took it to a place outside Ronaldsay Trust, where it was found.

Judge Nomsa Khumalo convicted the couple and postponed the matter to Wednesday for sentencing.

– SAPA

Johannesburg – Gauteng police are still using rubber bullets on protesting crowds despite a standing order put into place two years ago prohibiting their use, the DA said on Tuesday.

Police had fired rubber bullets on protesters in Bekkersdal, Diepsloot and at the Union Buildings in Pretoria in the past six months, DA MPL John Moodey said.

“This, despite the confirmation by Gauteng Community Safety MEC Faith Mazibuko that the standing order banning the use of rubber bullets is still in effect,” he said.

“With the increase in service delivery protests, residents in Gauteng face the same fate as Andries Tatane and others who have died or sustained serious injuries as a result of rubber bullets.”

Tatane died after being shot with rubber bullets during a service delivery protest in Ficksburg, in the Free State, on 13 April 2011.

On 28 March, the Ficksburg Regional Court acquitted seven policemen accused of causing Tatane’s death.

On Tuesday, the SA Police Service claimed it had the authority to use rubber bullets.

Police spokesperson Solomon Makgale said an instruction by former police commissioner Bheki Cele in 2011 made provision for the police to use rubber bullets if called for by the situation they were confronted with.

“Later on, in March 2012 and June 2012, the revised instruction specified that only [police] that were part of the public order policing unit and trained in the use of rubber bullets, [were] allowed to use rubber bullets under the instruction of the operational commander at the scene,” said Makgale.

– SAPA

Cape Town – More than 500 cases of corruption involving officials have been recorded at municipalities the past four years, says Co-operative Governance Minister Lechesa Tsenoli.

“In total, 522 incidents/allegations of serious corruption were recorded by the end of June [this year],” he said in a written reply to a parliamentary question, tabled on Monday.

His department had, since 2009, referred 745 allegations of fraud and corruption to law enforcement agencies for investigation.

This total excluded investigations being conducted or commissioned by provinces and municipalities.

“As of 31 May [this year], there were 408 arrests, of which 199 were municipal officials and 209 were members of the public.

“There have been a total of 176 convictions, 87 of which were government officials and 89 members of the public.”

Tsenoli said it had been noted that the conviction rate was very low.

He attributed this to various factors, including lack of co-operation by municipal officials unwilling to make statements; interference by unions, who advised their members not to make statements; and witnesses who refused to testify as whistle-blowers due to threats and intimidation.

– SAPA

Johannesburg – Agang SA leader Mamphela Ramphele urged the youth of Bekkersdal on Tuesday to respect their votes and use them wisely.

She told residents that the condition of Bekkersdal was not in line with what she and other freedom fighters had fought for.

“As a freedom fighter, I did not fight for the kind of condition that Bekkersdal is in today. I fought for better. You should be empowered to help build Bekkersdal, not to be in the streets with no jobs,” she said.

Bekkersdal was recently struck by violent protests that brought major disruptions to the township.

Residents were demanding better services and for their mayor to be removed.

On Tuesday, Ramphele told the protesters she understood their grievances and promised to urge mining companies in the area to contribute to the township’s development.

– SAPA

Kimberley – The actions of a 17-year-old youth on the day of the Griekwastad farm killings, of which he is accused, seemed strange, the Northern Cape High Court heard on Tuesday.

“Do you realise how your testimony looks…? How strange it sounds?” prosecutor Hannes Cloete asked the teenager in cross examination.

Northern Cape Judge President Frans Kgomo is hearing evidence in Kimberley in the trial of the youth, who is accused of killing farmer Deon Steenkamp, 44, his wife Christel, 43, and their daughter Marthella, 14.

They were shot dead on their farm Naauwhoek, near Griekwastad, on 6 April 2012. He is also accused of raping Marthella and of defeating the ends of justice.

Cloete asked him why he, as a functioning and composed individual, did not think of phoning the police about the attack on the farm while hiding.

“You are agile with a cellphone. You had various contacts on it, only the push of a button away. People that could help, the police.”

The State alleges the boy had a cellphone on him at the time.

“You did not think to phone? That cannot be true,” said Cloete.

The youth answered: “That was how I acted at the time.”

The prosecutor put it to him that evidence indicated that Marthella Steenkamp, who was seconds from dying, had thought about phoning for help.

“But you, in safety, uninjured in the shed, did not think of making a call?” asked Cloete.

Discrepancies in testimony

The State also questioned him about discrepancies between his testimony on Tuesday and that of witnesses in the trial.

There were also important differences between his story and expert evidence.

“There is no answer [from the youth]. You know the expert evidence creates problems for you,” Cloete submitted at some stage.

“No, Honourable,” the youth answered.

Cloete submitted that he was adjusting his story as he went along.

“It creates a bad impression as a witness. You must be careful,” the prosecution advised him.

Cloete also submitted that he should begin to give reasons for his replies to questions.

He stated that the youth’s constant reaction to questions, such as “I do not know”, “possibly” and “I do not remember”, would not help him.

Accused heard nothing

Earlier, the court heard that the youth did not hear the girl being attacked 15m away from where he said he was at the time.

“You want the court to believe for one moment that you heard nothing of Marthella’s attack… 15 metres from where you were?” Cloete asked.

“Yes, Honourable,” the boy answered.

Cloete told him that – according to his own version – he must have been 15 steps from where the girl was attacked.

“You would have had a view of where Marthella and her attackers would have been.”

Cloete told him the State did not expect him to change his testimony, however, his story in court was so untruthful that “it hurts even listening to it”.

The State told him it was worried about his almost “nevermind” attitude when answering questions.

The prosecutor reminded him that the court knew what Marthella experienced during the attack.

“And you say you heard nothing while two witnesses told the court you told them you heard her scream?” asked Cloete.

The trial continues.

– SAPA