Brave youngest crime victim
2008-06-12 09:26
Susan Cilliers
Pretoria - Dynamite is said to come in small packages and that is certainly true of eight-year-old Courtney Ellerbeck.
She was sitting up, chatting in her hospital bed on Wednesday after a six-hour operation on Tuesday.
Courtney, who was a paraplegic, vehemently nodded her head to show how determined she was to walk with the help of crutches and leg braces after Tuesday's operation in which her hips and one of her feet were straightened.
Her legs were stretched out in front of her and covered with plaster of Paris and neon-pink bandages, with her toes peeping out at the bottom.
It was as if the brave little girl, this time in the high-care unit of the Little Company of Mary Hospital in Pretoria, wanted to show the world that fate was not going to dampen her joie de vivre.
Shot while in the womb
In March 2000, Courtney became, as far as was known, South Africa's youngest crime victim.
Her mother, Lesley, had been seven months pregnant with Courtney when she was shot in the stomach during a hijacking on the East Rand.
The bullet went through Courtney's left buttock and paralysed her lower body.
She was brought into the world with an emergency Caesarean.
These days, Courtney speaks of the "bad" people who shot her mom.
"I have a dimple in my bum," she said wide-eyed on Wednesday, but preferred to chat about other things: that she enjoyed school and wanted to be a chef one day.
Biscuits and rusks were among the baked goods this Grade-1 pupil had put in the oven herself.
She pedals a special bicycle with her arms and enjoys playing with her dog Princess, a cross between a Jack Russell and a Dachshund.
She enjoyed drawing hearts, herself and her friends.
Lesley said she had had to accept what had happened to them because she could "not get yesterday back" and that she had to look forward.
"Nothing holds Courtney back."
Big back operation
Lesley, a single-mom, and Courtney live in Bonaero Park in Kempton Park on the East Rand.
Last year, Courtney had a big back operation to straighten the curve in her spine.
Lesley said this would help her keep her posture straight when she walked with crutches.
Courtney would use her strong stomach muscles to push her legs forward.
- Beeld