Triple murder: 'I'm not guilty'

2004-05-31 21:22

Temba - A belligerent William Kekana, who is accused of murdering a baby, her mother and grandmother, and raping a teenager, appeared in the Temba Circuit Court, north of Pretoria, on Monday.

Wearing a hood and covering his face with his hands, Kekana swore at photographers and reporters as he entered the court for the first day of his trial.

Pleading not guilty to 14 charges including three murders, two rapes and four kidnappings, Kekana immediately set in motion a trial within in a trial as he had apparently earlier confessed to investigators.

First witness, Captain Johan Diedericks from the violent crimes unit in Johannesburg, told the court that Kekana had opted to co-operate when asked if he would point out the crime scenes.

He told Diedericks: "I want to go ahead with it. I want to get it off my heart as it bothers me. I was not alone."

But 19-year-old Kekana's defence counsel, Advocate Janus Roothman, disputed that the accused had pointed out the crime scenes voluntarily as claimed by the State.

Kekana was arrested on August 13, 2003, for the hijacking and abduction of one-year-old Kayla Rawstone, her mother Janine Drennen, 24, and grandmother Hester Rawstone, 52, after Kayla's first birthday party in Sunnyside, Pretoria.

In July last year the hijackers shot Hester Rawstone in the neck and dumped her body in the suburb of Riviera. They then drove Drennen and her daughter to Stinkwater, near Hammanskraal, kidnapping a teenaged girl along the way.

They took their captives to an open veld, where they raped Drennen and the girl before shooting them and the baby. The teenager survived.

Kekana's co-accused, Fido Baloyi, was shot while police tried to arrest him.

The trial continues on Tuesday. Kekana was remanded in custody.

Sapa

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- SAPA