Horror dream not over

2008-10-02 22:59

Sonja van Buul

Vanderbijlpark - The young woman whose skull was fractured during a brutal attack in which her mother died, may never walk again.

"I thought it was a horrible dream that would end soon," Charmaine Pienaar told her dad Danie.

Her 41-year-old mother Heila was hacked to death.

Charmaine, 18, underwent a nine-hour operation in Vereeniging Medi-Clinic on Thursday morning to repair the damage to her skull and nerves.

She said during "the horrible dream" she "just wanted to protect mommy".

For hours she lay helpless next to her murdered mother's body at the family's scrapyard in Waldrift before Danie, 42, and her brother, Frikkie, 21, walked in on the horror scene.

"During the attack Charmaine's skull was fractured and both her legs are now paralysed," said Marius Vosloo of Meyerton, a spokesperson for the Pienaar family.

Before the operation, the doctors couldn't give the family a guarantee that Charmaine would be able to walk again, Vosloo said.

"They said it's in God's hands," he added.

Vosloo said Charmaine's cheeckbones were also shattered and her jaw was broken.

"Charmaine said shortly after the attack that the man had attacked them with an axe, but I think he hit them with a metal bar," Vosloo told Beeld on Thursday.

"Charmaine said the man had promised my mother he wouldn't harm them if they gave him money, but he still attacked them," Frikkie said.

He believed it was Tyson, the scrapyard's guard dog, that saved his sister's life.

"Charmaine apparently rushed to help my mother and when the man attacked her, Tyson bit him and he ran away."

- Beeld