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'I just saw her takkies'
02/07/2007 23:46 - (SA)
Leon-Ben Lamprecht, Die Burger
Rawsonville - One of the municipal workers who lifted the manhole cover of the sewerage pipe where the body of the murdered Sonja Brown was found, says he saw her tiny feet in white takkies drifting up to the surface.
Nico Swarts was busy pumping out the pipe when he said he saw "one arm pointing upwards, as if to say 'help me'.
"I just held my head and walked away."
The mother of two-year-old Sonja, Serina "Doy" Brown, 34, her voice choking with emotion, said she had read the passage in the Bible where the Lord had said "I will never forsake you."
Wiping away her tears with a dishcloth, she said she had still prayed for her daughter's safe return earlier that morning, but a short while later the toddler's body was found in a sewerage pipe scarcely 15m from her home.
Sonja, who lived at the De Nova informal settlement Geelkampie, disappeared without a trace at about 15:00 on Saturday.
Her body was found by municipal workers in the pipe in a two metre manhole at about 10:30 on Monday.
After the discovery, one of Swarts's colleagues, Cornelius Faro, went to call the police.
Used ladder to reach the body
Several hundred curious onlookers gathered at the scene, while police officers searched for leads.
The police used a ladder to reach Sonja's body, which was lying in the sewerage pipe about two metres below the opening of the manhole.
Brown was removed from the scene to spare her further trauma, while police officers held up blankets around the hole to stop onlookers from seeing the toddler's body.
Gerda Stadler, head of the Kabouterland day care centre that looked after Sonja during the day, said she had been a quiet little girl.
"She didn't mix much, but she did have one friend at the centre, Jamie-Lee Pieterse, who is also two years old."
Stadler suspects that Sonja was held captive in a toilet a few metres from the sewerage pipe where her body was found.
Brown said she could not describe the heartache that was consuming her.
"People, look after your children. Warn them against other people," she said.
Community members at the scene surmised that Sonja had probably still been alive when she was thrown into the pipe.
Captain Johnny May, local station commissioner, said Sonja was fully clothed and the fact that she was found in a sewerage pipe could definitely have washed away some of the evidence, "but only partially".
Murder tik-related
He confirmed that the police were investigating a case of murder.
Breede Valley's mayor Linda Sibeko said she suspected that the murder was tik-related.
Dr Johan Burger, former police commissioner and senior researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, said it appeared from media reports that this type of crime was becoming a major problem, particularly in the Western Cape.
Joan van Niekerk, national co-ordinator of Childline, said research showed that Cape Town was the most dangerous city in South Africa for a child to live in.
The police have asked anyone with information to phone the Rawsonville police at 00233491212.
- Die Burger
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