Inge died in killing frenzy

2007-02-20 22:29

Cape Town - The person who murdered Stellenbosch student Inge Lotz carried on stabbing her even after she was dead, the Cape High Court heard on Tuesday.

Dr Ansie Adendorff - who was district surgeon in Stellenbosch at the time - was giving post mortem evidence in the trial of Lotz's boyfriend Fred van der Vyver, who has pleaded not guilty to the March 2005 slaying.

Adendorff was specially flown in by the prosecution from the United Kingdom, where she is now working in a Notting Hill hospital.

According to her report, handed in as evidence, Lotz was hit or stabbed at least 37 times during the assault.

Tried to ward off attack

Adendorff told the court the initial wounds - which repeatedly fractured Lotz's skull - were inflicted with a blunt object, and it seemed from wounds on her right hand and a broken metacarpal that she tried to ward off the attack.

However, the lack of blood from other wounds, including 17 stab wounds to the neck, indicated that her heart had stopped beating by the time they happened.

Also inflicted after death was a gaping hole in her chest, about 10cm across, which appeared to be made up of multiple stab wounds.

It appeared from the clean edges as if the object - which could have been a knife - was inserted and then pulled downwards.

Two ribs were severed in the process, something which she said required considerable force, and five wounds pierced the lungs.

Adendorff also noted that Lotz had a broken nose. "It looks to me like someone who was hit with a fist," she said of this injury.

She said a small puncture wound on the right of Lotz's neck could have been caused by the spike of an earring when her head was forcefully turned to that side.

Skull 'soft'

Lotz had also bled from the ears and her lungs had filled with blood which flowed down through her air passages from the skull injuries.

In her initial observations in the autopsy report, Adendorff noted that Lotz's skull was "soft as a result of blunt violence".

She said all the stab wounds to the neck were inflicted from left to right, in a downward direction, and their depth varied from superficial to five centimetres.

Referring to the blunt-object wounds to the head, some of which showed a semi-circular edge, she said she had told detectives to look for a hammer as one of the murder weapons.

The prosecution has already handed in as evidence an ornamental hammer with which it claims Van der Vyver committed the killing.

Photographs

Adendorff backed her testimony with photographs taken of Lotz's wounds during the post mortem, which were projected onto a screen in the courtroom.

Judge Deon van Zyl warned members of the public sitting in the gallery that the images could be disturbing, and advised them to leave if they did not have the stomach for it.

Later in the proceedings he asked the prosecuting team to stop showing the photographs on the screen and Adendorff continued her testimony referring to a collection of printed photographs instead.

The prosecution has indicated it may consider leading evidence from a psychologist on the nature of the attack.

- SAPA