Mom 'had beautiful eyes'
2009-11-13 09:56
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Accidents
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Johannesburg - A former policeman has described how Renske Meintjies looked at him with her "beautiful brown eyes", held his fingers and asked about her children, before taking her last breath on Sunday.
Stephan de Meyer was one of the first people on the scene of the gruesome accident on the N1 in Limpopo in which Meintjies and her husband Ringo died.
He told Beeld on Thursday that he was heading from Rustenburg to his home in Mokopane (Potgietersrus) when the accident happened.
According to witnesses, the driver of a Volkswagen Jetta - which was in the fast lane - tried to overtake several cars.
He swerved to avoid hitting an oncoming car and hit the Meintjies family vehicle.
Thrown from car
"There was no way that the man (Ringo) could have kept control over that vehicle," said De Meyer on Thursday.
"The vehicle swerved this way and that, overturned and rolled."
He said the woman and her husband were thrown from the car and lay about six paces from each other on the tar road.
"The woman motioned to me with her right index finger, showing me to come closer," told De Meyer.
She held two of his fingers with her right index finger and asked if her children were all right.
De Meyer then told her: "They're okay."
"She was covered in blood, spoke with difficulty and said: 'Help me please, I can't breathe'".
De Meyer fetched a pink pillow that had fallen out of the family's Toyota Avanza and put it under her head.
Later on, he put the same pillow under her feet.
Beautiful brown eyes
"That woman had the most beautiful brown eyes."
De Meyer said Cresentia lay with her "blonde little head" on the tar road. "I at first thought it was a doll."
Calista, who had various injuries, lay behind the vehicle. Bystanders kept the lightly injured Chirene, 9, calm.
De Meyer said the mother died a few minutes before her husband. Both had serious head injuries.
He said he saw how bottles of liquor fell out of the Volkswagen Jetta.
De Meyer had been a police officer in Johannesburg for many years. He was still shocked on Thursday.
"When I saw their faces in Beeld, it deeply moved me," he said.
