'My kids can rest assured'
2009-09-30 21:08
Pretoria - Two Mozambicans were jailed for life on Wednesday for killing Welsh businessman Fred Picton-Turbervill in Pretoria last year.
The High Court in Pretoria found Mozambicans Petro Markel, 29, and Christovao Fresco Ndima, 21, guilty of murder and robbery.
They were sentenced to life plus 15 years imprisonment.
Picton-Turbervill, a descendant of a notable South Wales family, moved to South Africa in 2003. He was a director of a successful furniture manufacturing company.
He died in a Pretoria hospital shortly after being shot in the head in front of his South African wife Ursula, 41, and children Samantha, 10, Bryony, 9, Natasha, 6, and Gregory, 3, during a robbery at their house in Waterkloof Ridge, Pretoria.
Shot without provocation
Judge Ephraim Makgoba accepted Mrs Picton-Turbervill's evidence that Ndima assaulted and searched her husband before Markel shot him in the head without provocation.
She was forced at gunpoint to accompany Ndima while he searched the house for valuables while Markel continued to point the gun at her children.
The judge rejected the claims of the two accused that they did not know each other and were not involved in the murder.
Mrs Picton-Turbervill had placed both accused at the scene.
Markel also made a statement to police in which he admitted being there but placed the blame for the shooting on Ndima.
Task force tackles crime in area
Superintendent Johannes Jacobus Smit from the Brooklyn police testified that a special task force was set up to combat increasingly violent crimes in the Monument Park, Waterkloof and Waterkloof Ridge areas.
In the year before Picton-Turbervill's murder, there were four murders, 13 attempted murders, 62 house robberies and 384 housebreakings in the wealthy area.
Passing sentence, Makgoba said it was shocking to learn that people were no longer safe in their own homes.
The accused were Mozambique citizens who turned out to be murderers and robbers in a foreign country.
"Perhaps you thought... South Africa was a land of milk and honey and crime pays here," the judge said.
"I assure you this court will do its duty to show crime does not pay."
Justice prevails
Makgoba rejected argument that Ndima's youth should count in his favour, saying the time had come where courts should show the youth they could not take the law into their own hands.
Mrs Picton-Turbervill expressed relief about the sentences, saying justice had prevailed.
She said her children were doing well and could now rest assured that their father's attackers had been punished.
- SAPA