'Our son was burnt like a carcass'
2008-06-06 09:06
Port Elizabeth - "We have to live with the broken hearts and they with blood on their hands."
With these words Dieter Scholtz's parents concluded a heart-wrenching chapter of their lives in the Port Elizabeth High Court on Thursday.
Willie and Leonie Scholtz's only child disappeared about 15 months ago.
On Thursday his murderers were found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Ridiculous version
The verdict and sentence in the case against Jarrod Blignaut, Chuma Maloyi and Vusumzi Ncama did not go smoothly, however.
Judge Chris Jansen had hardly begun his verdict when there was an instruction to leave the court urgently because of a bomb threat.
The police's dog unit searched the building after this.
No bomb was found and Jansen proceeded.
He described the three men as blatant liars.
He said Blignaut's version of the events of March 13 last year were ridiculous and said it was clear that he played an active role in the crimes including robbery, kidnapping and murder.
Jansen said the evidence against Maloyi was overwhelming.
He added that the testimonies in their entirety made it clear that from the beginning Ncama had been part of the plan to rob the deceased.
The judge said that on the day concerned Dieter had been lured to the sports bar in North End, Loaded, which he was leasing to Blignaut, where he was then held up and robbed.
His killers then decided to murder him to hide their identities and to burn his body to erase their tracks.
Jansen found all three men guilty of all three crimes because they acted with a common goal.
Before the men were sentenced the State prosecutor advocate Hanli Bakker read out a letter to the court from the deceased's parents.
They wrote that they wondered whether the murderers realised that they took the couple's only child, their "sunshine" and "reason to live" from them.
The letter said that one of their child's murderers could have put a stop the gruesome criminal acts that night.
"They didn't do it but rather continued on their evil path of greed."
The couple also felt that the murderers robbed them of the chance to bury their son.
"Our child was burnt like the carcass of an animal."
After this Jansen said the community was sick and tired of violent crimes and that minutes before the sentencing he had read that India was the only country in which more people were killed than in South Africa.
Last year 32 000 people were killed in India and 31 000 in South Africa.
"It is the court's duty to remove criminals like you from society and at the same time to scare off other criminals," Jansen said to the three men.
He then sentenced the men to 15 years imprisonment on the charge of kidnapping and life imprisonment on the charge of murder.