Murder trial to start
Nelspruit - A case - which has been dragging on for two years -implicating members of the notorious vigilante group Mapoga-A-Mathamaga in a farmer's murder, will finally go to trial in the high court in Johannesburg in April.The trial was initially meant to be held this week, but the defence team asked for more time to prepare and the case was set down for April 22 to 25.
Lucky Nkosi, Moses Mbhoshane and a Mpumalanga contractor Dean van Coller are implicated in the gruesome murder of Willie van Heerden, 73 of Honeybird Farm in Louw's Creek near Kaapmuiden on November 29, 2000.
The occupants of a passing sedan pumped 13 bullets into Van Heerden's body at Karino outside Nelspruit about 06:00 on that day.
Police said the incident might have been related to business differences and it appeared that the killers were hired hitmen.
Van Coller is out on R10 000 bail while his co-accused are out on R5 000 bail each. They have not been asked to plead on murder charges.
Another vigilante who was jailed for life for feeding his victim to crocodiles at the Olifants River near Hoedspruit in Limpopo has already testified against the accused.
https://www.news24.com/news24/murder-trial-to-start-20030311
Death toll since 1994 -- 3,049
contact a.j.stuijt@knid.nl for any corrections, updates -- or phone me in Netherlands 31 (0) 519 701 266
------------------------------
Previously unreported: 20001201 VAN HEERDEN WILLEM M. LOW’S CREEK, MPUMALANGA
Convicted murderers Dean van Coller, Moses Mboshane, Lucky Nkosi were released by authorities by mistake after their conviction - their arrest warrant was only issued on April 18 2009.
18 April 2009 Alfred Moselakgomo of Sowetan newspaper reports that the widow of murdered farmer Willem Van Heerden, 73, killed in Dec 2000, was 'pleased' on learning that the Justice department had issued a warrant for the three men who had been imprisoned for killing her husband.
- The convicted murderers had, very inexplicably, been released by the authorities 'pending their appeal' after they were convicted and sentenced – but they had then vanished.
Elaine
van Heerden had publicly slammed the authorities for releasing her
husband's convicted killers -- saying that until they were back in jail
'she would not feel safe.' Her husband, a farmer at Low’s Creek in
Mpumalanga, was ambushed near Nelspruit and died in a hail of bullets.
After the murder, former counterintelligence unit member Dean
van Coller, Moses Mboshane and Lucky Nkosi, were found guilty of murder.
They were each sentenced to 18 years in jail but were for
some inexplicable reason, ' released pending their appeal ' against the
sentences.
This appeal was dismissed four years ago however Van Coller, Mboshane and Nkosi were still at large.
Police
had said earlier this week, after Mrs Van Heerden's complaint was
published, that there was “no way” they could arrest the killers because
warrants for their arrest had not been issued.
So yesterday
Justice Department spokesman Zolile Nqayi announced that they had issued
the arrest warrants, and that a manhunt had been launched.
“We
are investigating who did not do their work that resulted in this
blunder, which saw the (convicted) killers being free.”
