Cop's deadly shot shocks officer's kin

Published Feb 13, 2013

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Johannesburg - The family and in-laws of a metro policewoman shot dead on Sunday were inconsolable on Tuesday.

The silence in the family house in Payneville, Springs, was pierced by weeping and wailing.

“My daughter is gone,” her mother, Sophie Ngwenya, cried.

The dead woman’s mother-in-law wept for a daughter she was still trying to get to know.

The two grieving women could not explain to their 10-year-old mentally disabled granddaughter that her mother was dead.

Popi Maseko had joined the Ekurhuleni Metro Police Department in 2009 after leaving the SAPS, where she had been a volunteer.

Maseko was Margaret Magaga’s first daughter-in-law, someone she said was more than just a wife to her son, who is still in shock.

“He doesn’t know what he’s doing. We are all in complete shock,” Magaga said.

A phone call on Sunday night informing her of her daughter’s death brought Ngwenya’s life to a standstill.

After a friend had called to inform Ngwenya that her daughter had been shot dead, she went to see the scene to see for herself.

“I was told not to walk past the crime scene, but I did so and sat on the ground. I knew the moment I left home that my daughter was dead,” Magaga said.

She is now calling on the government to bring back the death penalty.

“What hurts most is that she was killed by a policeman. I would have understood if it was a thug, because that’s what they do.”

Shortly before her daughter was killed, Ngwenya, 65, had spoken to her and asked her to bring home a loaf of bread.

“Popi came home with her colleague to drop off the bread and a few things,” Ngwenya recalled.

The 28-year-old constable was due to appear in court yesterday, but failed to.

Tsakane police station’s Captain Petros Mabuza said the case was being investigated by the Independent Police Investigations Directorate.

A memorial service is due to be held at the Springs civic centre on Thursday.

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The Star

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