One of the two Durban siblings accused of murdering their parents said she “felt like an al-Qaeda suicide bomber” upon realising what had happened, the Durban High Court heard on Monday.
“I believed it was right, but it was wrong,” Nicolette Lotter, 29, testified.
She felt this way after Captain Shane Smith told her that her then boyfriend Mathew Naidoo, who she believed was the third son of God, was not the angel he purported to be, but was the devil who came to kill and destroy.
“Then it hit me that what happened was wrong,” she said.
Nicolette and her brother, Hardus, now 23, have pleaded not guilty to murdering their parents Maria Magdalena “Riekie”Lotter, 52, and Johannes Petrus “Johnny” Lotter, 53, at their home in Westville in July, 2008.
Their co-accused, Naidoo, now 25, initially pleaded not guilty, but later changed his plea to guilty. He said he did not murder the couple, but did help to cover up the murders.
The Lotters have said that they were under the influence of Naidoo, who told them God wanted their parents dead.
Nicolette testified that said she had believed what Naidoo had said as she had believed that this was what God wanted, and even told her mother this as she was stabbing her.
After Smith described Naidoo to her as a “blatant liar” she told Naidoo: “So, this is all about the money for you.” Naidoo did not reply.
Nicolette said Naidoo would have received all the money from her inheritance, because he was entitled to it as the son of God.
She said Naidoo had told the sibling their parents were evil and did not deserve what they had. He told them how to kill their parents.
He poisoned their minds against their parents, brainwashed them and reprogrammed her and she was like a puppet.
When Naidoo said “jump”, she asked “how high?”, Nicolette told the court.
Her boyfriend was not the only manipulator, she claimed.
“I actually suspect that his mother (Rita) might be the mastermind,” she alleged.
Naidoo was 21 at the time of the murder and his mother was 45. She was a single mother, earning R500. Her son had a girlfriend whose parents had everything and she would have benefited financially, Nicolette claimed.
When they met, Naidoo had been charming and caring, but he later became abusive and ridiculed her, saying that as he was the voice of God, she was being punished.
“At one stage he made me drink urine,” she said.
Nicolette earlier told the court that Naidoo told her and her brother that their parents had to be shot with a Taser (an electroshock weapon) and have air injected into their veins to induce heart attacks.
Asked how she felt about this, she said she could not oppose God, but was relieved that her parents would not feel pain.
After separating their parents and luring their mother to the kitchen, her brother came in with a Taser, she said.
Her brother did not want to Taser their mother and switched on the torch light instead of the Taser, she said.
As the Taser did not knock her out, they assaulted her.
She tried injecting air into a vein, but could not find one.
“We did not know how to kill someone,” she told the court.
She drove to the nearby Pavilion shopping centre where she fetched Naidoo
When they got back, her mother was still alive and bruised from the assault and her brother was holding down her mother, she said.
Naidoo told her that she had to stab her mother.
When she told him that she had done it, he told her several times to go back and make sure her mother was dead.
“I had to go back and stab my mother. I don't know how many times.”
After he was satisfied that her mother was dead, he said: “Good riddance to that bitch”, then stood over her body and said she had deserved to die.
Nicolette said she was still shaken up at the police station later on, but that Naidoo had shown no emotion.
“I asked him: 'How can you be so strong?' and he said: 'That's because I am not human'.”
She felt terrible about what had happened to her parents.
“I know what I did was wrong. I really have remorse for it.
“I am sorry for my parents and sister (Christelle), who has gone though all the pain,” she said.
She wished she could erase everything, but it was too late, and she wished she had never met Naidoo.
“I wish my parents were back to tell them how much I love them and thank them for all they did.”
“They did not deserve what happened.” - Sapa