Pretoria - The so-called monster dad from the Springs house of horrors allegedly cuffed his 11-year-old son to a kitchen cupboard while he and his wife left to spend the weekend in Durban.
According to the mother, the boy was cuffed to the cupboard because he was naughty. She, however, said soon after they left, her husband phoned someone to uncuff him.
But security guard Gerhard Marais, who lived in a flat on the Springs premises, on Thursday told the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, that he uncuffed the boy some time on Friday afternoon in 2014 after the family had left. Another tenant on the premises, only identified as Uncle Kallie, who has since died, asked him to uncuff the child.
Uncle Kallie cuffed the child to the cupboard again on Sunday as he knew there would be trouble if the parents returned and the boy was not where they had left him.
Marais said Uncle Kallie called him one afternoon to assist in freeing the boy. He said when he got to the kitchen, the child was exhausted from standing with his arm in the air fastened to the cupboard.
He testified that he saw the eldest daughter in the house with one of her younger siblings. He did not see the other children and thus did not know if they left for Durban with the parents.
Marais said he seldom saw the children coming out of the house, but on the odd occasion he would see the 11-year-old had bruises on his face. From time to time, the mother also had bruises, he said.
“I often heard arguments in the house, but during those times, we stayed indoors, as we did not want to interfere.” He said the father, before he was jailed pending this trial, was a hefty man.
Marais testified in the trial of the 37-year-old parents, who may not be identified to protect their five children, whose ages ranged from 2 to 16 when the couple were arrested in 2014.
It was claimed that they attempted to murder the boy; the father severely assaulted him and the mother did nothing to assist her child.
The police were alerted by the neighbours that all was not well at the double-storey house in Plantation Street. This was when the boy, after he was assaulted, ran to the neighbours for help. His father, however, went to fetch him and took him back home.
It was further claimed that the father severely tortured the boy over a number of years. The child testified behind closed doors about the treatment he was subjected to.
His then 16-year-old sister was sexually abused. The smaller children were mostly spared, but allegedly neglected.
The mother claimed though her lawyer that she was subjected to abuse and that she could not assist her children.
The father, meanwhile, denied that he had cuffed the child to the kitchen cupboard and said the boy had a set of cuffs and he from time to time played with them by cuffing himself.
Judge Eben Jordaan was told that the cuffs were easy to open with a fork.
The mother, however, admitted her husband cuffed the naughty child, but denied it was meant to be for the entire weekend.
She was adamant that when they returned on the Sunday, the child was no longer cuffed.
The State closed its case, but said it would reopen it after a psychologist had delivered her expert evidence on behalf of the mother. The mother was said to be totally illiterate and could barley read or write.
Her Weskoppies Hospital report stated she did not have “an average intellectual functioning”.
The father, in a surprise turn of events, opted to close his case without testifying or calling any witnesses. This means that he did not refute the allegations made against him firsthand.
His advocate said she explained the consequences of this to him numerous times, but he refused to budge.
The trial resumes on Monday.
Pretoria News