Port Alfred – The perseverance of Port Alfred detectives paid off on Friday with the arrest of a man suspected of the gruesome double murder of an elderly couple in Knysna two weeks ago, Eastern Cape police said.
Following nine days of relentless searching, the detective team of Warrant Officer Daluxolo Soci and Constables Debbie Hilpert, Siyabonga Doyi, and Thobela Ntozini, under the command of Lt-Col Ncamisa Donkrag, finally caught up with the suspect, 36, in Hamburg in the Peddie area, Lieutenant Luvuyo Mjekula said in a statement.
“He is the primary suspect in the gruesome murder of two elderly residents, aged 60 and 65, of the coastal Knysna town on 1 August 2015.”
The couple were attacked in their residence in Lindsay Street, Hunters Home.
The wife was found in the living room inside the house with her throat slit. Her husband was found with serious head injuries in a pool of blood in the garage. He died later in hospital.
The couple’s dark green Isuzu vehicle was stolen.
After Knysna police sought the assistance of other SA Police Service stations throughout the Eastern Cape, the Port Alfred crime intelligence unit received information that the vehicle and stolen property were hidden in Port Alfred’s Nemato township.
The unit and the Grahamstown vehicle identification unit followed up on the information and recovered the vehicle and property. A woman, believed to be the suspect’s wife, was arrested.
She appeared in court in Knysna, was refused bail, and was currently in custody there.
Since last Thursday evening, Port Alfred detectives had been on the hunt for the suspect.
“For nine days I and my team have not slept. On Thursday we were supposed to knock-off at 10pm but since then we have been working around the clock with no sleep,” said Donkrag.
The team finally made a breakthrough on Friday.
Donkrag said they found the suspect at about 3.40pm watching TV with a girlfriend in a shack. They also recovered the victims’ cellphone and the vehicle keys.
The suspect was currently in custody in Port Alfred and would be transported to Knysna on Sarturday. He would appear in the Knysna Magistrate’s Court on Monday on charges of house robbery, murder, and theft of a motor vehicle.
Donkrag and her team, assisted by the Port Alfred K-9 unit, were praised by, among others, Eastern Cape visible policing head Brigadier Malibongwe Ntsabo and Port Alfred police cluster commander Colonel Vuyile Gcaba.
“As we are working, we are serving the South African Police Service, not Port Alfred alone,” Donkrag said.
“We wanted to avoid that he commits further crimes in the Eastern Cape. He was already making threats to shoot me and kidnap my children; he showed no remorse and was not scared to tell everyone about the incident,” she said.
ANA