Tell the truth, woman begs husband's killer

Tiffany Dawn Govender with her mother-in-law, Sarojeni Govender, outside the Durban High Court. Picture: Zanele Zulu

Tiffany Dawn Govender with her mother-in-law, Sarojeni Govender, outside the Durban High Court. Picture: Zanele Zulu

Published Dec 22, 2016

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Durban - This will be the second Christmas Tiffany Govender spends without her husband Seshen.

But on Wednesday the 26-year-old Parlock widow was able to get some closure when her husband’s killer was sentenced in the Durban High Court to life imprisonment.

Twenty-six-year-old Leeroy Smith was given the maximum sentence by Acting Judge Anuradha Kallideen for what she deemed was premeditated murder.

He was also sentenced to 15 years for robbery with aggravating circumstances and another 15 years for illegally possessing a firearm. These sentences are to run concurrently.

Seshen was shot five times in the face and his body dumped in John Dory Drive in Newlands East on March 10, 2015, days before his 21st birthday.

His BMW was found abandoned in KwaMashu, some 15km away.

Speaking outside court shortly after the sentencing, Tiffany said she wished the death sentence was an option because it was the only sentence suitable for her husband’s killer.

She said Smith had deprived her son, Levi, of a father. Seshen was murdered a few months after his son was born.

“This was no ordinary killing, it was brutal and cold-blooded,” she said.

Tiffany last saw her husband on March 9 after he left her to meet Smith.

His body was found the next day by municipal workers at a park in Newlands East.

Ryan Santos and Marlin Ballentine were initially arrested with Smith, but Ballentine later turned State witness and testified against Smith.

Santos was tried separately and found guilty of robbery with aggravating circumstances and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment and eight years for possession of an unlicensed firearm.

The distraught widow said she welcomed the life sentence, but felt life imprisonment was nothing compared to the loss she and her son suffered when her husband was killed.

“My son was robbed of his father. He will never get to see his dad, ever. It is the most painful thing for a son to grow up without a father,” she said.

She said Levi had been 11 months old when her husband was killed.

Her husband sold jewellery and was planning to sell his car and save the money for their son’s first birthday party.

“He was a loving and caring man. He took care of us and worked as a car mechanic so he could support me and the baby. He did not live to see his son,” she said.

The young mother said

she hoped to have face-to-face conversation with her husband’s killer.

“I still do not believe he shot him five times in the face with the intention of robbing my husband. I think there is more to this.

“I will keep visiting him over and over again until he gets annoyed and tells me the truth. I will never find real peace, not until I talk to him. I want to know the real reason why he did it.”

Seshen’s mother, Sarojeni, was also in court on Wednesday.

She cried after the sentence was handed down and thanked the police officers who had worked tirelessly to put her son’s killer behind bars.

She said her husband, who could not come to court as he had suffered a stroke, would be delighted to hear justice had been served.

“It has been too long waiting. I know that my husband is anxiously waiting at home for me to come back and tell him the good news. It’s comforting to know that at least my son’s killer will rot in jail.”

When handing down her decision, the acting judge said there were no factors that justified mercy in this case.

“Society needs to be protected from people like the accused. You showed no remorse and robbed the deceased of an opportunity to raise his son,” she said to Smith.

Smith’s lawyer, advocate Jay Naidoo, had applied for leave to appeal against the conviction and sentence, which Kallideen dismissed saying the case had no prospects of succeeding in another court.

Daily News

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