Johannesburg - A depressed Meyerton man stabbed his ex-fiancée to death on Monday, then picked up her dog, drove in her car to the nearby R59 highway and stepped in front of a truck.
Shaun Pretorius is believed to have been driven to stab Madezelle Smit because she had ended their 12-year relationship recently.
He then killed himself along with her beloved dog Bubbles.
A friend of Smit said on Tuesday that she had never liked Pretorius as he was controlling.
Vereeniging police confirmed on Tuesday morning that Pretorius, 32, had stabbed Smit to death at his parents’ home in Meyerton.
“The deceased had multiple stab wounds on her body,” said police spokesman Captain Shado Mashobane.
“The dog was also killed in the process when the suspect ran in front of a fast-moving truck,” said Mashobane.
The pair had broken up recently and the police said it was unclear why Smit had gone to Pretorius’s family home with her dog.
One of Smit’s best friends was tearful this morning about her murder.
“I never liked him, I always said to her she must leave him,” said Mariska van Eeden, adding that shortly after this Pretorius had banned Smit from seeing her.
According to Van Eeden, Pretorius was “disrespectful” towards Smit and that the friends hadn’t seen each other often for about two years since he had placed the ban on their friendship.
However Van Eeden said Smit had recently started a new relationship, which both she and the police suspect could have motivated the murder.
“We cannot say what triggered Shaun to do the killing, however we cannot rule out that fact that this could have been influenced by the relationship that has broken (sic),” said Mashobane.
Van Eeden said she regretted not speaking to her friend when she heard she had started a new relationship.
“I was going to phone her yesterday morning, but I went to the gym and just got so busy. There’s no words to describe how much I loved her.
“She was such a loving person, so bubbly and always smiling. She was so beautiful, so kind and always helping everyone,” said Van Eeden.
She said she had been informed of Smit’s murder on Monday afternoon by her aunt. The initial rumour was that there had been a robbery in which her friend had been stabbed.
Just hours before her murder, Smit shared a photo on Facebook of a plant breaking through soil, next to the words: “The tiny seed knew that in order to grow, it needed to be dropped in dirt, covered in darkness and struggle to reach the light.”
Besotted with Bubbles, Smit and Pretorius had made a Facebook profile for the dog.
The Star