By Natasha Joseph
It was likely that Norman Afzal Simons was responsible for the deaths of six young boys counted among the victims of the notorious Station Strangler, an inquest magistrate has found.
Mitchells Plain regional court magistrate Marelize Rolle said she believed, however, that any attempt to prosecute Simons would be unsuccessful because so much time had passed since the string of murders in the late 1980s and early 1990s and because crucial witnesses has died.
Rolle was giving her findings on Monday after the three-year inquest into the deaths of Owen Hofmeester, Donovan Swartz, Elino Sprinkle, Marcelino Cupido, Fabian Wilmore and an unidentified boy.
The boys ranged in age from eight to 14. Their bodies were found on sand dunes in Mitchells Plain in 1994. All were in an advanced state of decomposition.
The Station Strangler terrorised Mitchells Plain and surrounding communities from 1986 to 1994. In all, 21 boys were believed to be the Strangler's victims. Most were sodomised, the majority were strangled, and the victims were almost always found lying on their stomachs, with their hands tied behind their backs.
Simons, then 27, was arrested in April 1994 and later convicted of the murder of 11-year-old Elroy van Rooyen. He received a life sentence, which he is serving in the Drakenstein Maximum Correctional Centre in Paarl. Security was tight in the courtroom on Monday.
Six uniformed Department of Correctional Services officials, all visibly armed, surrounded the dock and asked members of the public who were not older than 18 to leave before proceedings could begin.
Simons, a former primary school teacher, entered the courtroom in leg irons.
He wore a white shirt, navy blue trousers, a dark tie and a khaki bulletproof vest.
He did not look towards the public gallery and sat down immediately, focusing his attention on Rolle.
About an hour into Rolle's long delivery of her findings, Simons became agitated.
He removed the bulletproof vest, asked a police officer for a cup of water, and then began rocking slightly from side to side, shaking his head and crying as the magistrate outlined the evidence against him.
Rolle granted a 20-minute adjournment, during which Simons was comforted by his attorney's wife.
When Rolle returned, she said there was no reason for Simons to stay in the courtroom if he did not want to.
Simons was led back to the cells beneath the courtroom.
One woman in the public gallery urged him to "be strong" and he nodded in response.
In delivering her verdict, Rolle said that while there was no DNA evidence linking Simons to the six boys' murder and his handwriting did not match that on a note found in one victim's pocket, there was enough prima facie evidence to hold him responsible for their deaths.
Simons had been seen with at least two of the dead boys in the months leading up to their murders.
His confessions following his 1994 arrest also served as evidence against him, Rolle said.