Girl offered herself as reward, court told

The 14-year-old Pietermaritzburg girl charged with having her grandmother slain by hitmen had broken down and cried while begging the men to kill her relative.

She even offered herself as a "reward" when they seemed reluctant to commit the crime.

This was the chilling evidence of self-confessed killer Sipho Elliott Hadebe, who is serving a 25-year jail term after pleading guilty to the crime.

According to him, the girl - who was just 12 at the time - had approached two strangers walking past her home and asked them to kill her grandmother.

Hadebe told the court that when he said the neighbours would hear, the accused had offered to turn the radio up loud. Once the murder had been committed, the girl walked out of the house to make sure no one would notice the killers leave.

The girl is charged with the murder of her grandmother Radha Govender, 59, who was a businesswoman in the area.

On Monday the Pietermaritzburg High Court wrapped up the case, Judgment is expected on Thursday.

The court also heard the testimony of Shaen Govender, the daughter of the deceased, who said her mother had doted on the accused and was very supportive of her.

She told the court that her mother loved the accused so much the two had slept in the same bed and she drove her to school. The accused had defied her own mother and went against her wishes to live with the deceased, she said.

Govender said she had found a voicemail left by the accused on the night of the murder in which she said: "Something has happened to mom. Please come home".

Hadebe told the court that he had been walking from a shebeen with his friend Vusumuzi James Shabalala when he noticed the girl pacing up and down in the street.

The girl, who was crying, asked them to come inside the house where she said she had problem and asked them for help.

She had pointed to a sleeping woman in bed and said "here is the bitch who killed my mother and father. I ask you to kill her".

Hadebe said he had climbed on the bed and stabbed the woman but the knife broke. Shabalala asked for another knife from the girl, who gave him two.

Hadebe said he had then stabbed the woman twice in the head and neck while Shabalala pressed a towel against her face.

After the murder the girl had brought them a bag full of jewellery and both men had removed a video machine, a satellite decoder and some clothes.