Johannesburg - Alyssa Botha’s father’s dream was to see her compete for South Africa in the Olympics one day. At 13, Alyssa was already an athlete to be reckoned with.
The teenager represented South Africa in a cross-country athletics in Mozambique and also had provincial colours in hockey.
Anton Botha felt sure his daughter would go far in sport.
However, on September 5, 2012, Botha’s hopes and dreams for her were shattered when armed men shot the 13-year-old dead in front of him and his other daughter.
Botha - who was with surviving daughter, Meghan - expressed irritation in the Gauteng Division of the High Court, sitting in Palm Ridge, where three Mozambican men, Alfred Zwane, Samson Mandlezi and Manir Ubisi, are accused of Alyssa’s murder.
“How do you explain losing a child to people who don’t care? What angers me is their arrogance. They turned around and looked at me and my daughter… you could even see the smirks on their faces,” he said of the trio on Monday.
Zwane, Mandlezi and Ubisi are alleged to have terrorised the Muldersdrift community, leaving death and mayhem in their wake.
On the day Alyssa was killed, Botha had just arrived at his plot when three men attacked the family. He was shot in the abdomen while Meghan was shot twice in her legs.
Alyssa was also shot in the abdomen and died at the scene.
The attackers were not interested in the new car Botha was driving and took only three cellphones and a wallet.
The following week, they allegedly shot André Jordaan - who lived in the same road as the Bothas - seven times. He died in hospital.
The assailants took his TV and three cellphones.
The trio also face two cases of attempted murder and several robberies after a spate of attacks on Muldersdrift residents in 2012.
Judgment
was expected to be handed down on Tuesday.
The Star