SA couple’s fatal brawl in Ireland

South Africans Cornelius and Angie Belling who apparently killed each other. They had been living in Ireland.

South Africans Cornelius and Angie Belling who apparently killed each other. They had been living in Ireland.

Published Dec 19, 2014

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Cape Town - A South African couple are believed to have knifed each other to death in an Irish village in County Clare.

Angie and Cornelius Belling’s two young children were being cared for by neighbours following their deaths around 7pm on Wednesday in the village of Kildysart, where the family had been living for a few months.

Angie Belling was 27 and her husband was 44.

The Irish Mirror and RTE, the Irish broadcaster, reported that police and firefighters had been dealing with a fire in a hardware shop when a bloodied woman carrying a small child ran out of a house across the road towards them.

She collapsed on the pavement, and the child ran back to the house. Police and firemen tended to the woman, discovering she had stab wounds to her neck and chest.

Paramedics arrived, but the woman died on the scene.

Police followed the child to a rented flat in the house where they found a man at the top of the stairs, also covered in blood. He spoke to the police briefly, but then succumbed and was pronounced dead.

Police later carried the two children, aged 3 and 5, from the house wrapped in blankets.

They were not believed to be injured.

A police spokesman said they were not looking for anyone else in connection with the double killing. They could not say at this stage whether the attacks represented two murders or a murder and a suicide.

“At the moment this is likely to be a case of the couple stabbing each other.

“This would appear to be a domestic that went drastically out of hand.”

* The South Africa Department of International Relations and Co-operation is trying to confirm reports of

the killings.

Dirco spokesman Clayson Monyela said it tried to follow up on the reports.

His colleague Nelson Kgwete said the SA Embassy in Dublin had dispatched a team to Kildysart on Thursday .

He said the team was expected to report back late on Thursday night.

Cape Argus and Cape Times

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