Cape Town - One of the last people to see Anene Booysen, before she was raped, mutilated and left for dead, testified that the Bredasdorp teen was “happy and laughing” outside a local pub.
Chrisna Mentoor was also asked to explain to the Swellendam Circuit Court why she had lied to police in a statement that Johannes Kana - on trial for Anene’s rape and murder - had gone home with her on the night before Anene was found raped and mutilated.
The court had heard earlier this week that 17-year-old Anene was at Kallies Pub on February 1 and that she and Kana were seen leaving the establishment together.
Judge Patricia Goliath asked Mentoor why she had initially lied to police.
She said she wanted to protect Kana, because he was a friend and she did not want to see him get hurt.
“He is a person who protects women, he doesn’t allow men to hit women.”
Judge Goliath questioned what mood Anene was in the last time she saw her.
Mentoor said she was happy and laughing.
Also on the witness stand on Wednesday was paramedic Wickus Kiewietz, who told the court he was dispatched to the crime scene after police had arrived at the Bredasdorp hospital to say that someone had been stabbed and that the injured person’s intestines were hanging out.
After arriving at the scene he and a colleague tried to assist Anene but she kicked and hit out at them as she did not want them to touch her.
“When we turned the patient on to her back we saw her intestines hang out. A drip was put on and trauma dressing was used to cover the intestines.”
After prosecutor Maria Marshall asked Kiewietz to look at pictures of the scene, he said it was Anene’s intestines which were stretched out on the sand.
Kiewietz told the court that, when they left Anene at the hospital, she was placed on another drip and she sat up in bed and asked for water because she was thirsty.
During cross-examination by Kana’s lawyer, Pieter du Toit, Kiewietz said a nurse asked Anene whether she knew who had committed the crime and she replied “yes”.
Earlier Mentoor and Kiewietz accompanied Judge Goliath and prosecutors to Bredasdorp for an in loco inspection to retrace the last steps of Anene on the night of February 1.
Kana arrived with his feet shackled and surrounded by police officers at the pub in Bastiaan Street. Mentoor pointed out the direction in which she had last seen Kana and Anene walking in the early hours of February 2. The entourage later entered the pub which was cordoned off to the media and public.
A large crowd had gathered outside the pub and at Asla site B where Anene was found.