Pretoria – Bonolo Gwendolene Lekalakala was so desperate to kill her mother and stepfather that when the deadly Blue Death insect killer she laced their drinks with did not work, she had both strangled with a USB and cellphone charger cable.
The 20-year-old then dumped their bodies in the Hennops River in Centurion. She gave no reason why she wanted her mother, Eva Beetge, 49, and her husband Piet Beetge, 59, of Capital Park, dead.
She told the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, she and her two co-accused, her boyfriend Raymond (Thapelo) Molokomme, 25, and Nicholas Kgaugelo Rapelego, also 25, planned to kill her parents.
At first, they laced the pair’s drinks with Blue Death. When that did not work, they strangled them on December 26, 2015.
Lekalakala pleaded guilty and was convicted of the double murder.
Her co-accused still have to plead. Lekalakala said in her explanation of plea that her boyfriend suggested they kill her parents.
She at first did not agree, but later warmed to the idea.
On the day before the killings – Christmas Day – she and her mother had an argument over the phone, she said.
“I told Thapelo we should kill my parents. I bought poison. When I got home I apologised to my mother and we made up.” Her mother and stepfather were sitting in the lounge, drinking, and her stepfather asked her to pour him another drink.
“I mixed Amarula with the poison and gave them their drinks. My stepfather drank it all; my mother did not.”
Her stepfather went to have a nap, while the mother remained in the lounge.
Lekalakala locked up the dogs and switched off the power to the house. She then allowed her co-accused into the house.
“Kgaugelo grabbed my mother around the neck and kicked her legs. My mother fell to the ground and Thapelo put his hand over her mouth. Kgaugelo asked for a shoe lace but I gave him a USB cable. They strangled her by each holding on to an end of the cable and pulling it. After the strangulation I felt her pulse and she was dead.”
They then went to her stepfather’s room where he was sleeping, she said. Lekalakala said her boyfriend asked her to fetch a knife and he fetched a brick.
“Kgaugelo hit my stepfather in the face with the brick and he woke up. Thapelo placed the charger around his neck and both strangled him.”
The bodies were loaded into a car and dumped in the river.