Cape Town – Four men will face charges of murder, rape and robbery with aggravated circumstances for the killing of 16-year-old Franziska Blöchliger in Tokai Forest, prosecutors said as the suspects appeared in Wynberg Magistrate’s Court on Friday.
The case was postponed until next Friday and the four, three in their 20s and one aged 32, would remain in custody until then.
The State told the court the suspects would each face one count of murder, three of rape and one of robbery with aggravated circumstances. According to the State, semen had been found at the scene and was sent for analysis.
Prosecutors said the teenager was raped and sodomised.
The matter was postponed to March 18 and the suspects were to remain in custody.
Franziska was found murdered on Monday after the 16-year-old had separated from her mother at Tokai forest to go for a run. Her body was discovered roughly 200 metres from the meeting point her and her mother had agreed on.
She was robbed of her iPhone and her mother’s red tracking watch.
Three suspects were arrested on Tuesday night in connection with the murder, while a fourth suspect was arrested later in connection with Franziska’s stolen property.
One of the suspects is from Steenberg and the other three from Westlake. It is understood that one them is the son of a Pollsmoor prison warden and that one had a troubled history of drug abuse.
“This laaitie’s (kid’s) father is a warden,” said a member of the court gallery, who asked not to be named.
Another colleague of the father said the suspect came from a “good home” with “good parents”.
The colleague said it was drugs that was destroying the community, allegedly pushed by “a quiet, young coloured man Farouk”.
African News Agency