Pretoria - A young Mamelodi East man dubbed the Facebook serial rapist as he befriended young women - mostly teenagers - on Facebook and later communicated with them through WhatssApp before he met them in person and raped and robbed them, admitted to all his evil deeds.
The clean shaven and well kempt Sedzani Muthuhadini Ndou was barely 18-years-old when he ran a reign of terror among young women, especially in Mamelodi.
Ndou was on Tuesday convicted in the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, on 16 charges, ranging from mostly rape charges to robbery.
He had raped five women over about a three month period in 2016, before he was eventually arrested.
His arrest came about after a friend of one of the teenagers lured him into a trap when she too, befriended him on Facebook. The two made arrangements to meet, but unbeknown to Ndou, she took the police along to their meeting spot.
Although Ndou was only connected via DNA evidence to three of the victims, who were aged between 15 and 21, he was ready to admit to all the charges against him.
It was, however, said in court that apart from all his victims who identified him as their attacker, the fact that his modus operandi was always the same, left no doubt that he was the culprit in all the cases.
Ndou opened a fake Facebook account, using the picture of an unknown young man, called Junior and pretended it was him.
He and his victims chatted for some time on Facebook and they usually exchanged pictures - him using fake pictures which belonged to an unidentified person.
He also communicated with his victims through WhatsApp and eventually they decided to meet with each other.
Ndou usually arranged to meet his victims at a Spar supermarket in Mamelodi. Ndou would arrive and introduced himself as Mpho, the cousin of Junior. Ndou then told his victims that Junior was busy and he had send him to fetch them and take them to his home.
Ndou walked his victims through bushes to “Junior’s house” where he suddenly turned on them. He usually forced them to perform sexual deeds on him, before he then raped them.
He admitted that he afterwards threatened to beat them up if they did not give him their belongings. He mostly robbed his victims of cash and cellphones, before running away and leaving them there.
“I knew my actions were wrong and punishable, but I still intended to rape and rob my victims,” he said in his explanation of plea.
Ndou was quite happy to plead guilty to all the charges, even though he was told by his advocate that he could possibly face life imprisonment.
A social worker will on May 2 present a report regarding Ndou to court, to be used for sentencing purposes. Judge Eben Jordaan was told by the defence that it was important due to Ndou’s youthful age.
He appeared relaxed in the dock awaiting his fate and smilingly chatted to family members in the public gallery before the proceedings started.
His victims and their families meanwhile packed the public gallery and they were ready to testify against them.
They were, however, grateful that Ndou had pleaded guilty, which spared them the hardship of reliving their nightmare ordeal in the witness box.
The woman vowed to be back in May to see him go to jail for a long time.