Pastor and his two wives in court over four-month-old baby found in shallow grave near Hennops River
The three appeared in the Atteridgeville Magistrate's Court on charges that include premeditated murder, kidnapping and fraud, with the state alleging a funeral policy was taken out on the child.
A man described as a pastor and his two wives appeared in the Atteridgeville Magistrate’s Court on Monday in connection with the death of a four-month-old baby whose body was found in a shallow grave near the Hennops River in Pretoria.
The Gauteng spokesperson for the National Prosecuting Authority, Lumka Mahanjana, told the court that the three accused had taken out an insurance policy on the child and intended to claim against the baby’s death. “That was their motive, to kill the victim,” she said.
The three do not face identical charges. According to Mahanjana, accused number two, one of the wives, faces counts of conspiracy to commit murder and fraud. The pastor and the other wife face those charges together with premeditated murder, kidnapping, murder, human trafficking and robbery with aggravating circumstances.
The case was not reached on the merits. Legal aid representation was not in court, and the matter was postponed. “You must understand that today the legal aid was not in court, hence why we could not proceed with the matter,” Mahanjana said. It returns to court on 16 October for bail and legal aid.
Police account for the events leading to the baby’s death says the man and his two wives travelled with a 43-year-old woman and her baby to the Hennops River last week for a ritual. The man is alleged to have gone ahead with the woman, leaving the infant in the care of his wives. Police believe the woman was raped before she managed to escape. The baby’s body was later found in a shallow grave near the river.
As eNCA reported on 12 October, the three appeared before the Atteridgeville court on the same day.
What a South African reader will recognise in this matter is the shape of it. Atteridgeville is a township west of Pretoria, and the Hennops River runs through the rural and peri-urban edge south of the city, a short drive from the courthouse but a different world in terms of who is watching. Cases that begin with a ritual trip and end with a body in a shallow grave are not new to South African courts, and they are rarely resolved quickly. The magistrate’s court stage is about bail and legal aid, not about guilt.
The charges themselves carry the weight of the state’s case. Premeditated murder, kidnapping, human trafficking and robbery with aggravating circumstances are Schedule 6 offences under the Criminal Procedure Act, which places the burden on an accused person to show exceptional circumstances justifying release on bail. Conspiracy to commit murder and fraud are the counts that speak to the alleged insurance policy, and they are the ones the state will need to prove with documents as well as testimony.
For the family of the four-month-old, the court date on 16 October is the next fixed point. For everyone else in Atteridgeville and across Pretoria, the matter is a reminder of how quickly a child can disappear from a household and how long the courts can take to account for it.
