Instant justice

A night out for an alleged ex-convict on parole nearly ended in tragedy, when the man was cornered by an angry mob and nearly beaten to death. The incident happened last Thursday evening and took place late at night in the bushes not far from the village of Hamangilasi in the Vuwani area.

Information that this paper managed to piece together is that the man, who is alleged to have done his time in prison and is out on parole, set out armed with a big panga, an iron rod and condoms. The suspicion is that he was in search of victims to rob and to rape.

He alleged targetted a household at Mabangani, where he tried to force his way into a house. When the owner of the house realised the presense of the intruder, she shouted at the top of her voice, which alerted neighbours. They rushed to the scene and, on seeing that people were about to attack him, the alleged robber fled the scene on foot.

He outsmarted them, but they had already identified him.

Community members grouped themselves together and set out hunting him, and he was found later dancing at a local tavern. On seeing the mob, the man knew that they were after him and he fled the tavern, with the mob in hot pursuit.

He was caught not far from one of the liquor outlets in the village. The angry community members dispensed instant justice, hitting him with whatever they could lay their hands on. The man was badly injured, with some of his limbs broken. He passed out and was saved by the timely arrival of the police, otherwise the angry mob would have cut off his genitals as they had threatened.

The police guarded him until emergency pesonnel arrived and administered first aid before taking him to hospital. Next to the man was his panga and some condoms.

A community member who preferred annonymity said the community had had enough of the man's criminality. "This man ran away from a centre for returning prisoners out on parole to come and terrorise us. Since he came back, so many incidents of robbery and attempted rapes have occurred in the village and all fingers are pointing at him. We are tired of crime here and I just wish the police had not arrived, so that we could have dealt with him ourselves."

She also added that "rapists deserve to be castrated, so that they will not do crime again."

W/O Elijah Malatjie of the Vuwani police confirmed the incident, saying a man had been attacked by a mob in the village. "We have opened an attempted murder case. So far, we have not made any arrests as we are waiting for the victim to heal up, so that we can take a statement from him." He added that their investigations were continuing and he warned the community not to take the law into their own hands.

Date:24 April 2015

By: Elmon Tshikhudo

Elmon Tshikhudo started off as a photographer. He developed an interest in writing and started submitting articles to local as well as national publications. He became part of the Limpopo Mirror family in 2005 and was a permanent part of the news team until 2019.

Read: 12688