No R9m payout after wife's 'hijack' slaying

09 October 2016 - 02:00 By PHILANI NOMBEMBE

It reads like a movie script: extortion, divorce, a corrupt police officer, money, alcohol and guns. These are the explosive issues at the heart of a protracted legal tussle between Mpumalanga businessman Pieter Johannes Muller and Sanlam over a R9-million life insurance payout.Ten years after the death of his wife, Maryna, Muller is refusing to admit defeat.Even though he divorced Maryna several years before he took out the policies, he claims they were still madly in love and ended their marriage for "business reasons".The couple were running a successful equipment hire firm in Ermelo when Maryna died in a hail of bullets during an alleged hijacking in Pretoria in September 2006.story_article_left1Four days earlier she had survived another shooting at a three-way stop in Nestpark, Benoni. After the "hijacking" her body was found in the passenger seat of their Toyota Prado with the seatbelt still fastened. Nothing was stolen.Sanlam suspected Muller of orchestrating her murder, but a decade later no one has been arrested. The insurer refuses to pay out four life policies, arguing the claim has lapsed - and that Muller was complicit in her killing.Last week, the Supreme Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal against a judgment in favour of Sanlam by the High Court in Cape Town.In a bizarre twist in 2007, Muller paid R28,000 to a top-ranking Brooklyn detective, Superintendent Deon Snyders, for a letter stating he was not a suspect so that Sanlam would release the money.Snyders was bust upon demanding another R10,000 from Muller, and a trap was sprung. He was convicted of corruption and fired.An inquest found that the killing was committed "by persons unknown to the state". In an affidavit, investigating officer Senior Superintendent Rudolf van Olst told the inquest Muller's explanation of what transpired was improbable.Muller claimed he and Maryna went to look for trucks in Pretoria on the evening of the alleged hijacking, saying that he stopped next to the highway to urinate "as he has a weak bladder". The car was hijacked with Maryna inside."There is no evidence of a person urinating at the scene, no visual evidence of the deceased's husband, Mr Muller, walking up the bridge, Muller's version that the highway was very busy at the time, the blood pattern in the vehicle. [and] R50,000 which is not properly accounted for," said Van Olst.mini_story_image_hright1"The fact that Muller went to look for trucks in the evening while all the products available are to be viewed on the company's website; the fact that there was an attempt on the life of the deceased where only the deceased's husband Pieter Muller knew where she would be; and [the fact] there is no frequency of crime in that area; the fact that the deceased was insured; ... and Muller's corrupt relationship with Snyders ... places huge suspicion on Pieter Muller and [one of his employees]."But Muller painted a rosy picture of the couple's relationship. He told the inquest they had a bath together at a Pretoria guesthouse and Maryna drank a lot of wine before they went out for dinner.The guesthouse owner, however, said only one towel was used, nothing was found in the bins and the room was clean.Gauteng police spokesman Colonel Lungelo Dlamini said the case had been tentatively closed."Although the vehicle was found partially burnt, no one [has been] identified as the suspect or linked to the murder up to this stage."When the life insurance company dug in its heels over the payout of R8,876,000, Muller hauled it before the High Court in Cape Town in 2011. Sanlam argued his claim had lapsed and he "was complicit in the death of his former wife".When he went to the SCA almost 10 years after his wife's death, judges lambasted him and his lawyers for tardiness, struck his appeal off the roll and ordered him to pay costs. "I consider that Muller and his legal advisers have conducted this litigation in a deplorable fashion," Judge Carole Lewis said...

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