Karabo was suicidal after abuse‚ miscarriage and rape‚ says Mantsoe
Karabo Mokoena had suffered a miscarriage after being beaten by a Nigerian boyfriend and had been emotionally scarred after being raped by one of her ex-lover’s friends.
She was also abused by her father and another Nigerian ex-boyfriend who‚ despite physically and emotionally abusing her‚ had gotten her hooked on the high life‚ giving her around R100‚000 monthly.
This was the grim image that Sandile Mantsoe painted of his 22-year-old lover‚ Mokoena‚ who he is now accused of killing.
These details are contained in a statement that Mantsoe gave to police on May 11‚ a day after he was arrested in connection with her disappearance.
In the High Court in Johannesburg on Thursday‚ Captain Rodgers Mahundla‚ who took down Mantsoe’s statement‚ read it out to the court.
The court heard how Mantsoe claimed he and Mokoena had started living together shortly after they began dating in September 2016 because the abuse Mokoena had suffered at her father’s hands had prevented her from going home.
“She [Karabo] had a miscarriage from her boyfriend from Nigeria. He had kicked her stomach and she lost the baby.”
Mantsoe added that Mokoena had also told him about how she had been raped by a friend of her ex-Nigerian lover‚ leaving her with emotional scars and depressed.
He alleged that she had repeatedly tried to take her own life.
“She saw the guy who allegedly raped her at Sandton Skye. She took my Mercedes Benz which was grey in colour and she crashed it because she wanted to commit suicide‚” Mantsoe said.
“[Another] attempt was at the place of my residence in Sandton Skye in 2017. I don’t remember the date but it was in March. She drank a lot of pills saying she wanted to commit suicide‚” he said‚ adding that he had to call security guards to come open his apartment as she had locked herself in.
“We found her sleeping next to a box of pills on the floor. She was very dizzy. There was a suicide note which she destroyed later.”
While Mantsoe is accused of murdering Mokoena‚ he has pleaded not guilty‚ saying she had committed suicide by stabbing herself in the neck.
His statement revealed how he had tried on numerous occasions to end their relationship but she always came back and apologised‚ wanting to fix it.
Mantsoe’s statement gave his version of how he had panicked when he came home to find her dead on his carpet.
“When I came home‚ I found Karabo on the carpet with blood coming from the neck… I panicked. I did not know what to do because there was a knife.”
He claimed to have dragged Mokoena’s body to the bathroom‚ left the apartment and gone in search of material that could help him get rid of the corpse.
“I went to go get a tyre at Lyndhurst and bought fuel and went to look for a place to go and dispose of her body. I found one and left the tyre and petrol there. I went back to my apartment and tried to figure out how to get the body out. I went to get a bin because I thought she could fit into the bin‚” he said.
He put the bin containing the body on the backseat of his car and drove to Lyndhurst.
“I put the tyre and fuel on her and I burnt her‚” he said.
“I didn’t kill her‚” he continued‚ adding that he had also not kidnapped her but she had come to his apartment willingly. He stressed that no one would have believed him had he said she committed suicide.
Mantsoe alleged earlier that on the morning before the suicide‚ the couple had had a fight‚ when he had wanted to end the relationship.
“I had told her that I no longer want to have sex because we both sleep with other people‚” Mantsoe’s statement read.
Other witnesses called before Mahundla have testified that Mantsoe admitted to killing Mokoena in a bid to end a blood ritual that the two of them had entered into to strengthen his forex business.
This version‚ however‚ which Mantsoe has vehemently denied‚ was not included in his official statement. Mahundla left the dock on Thursday with Mantsoe’s lawyer saying they had no cross-examination questions for him.
The trial continues on Friday.