An elderly Mpumalanga couple is under police guard in hospital after being set alight by a mob who accused them of killing their 18-year-old grandson.
Police spokesperson, Brigadier Leonard Hlati, said on Tuesday that members of the Mayosi community outside Nelspruit accosted the couple, aged between 75 and 80, and started questioning them about the death of the teenager.
"Subsequent to the interrogation, the community members took the law into their own hands by setting the couple alight with tyres," he said.
Hlathi said police were summoned to the scene and rescued the couple, who will face charges of murder once they are discharged from the hospital.
He said preliminary investigations showed that their grandson, whose body was found in bushes, might have been poisoned.
No arrests have yet been made in connection with the mob attack on the elderly murder suspects.
- African News Agency (ANA)
