A father of two was sentenced to life imprisonment on Monday, for the violent and brutal murder of his elderly neighbour, after he had smoked a mixture of dagga and crushed mandrax – known in the criminal underworld as “witpyp”.
Ryan Faure, 36, a carpenter by trade, stabbed Susan Loubser, 79, multiple times in the chest and neck, before dragging her bleeding body from the front door to her bedroom, and dumping the body on her bed.
He was brought to book after he had boasted about the slaying, and asked friends to find a buyer for a TV set that he had removed from the deceased woman’s home.
He appeared in the Parow Regional Court, before magistrate Constance Nziweni, who sentenced him to life for the murder (25 years), and 15 years for breaking into the elderly woman’s home with intent to commit robbery.
Both sentences were to run concurrently which, technically, means that he serves both sentences together, instead of doing the one first, and then the other.
His father told the court that his son was a “good man”, and that he even did duty with the neighbourhood watch, but the magistrate said it was obvious that the father did not know his son as well as he thought he did.
The magistrate agreed with prosecutor Daniel Cloete that Faure had attacked an elderly, frail and defenceless woman, knowing that he could easily overpower any resistance against his vicious and brutal attack.
The court heard that a neighbour had heard the deceased woman’s screams, and had telephoned her son about it.
The son had rushed to his mother’s home, to find that her body had been dragged from the front door to the bedroom, and dumped on her bed.
The magistrate said Faure had shown no remorse, and had maintained his innocence throughout the case. He had also tried to frame State witnesses as liars, in order to save his own skin, she said.
By maintaining his innocence, he had compelled the prosecutor to call the deceased woman’s family to testify in the case, she said.
She said Faure could have spared the family the ordeal, and the court regarded this as aggravation. She said Faure had had ample time, as he watched the deceased woman’s movements in her home, to change his mind about attacking her, and to think about what would happen to his own children if he were jailed.
Instead, he had proceeded to attack and murder her, the magistrate said.
She said she had sympathy for the children, but that Faure himself was the cause of their predicament.
She added: “Neighbours are supposed to protect one another, but you chose to kill your neighbour.”
She said Faure had watched the deceased woman from his own home, before attacking her, “and if that is not premeditation, then I don’t know what is”.
She said violence and brutality was endemic in the country, and the courts had a duty to punish it severely, and to send out appropriate messages to the different communities.
She told Faure: “Life imprisonment may be harsh, but this court is strongly of the view that it is the only appropriate sentence for you – the only sentence that will send out the correct message.”
She also declared him unfit to possess a firearm.
-African News Agency (ANA)
