Durban — The murder trial of a mother and her daughter whose bodies were stuffed into a suitcase and dumped near the Umgeni River on Lwandle Drive in KwaDabeka, is expected to go ahead in the Durban High Court on Tuesday.
Slindile Pamela Zamisa, her daughter Andile Zamisa, 23, and a teenager are charged with the kidnapping and murders of Smangele Simamane and her daughter, Sbongakonke Mthembu,12.
The trial was supposed to begin on Monday however Judge Graham Lopes was unable to hear it as he has an ongoing trial before him from 2018 that he needs to finalise.
Dressed in black the Zamisa’s stood in the dock after their matter was called, and the teenager rushed to join them clad in full school uniform.
Last week the teen, who had been 13, at the time of the alleged murders in 2020 had been wearing high heels. The Zamisa’s remain behind bars after being denied bail last year while the teenager is out on warning and released into the custody of a guardian.
They are represented by a Legal Aid attorney Zeera Fareed and the teen has a private attorney, Thulani Mlondo.
Speaking outside court Simamane’s mother in-law Nomkhosi Simamane who lives with the couple’s 3-year-old toddler, said since the discovery of the bodies, she had kept every newspaper article to show the little girl when she is old enough to understand.
“The toddler still asks why her mother went to work and never came back. I tell her that I am her mother.”
Zamisa’s lover as well as her stepdaughter have served nearly a year of the sentences handed down to them by the Pietermaritzburg High Court for their part in the killings.
Zamisa’s stepdaughter Nomfundo Truelove Ngcobo was sentenced to 20 years while Nicholas Sithembiso Lamula got six years imprisonment.
They pleaded guilty to the murders and were convicted and sentenced last year.
In her plea, Ngcobo said that the motive for the killing was that she believed that Simamane was part of a group of people who were responsible for her father’s death through witchcraft.
In his plea, Lamula said Zamisa managed to lure Simamane and her daughter to a house in Durban where she blamed them for a close relative’s death.
WhatsApp your views on this story at 071 485 7995.
Daily News