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TOP private investigation firm Sleuth Consulting Services – whose directors are former high-profile police commanders Bushie Engelbrecht and Piet Byleveld – has been appointed to assist the investigation into the most violent farm attack in the Swartland area in decades.
The Malmesbury couple attacked on their cattle farm on November 18 are recovering as investigators have linked a suspect to the attack, via his fingerprints.
Engelbrecht, a former major- general and commander of the Special Investigations Unit, told Weekend Argus the “abhorrent attack” was the first in the Western Cape that his firm would investigate.
“We’re co-operating with the police with the joint aim of catching all involved, and getting a conviction,” he said.
Three criminals broke into the farmhouse at 3am, waking the couple. Two of the intruders dragged the farmer’s fiancée to the kitchen, where both raped her. Afterwards, she heard her fiancé being attacked with an axe in the bedroom. She believed he was being killed, and that she would be next. But minutes ticked by then at last she heard the criminals leave. At 4am she finally managed to push the panic button for help.
Police found the seriously injured couple at the farm a short while later.
The farmer’s father told Weekend Argus that his 26-year-old son, who cannot be named to protect his fiancée’s identity, had his hands and arms broken in the attack. He was released last Sunday from the Paarl Medi-Clinic, was walking, and had sustained no brain damage. He said this was amazing considering the scars from the axe attack.
He said his son remembered nothing of the attack, although he’d been told what happened. He had been struggling to sleep ever since.
The farmer’s 29-year-old fiancée was also receiving the necessary care and medication, the farmer’s father confirmed.
“She’s really an incredibly strong person. She’s much better now that my son is getting better. But I’m keeping a close watch on her, because I am so concerned.
“I feel so incredibly sorry for the children,” he said.
“The only thing that has pulled us through is the immense support we have received internationally and nationwide,” the father said.
Thys Swart, head of the Western Cape Simmentaler Club, where the farmer is a fellow board member, described him as “a gentle giant with red hair”. He said he had spoken to him on Thursday for the first time since the attack.
“He can’t write because his hands and arms are so seriously injured. That’s why he specially called me to ask that I thank everyone on his and his fiancée’s behalf for all the prayers, letters, good wishes, SMSes and flowers. They honestly appreciate it,” Swart said.
Malmesbury police spokesman Henry du Randt said police had matched footprints to the soles of blood-spattered takkies found in the suspect’s possession when he was arrested. Some of the couple’s possessions were found on him.
Detained four days after the attack, the suspect, aged 28, is a known criminal. He had refused to talk about the crime, or name his two accomplices, which had hampered the investigation, said Du Randt.
The suspect appeared briefly in the Malmesbury Magistrate’s Court on Friday, charged with attempted murder, rape and house robbery.
The attack is one of four farm attacks in the Western Cape this year. In February, Stellenbosch farmer Alberto Costa was shot dead. Last month an elderly couple were attacked and robbed on their farm in Vredendal, while a 59-year-old woman was shot and seriously injured on a farm in Grabouw.
Police have arrested suspects in all the cases. – Weekend Argus
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Top private sleuths to help probe farm attack