Africa-Press – South-Africa. A man accused of being a gangster and involved in a triple murder in Cape Town said he kicked the daughter of one of the survivors off the roof of a house, but only because the mother had asked him to get her down.
“I kicked her in the face,” said Moegamat “Gamie” Swarts when he was cross-examined by his lawyer in the Western Cape High Court on Wednesday.
He said he was walking down the road in Uitsig on his way to court, with his girlfriend, when “Auntie Glenda” Ruiters asked him to get her daughter off the roof.
He testified the mother had told him she had stolen items from their house – and she wanted the daughter brought off the roof. The court heard the daughter was standing on a corrugated iron roof, holding on to a pole.
Swarts testified that he used the plaster cast wall next to the house to climb onto the roof.
“And then I kicked her off the roof,” Swarts told Judge Robert Henney. “I kicked her in the face,” he said. She fell into the backyard.
He climbed down and started walking again. He said Ruiters was hitting her daughter with a broom when he left – and the daughter said to him: “You will see.”
Swarts, Mahlubandile “Hlubi” Jacobs, Vincent “Skelato” Davids and a man, who was a minor at the time, face three charges of murder, one of attempted murder, charges of being in possession of ammunition and guns illegally, and for being part of a pattern of gang activity.
Christie Cornelius and his granddaughter were shot dead in Geranium Street, Uitsig, in March 2019.
Cornelius was apparently killed because he did not want to join a new gang, called Ama Don’t Care. The old-school 26’er had had enough of the gang life. His four-year-old granddaughter was playing near the bakkie he was leaning against, and she was also killed.
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The court heard the Ama Don’t Care were understood to have recruited people from the 28s and the 26s in Uitsig, in the wake of another gang – called the G-Unit – being “dismantled” when one of its leaders was shot dead.
The next month, someone knocked at Ruiters’ door – and, as she opened it, she was shot in the head and died. She might have become an eyewitness in the case. Her daughter ran away in a panic. Although she was also shot, she survived.
Swarts’ lawyer, Mike Pothier, reminded him the daughter had testified that she actually kicked him off the roof earlier in 2019, not the other way around.
However, Swarts insisted his version was the correct one. He has denied being part of any gang activity, or belonging to any gang, or having anything to do with the murders. The trial continues.
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