A widow has been convicted of two murders after
contracting a man to kill her husband by hanging him in the bathroom of their
Standerton home, but when the alleged hitman blackmailed her for more money,
she had him killed as well.
The neatly dressed Portia Tsotsetsi, 27, wearing
gold-rimmed spectacles, appeared calm after Judge Tati Mokgoka, sitting in the
high court in Pretoria, convicted her of murdering her husband, Nzimeni Sithatu
and the alleged hitman, Dumisani Ngubeni.
Tsotsetsi claimed she had nothing to do with the two
murders. She had taken a sleeping tablet on the night of February 21, 2012. and
went to bed. When she woke up, she said, she discovered her husband hanging
from the ceiling in the bathroom.
It is claimed he was first killed in the bedroom and that
she and Ngubeni packed the blood-drenched bedding into a black plastic bag.
Ngubeni kept the bag with the soiled linen and apparently
blackmailed the widow for more money for not spilling the beans on her.
Ngubeni was killed three months later on May 16, 2012,
after Tsotsetsi called him to her home after “agreeing” to pay him for his
silence. When he arrived, she and co-accused Stanley Dube, 35, overpowered him
and stabbed him to death.
They loaded his body into a vehicle and dumped it in a
river.Dube was on Monday also convicted of murdering Ngubeni.
The neighbours said they found it weird that the widow
and Dube later burnt blankets and a carpet over an outside fire. The widow
explained she was simply spring-cleaning her house. She was arrested shortly
afterwards.
Sentencing will resume on January 19.
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