Man sues after arrest for Bafana player’s murder
The man arrested for killing Jeffrey Nkuta is claiming R250 000 for wrongful arrest and claims a cop assaulted him.
|||Pretoria - When former Kaizer Chiefs and Bafana Bafana defender Jeffrey Ntuka was stabbed and died at the age of 27 in 2012, police thought they had their man and arrested JM Makhetha, 21, from Kroonstad.
But now Makhetha is claiming R250 000 for wrongful arrest and claims he was assaulted by police.
On Monday acting Judge Japie Strydom, ordered police pay to Makhetha the damages he could prove he had suffered; a value to be determined later.
Ntuka was fatally stabbed in January 2012 after an alleged drunken brawl at a Kroonstad tavern. In February, Makhetha was arrested and detained for hours.
His mother, Gladys Makhetha, testified her son, who was living with her, went to a tavern that night. She was later woken up by her son screaming that “someone wanted to kill him”.
She opened the door and was confronted by a number of armed men surrounding her son.
She asked what he had done but said she was met with silence. She saw her son was on the ground and the men were kicking him.
When a police vehicle pulled up outside, she believed her son would be safe. But this was short-lived as her son was further manhandled by uniformed police officers, she testified, before he was thrown into the van and it drove off.
She said two armed men then insisted on searching her home for someone called Motintinyane.
The next morning her son came home, his eyes swollen and he was covered in bruises. He told his mother those who assaulted him believed him to be one Motintinyane.
Makhetha testified that when he was at the tavern a stranger had come up to him and asked his name. The man placed his arm around Makhetha’s neck, accused him of lying, and punched him in the face.
Makhetha was terrified and tried to run from the tavern, but a group barred his exit.
He forced his way out and ran home, but they came after him.
He heard them saying they were going to shoot “this guy” so he hid in bushes outside his house. When he saw the police car stop and heard his mother’s voice, he thought he was safe and came out of hiding.
But the police and the men he had encountered at the tavern assaulted him. He was grabbed by his clothes and thrown into the van. He said he was assaulted further at the police station until a female officer told her colleagues he was not Motintinyane. He was then told to go home.
A doctor noted all his injuries and he laid a charge against the police. They refused to open a case and only did so after a lawyer intervened.
The police testified that when Ntuka was stabbed to death the killer was identified as a person by the name of Motintinyane.
Some of the police knew this person and knew where he lived with his mother. The investigating officer said he made copies of this person’s picture and circulated it among the detectives. The court was told that the arrest and assault never happened because the police knew what Motintinyane looked like and they would not arrest the wrong man.
But Judge Strydom ruled that Makhetha spoke the truth given the fact he had laid a charge and a doctor confirmed his injuries.
In 2013, April Jao was convicted of the crime and sentenced to 12 years in jail.
zelda.venter@inl.co.za
Pretoria News
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