WINDHOEK – The three convicts who escaped early last Sunday morning and were re-arrested later that evening near Kapps Farm while on foot told Magistrate Justine Asino they intend pleading guilty.
They were each charged with one count of escaping from lawful custody in the Windhoek Magistrate Court. The suspects, Sylvester Beukes, Steven /Gaoseb and Hendrik Modise allegedly sawed through the burglar bars of their cell as well as the prison fence with an unknown object during their daring breakout. It is not known whether they had inside help as an internal investigation is still ongoing.
Deputy Commissioner Eveline January at Prisons Services confirmed an internal investigation has been launched, but at the time of going to press had no new information on the matter.
Beukes is serving a 105-year sentence for the 2005 brutal massacre at farm Kareeboomvloer in the Kalkrand district of the Hardap Region in which farm owners Rassie and Elzabe Erasmus and six other people were brutally murdered. The Erasmus couple’s son “Shorty” was at the time implicated as the brains behind the gruesome killing by Beukes, but was acquitted by Judge President Petrus Damaseb.
The other six victims were two brothers, Sonnyboy and Sethy Swartbooi, pregnant Hilma Engelbrecht and her two daughters, Christiana (6) and Regina (4), and Deon Gertze (18).
/Gaoseb is serving a 27-year prison sentence for murdering City Police officer Anton Matesu in his home in Windhoek’s Acacia residential area in January 2005.
Modise, an Okahandja resident is in prison for having raped a mentally ill girl on farm Okarusepa in the Okahandja district in July 2010.
Magistrate Asino remanded the matter until today for the convict’s plea and trial on request of State prosecutor Samantha Diergaardt.
By Roland Routh