By Anna Shilongo
WINDHOEK
The woman who recently cheated death after her neck was nearly cut open with a knife shortly after she was allegedly brutally raped by a German national is recovering well at home after the near-death experience in a case speculated to be likened to the ‘B1’ murders.
According to the victim’s brother and friends at Otjomuise where the victim resides, she suffered a swollen face from bite marks.
Her eyes were swollen shut and she had difficulty swallowing food and bled profusely through the mouth.
Initially New Era was told she had travelled to Katima Mulilo but her elder brother says this is not the case because she is recuperating from her injuries at her other brother’s house in Otjomuise.
Yesterday though, this journalist tried to speak to the victim but her brother, who cannot be identified on ethical grounds, advised this newspaper that she was not in a condition to speak.
“I don’t think she will talk to you. She is not in a stage of speaking to any one right now because she is still traumatised,” said the brother.
According to friends and neighbours who knew the victim well, the victim had a stable boyfriend with whom she lived together for quite a while. She recently gave birth after undergoing a Caesarean. The area that was stitched was re-injured during the violent attack that took place in a secluded area near Ramatex.
According to the brother, the suspect Heinz Kinierem, 42, who last week appeared in court charged with rape and attempted murder nearly broke her neck and the victim now has a medical brace around her sore neck on top of the heavily bandaged wounds.
Asked whether his sister was a commercial sex worker, the brother said he was not aware of it because they never lived together.
“If she is a sex worker, I am not aware of it and I wouldn’t know it. She also never mentioned it to me, why don’t you ask her yourself; I think she will know better,” he said.
According to the victim’s brother, doctors have advised her not to breast-feed her recently born baby until the outcome of blood tests.
The victim’s newborn is said to be three weeks old.
Although some people in the neighbourhood said the victim and the suspect knew each other, the brother said there was no truth in that.
” They were not friends neither did they communicate before; he is just someone my sister knew by walking there, I don’t think there were any strings attached,” said the victim’s brother.
The suspect lived in the Otjomuise area before his house burned down some few months ago. He now resides in Katutura at Wanahenda.
He is married to a Damara-speaking woman and they have one child.
According to the source, the wife is unemployed.
“He is not a Namibian, he only came in the country five years ago and got married,” said a source.
The suspect is an employee of an engineering company in Northern Industria.