WINDHOEK – Defence counsel Bradley Basson who appeared on behalf of alleged child killer, Jonas Penduvanhu Shinana yesterday had the former girlfriend of Shinana in tears during cross-examination.
Rosalia Antonius who is the biological mother of the slain children, 6-year-old Matheus Shinana and 4-year-old Emilia Naatya Shinana testified in cross-examination in the ongoing murder trial. It was already ordered on request from State Advocate Palmer Khumalo that Antonius be assisted by a friend during the proceedings. He told Judge Nate Ndauendapo that Antonius is receiving counseling for the death of her children. A merciless Basson hammered Antonius on certain ‘admissions’ she made in a statement to the police in which she said Shinana allegedly threatened to kill her. According to her statement she had “repented and as such could no longer live with a man in sin,” Basson said. The statement further reads that she wanted to go and live with her sister, to which Shinana consesnted, but warned her that if he went looking for her, and did not find her, he would kill her. Basson wanted to know from the witness why she did not show the SMS that contained the threat to the police.
Basson also the witness who was the lady who fed her the goings on in court, which led her to confront him outside the court room with the words “I am the mother of those children.” Antonius denied she was being fed information from inside the court. Basson also wanted to know from the witness why she went to the north if she could have just gone to the Wanaheda Police Station to report the death threat made against her. An already tearful Antonius replied through an interpreter: “My Lord I was afraid, Jonas could have easily shot me. He can even knock off from work and come and fight with me.” She further said after every fight she and Shinana had she would pack up her belongings only for Shinana to unpack them. Coming back to her statement, Antonius refuted the contents and said she only told the police officer who took down the statement that she was going to Havana to church to pray and as the prayers would last from 8 in the evening until late it would be safer for her to stay at her sister’s house in Havana. Basson called this a blatant fabrication, the same with the so-called death threat.
He again jumped onto another issue, this time her various visits to Shinana in jail and in hospital. Antonius replied she did not go out of free will, but to “show mercy” to a person who called for assistance. While she said that she was forced to go visit Shinana by her family, who are “born again” at the same time she said that she went on the visits because Shinana called her and asked her to bring him toiletries. At one stage she visited Shinana while pregnant with another man’s child and again when she went to show him the baby, Basson accused the witness, asking why she did not leave the baby at home with her sister. Antonius replied that she could not leave the infant at home since her sister was apparently in the north and that Shinana had called her to visit him. On a question from the judge regarding the relationship between Shinana and his children Antonius replied he (Shinana) did not like the girl, Emilia as she was naughty and that he had no relationship with Matheus, who resided with his grandmother in the north. At that stage the witness started crying uncontrollably and Judge Ndauendapo postponed the matter for lunch.
Shinana is accused of slitting the throats of his two children. He also tried unsuccessfully to take his own life in a botched suicide bid, when the rope he used in the process reportedly broke.
By Roland Routh