Karabo’s killer claims innocence after guilty verdict
themselves. The accused caused the body of the deceased to burn beyond recognition and then tried to conceal the fact that she was dead and he got involved in a web of lies‚” Johnson said.
“The accused went about very meticulously covering up his deed after the deceased was killed on April 28 2017. He apparently showed no emotion throughout because if he had‚ this would have been put to the witnesses.”
The 28-year-old forex trader‚ and a married father of three who is estranged from his wife‚ was arrested almost a year ago for Mokoena’s murder.
Mokoena’s friends and family testified that her relationship with Mantsoe was toxic‚ and that Mantsoe repeatedly assaulted her to the point that she spent her last birthday in hospital.
She sent pictures of her bruised face to her friends.
Mantsoe‚ on the other hand‚ had painted Mokoena as an abusive lover‚ who was troubled by her past. He alleged she had a terrible relationship with her father and said Mokoena had been disturbed by a miscarriage she had suffered from a prior relationship and a rape ordeal. He further said she had been addicted to the high life and had frequented some of Sandton’s expensive apartments.
He submitted that he had returned home on April 28 2017 and found that Mokoena had committed suicide by stabbing herself in the neck.
Mantsoe said he feared he would be blamed for her death and thus had decided to dispose of her body by drenching it in pool acid and petrol before setting it alight in a ditch in Lyndhurst. The badly charred remains were found the next day by a passerby.
A postmortem failed to determine Mokoena’s cause of death as her vital organs had been destroyed in the blaze.
Mantsoe is to be sentenced today.