Mother’s drowning ‘an accident’

THE drowning of the mother of slain Stellenbosch University student Hannah Cornelius on Sunday was an accident.

Hannah Cornelius Foundation chief executive Lily Reed said Anna Cornelius‚ 56‚ went swimming every day at about 7am.

Anna drowned near Scarborough in Cape Town – less than a year after Hannah was raped and murdered.

“She had been quite ill. She had flu and a chest-throat infection the whole week before. I think that added to it,” Reed said.

Reed described Anna as a devoted mother and loving wife.

“Anna was an amazing human being‚ full of light and energy. She is with her daughter now and resting in peace.”

Anna was a lawyer and leaves behind her husband, magistrate Willem Cornelius, and son Dries.

Anna’s body was found off Scarborough on the Cape Peninsula.

National Sea Rescue Institute Kommetjie commander Ian Klopper said it was suspected that she had drowned.

“At 9am on Sunday‚ NSRI Kommetjie duty crew launched the sea rescue craft Spirit of the Vines following eyewitness reports of a body floating offshore of Scarborough‚” Klopper said.

“On arrival on the scene the body of an adult female was recovered by our sea rescue craft from the water 150 metres offshore of Scarborough and NSRI paramedics confirmed her to be deceased from a suspected fatal drowning accident.”

NSRI took the body to their Kommetjie sea rescue station before it was taken into the care of the Forensic Pathology Services. The police opened an inquest docket.

This comes less than a year after her daughter Hannah‚ 21‚ was raped and killed on May 27 last year.

The four men accused of attacking Hannah appeared in the Cape Town High Court on Friday for a pre-trial hearing.

Vernon Witbooi‚ Eben van Niekerk‚ Geraldo Parsons and Nashville Julius will spend another month in jail until their trial gets under way. The case was postponed to April 20‚ because the defence said it had not yet received all the state’s evidence against the men.

Hannah and her friend Cheslin Marsh were hijacked and kidnapped in the early hours of May 27.

Marsh was stabbed and hit with a brick but managed to find help after he was left for dead in Kraaifontein.

Cornelius’s head was crushed by a rock after she was stabbed several times.

The accused are thought to have attacked two other women later that morning using Cornelius’s blue Citi Golf.

Their trial is expected to take between three and six weeks.

The Hannah Cornelius Foundation aims to help underprivileged children access opportunities by offering‚ among other things‚ trauma counselling and help with unplanned pregnancies.

Anna’s funeral service will be held on April 3 in the NG Kerk Vishoek.